Designed by award-winning science educator, author, and Michigan Teacher of the Year Gary Abud, Jr. in partnership with PBS, this session will focus on instructional strategies, high impact core teaching practices, and amazing learning resources about the Great Lakes from Detroit Public Television's award-winning show Great Lakes Now. In this session, you'll learn how to help your students explore the Great Lakes like never before and engage in productive discussions, engineering challenges, and intriguing investigations that they'll never forget. From fatbergs to watersheds to invasive species, biodiversity, climate change, and much more, you'll see how the Great Lakes makes for a GREAT way to teach myriad science concepts and engage students in the science and engineering practices of the NGSS no matter where they are learning, because the blended learning activities can go with you anywhere!

TAKEAWAYS:
Learn how to explore the Great Lakes with your students while incorporating multimedia, cognitive science, and student discourse.

SPEAKERS:
SANDRA SVOBODA (Program Director, Great Lakes Now: , MI), Gary Abud Jr (Nourish the Future - Education Projects, LLC: Columbus, OH)

Soils are vital to sustaining life. What makes this natural resource so special? Join us for an active session that digs into numerous soil science concepts and vetted teaching resources connected to the geosciences, biology, chemistry, and physics.

TAKEAWAYS:
Soils are the foundation upon which life exists on Earth. The life that teems below ground supports the life above ground. Understanding the ecosystem services provided by soils requires cross-disciplinary thinking and reveals how vital soils are to our existence.

SPEAKERS:
Margaret Holzer (Retired: Chatham, LA)

Explore how to use the air sensors to demonstrate the dangers of vaping to students. Participants will see how to measure air quality around the mist expelled out of vapers in a closed system testing system, made from simple materials, in which non-nicotine vape juice is expelled.

TAKEAWAYS:
Air quality, measured in several areas such as particulate matter and AQI, can be used to show that the ingredients in vaping reduce air quality for not only the vaper, but people around them. Students will also learn how to read and analyze graphical data.

SPEAKERS:
Courtney Behrle (BioNetwork: Greenville, NC)

Play a new free online science game - Wake: Tales from the Aqualab. Take on ocean-based ecosystem missions, and engage in experimentation, modeling, and argumentation around middle school life sciences content. Use a submarine to explore a kelp forest! Travel to the arctic to find a missing whale!

TAKEAWAYS:
Learn ways to implement Wake in your classroom - including associated curriculum and supplemental materials. The full game can cover 10+ classes, with over 35 jobs of increasing complexity, and a fun story. Learn about our research on game-based supports for student learning of science practices.

SPEAKERS:
Jennifer Scianna (University of Wisconsin Madison)

Compare surface temperature data collected by students between urban & rural areas studying the phenomenon of urban heat islands. Get involved in the summer in a Google classroom and receive equipment.

TAKEAWAYS:
The importance of collecting surface temperature data to study “heat islands” within communities and ways to interpret the ground-truthing & satellite data.

SPEAKERS:
Sara Mierzwiak (The University of Toledo: Toledo, OH), Kevin Czajkowski (The University of Toledo: Toledo, OH), Jessica Taylor (NASA Langley Research Center: Hampton, VA), Janet Struble (: Toledo, OH)

Join the author of the Once Upon A Science Book series to try out a hands-on lesson on ocean garbage patches and the Coriolis Effect. You'll also learn strategies that will help you build literacy while teaching any science topic.

TAKEAWAYS:
Attendees will be introduced to the literacy learning cycle format, in which hands-on work precedes meaningful reading and writing activities. You will see how this system works by participating in a lesson and come away with practical strategies for your classroom.

SPEAKERS:
Jodi Wheeler-Toppen (Author/ Staff Development: Atlanta, GA)

Learn about Educating for Environmental Change, a free Indiana University program that helps educators teach the science and policy of climate change and participate in an exemplar ice core activity.

TAKEAWAYS:
Science teachers have stated that standards like the NGSS are a principal reason for teaching climate change in their classroom. This workshop will engage participating teachers in hands-on, exemplar climate change activities that align with the NGSS and emphasize science practices.

SPEAKERS:
Adam Scribner (Indiana University Bloomington: Bloomington, IN)

Explore how excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere makes water more acidic through hands-on activities from the free 5E lesson plans in middleschoolchemistry.com.

TAKEAWAYS:
Teachers practice using grade-appropriate explanations of the interactions of atoms and molecules to help students better understand the causes of the phenomena they observe and its connection to the problem of ocean acidification.

SPEAKERS:
James Kessler (American Chemical Society: Washington, DC)

Participants will learn strategies for implementing Meaningful Watershed Education Experiences in their classrooms. Strategies include how to build relationships with community partners, finding local spaces to use to conduct investigations, and how to engage students in field-based investigations.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will have a “front row seat” and get hands-on experience with the resources needed to implement a Meaningful Watershed Educational Experience. Participants will walk away with specific strategies for building partnerships and gaining resources to support their instruction.

SPEAKERS:
Alexis Tharpe (ODU Research Foundation TCEP: Norfolk, VA 23508, VA), Venicia Ferrell (Research Assistant Professor: Norfolk, VA)

Will I ever use this outside of the classroom? When students engage in integrated real-world math activities, they make deeper connections, gain a stronger understanding of academic concepts, and see the concepts as a whole. Teachers in grade bands will collaborate on an integrated garden activity.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will be provided with lesson plans, student work, and anecdotes to initiate discussions about what this activity could look like in their classrooms. At the end of the session, participants will see how integrated math learning projects, like the one described here, connect students.

SPEAKERS:
Sandra Miles (Graduate Student: Logan, UT), Michelle Parslow (Student)

This interactive session will explore scaffolded, NGSS aligned, three-dimensional Earth science resources for all students including multilingual learners. The My NASA Data Literacy Cubes support data literacy using authentic data from scientific research.

TAKEAWAYS:
Implementation strategies for a flexible resource which can be used with multiple Earth System Science DCIs, support numerous science and engineering practices related to questions, evidence, models and data, and CCCs for patterns, scale, proportion and quantity, and stability and change.

SPEAKERS:
Desiray Wilson (Science Systems and Applications, Inc.: Hampton, VA), Natalie Macke (Pascack Hills High School: Montvale, NJ), Angela Rizzi (NASA Langley Research Center/ADNET: No City, No State)

Engage multilingual learners with human ecology activities scaffolded for different levels of English proficiency. Participate in hands-on lessons (simulations and group problem solving) that promote 3D learning while building language skills.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will learn strategies to adapt science activities for the middle school classroom to be more inclusive for English language learners. Shared activities explore “Human Impacts on Earth’s Systems” and “Natural Resources” (ESS3).

SPEAKERS:
Abby Watkins (Population Connection: Washington, DC)

Join the Wade Institute and their partners to explore STEM Challenges developed for MA STEM Week. Participate in inquiry-based investigations using the engineering design process. Receive the curriculum packets. Challenges include: Extreme Zoo Makeover, Survivor Island and Storm City USA.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will experience using the Engineering Design Process and inquiry investigations to develop engineering challenges for their students and receive curriculum packets for 3 Challenges developed for Massachusetts' STEM week.

SPEAKERS:
Rachel Stronach (Lloyd Center for the Environment: Dartmouth, MA), Kathryn Atkins (Wade Institute for Science Education: Quincy, MA), Sandra Ryack-Bell (Wade Institute for Science Education: Quincy, MA)

Projections are that by 2050, there may be more plastic in our oceans than fish, leading to calls for a worldwide treaty restricting plastics. In this session, participants will explore new remote-sensing capabilities for monitoring microplastics from space and relevant STE[A]M+G educator resources.

TAKEAWAYS:
To offer participants resources and strategies for developing a STE[A]M+G Earth science unit that integrates problem-based learning (PBL), hands-on NASA student design challenges and cross-curricular material.

SPEAKERS:
Anne Weiss (Educator Professional Development Specialist)

Through the Gulf of Maine Research Institute’s community science program, students go into the field to collect and contribute data to ongoing research on climate-related ecosystem change, building a foundation for understanding of variability. Come experience this data literacy strategy in action.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. A strategy that leverages student experiences collecting community science data to build confidence in working with and interpreting larger community science datasets. 2. Familiarity and confidence using CODAP, free educational software designed to support data learning.

SPEAKERS:
Molly Auclair (Gulf of Maine Research Institute: Portland, ME), Robin Lea (Gulf of Maine Research Institute: No City, No State)

You are using models in your science classroom, but are your students MODELING to make sense of systems and phenomena? Come to this hands-on session to learn more about modeling as a sensemaking practice and how to integrate meaningful modeling experiences into your science classroom!

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will come away from this session with a deeper understanding of modeling as a sensemaking practice, having engaged with multiple models and with ideas about how to integrate more modeling in their own classrooms, support discourse, and formatively assess students’ modeling practice.

SPEAKERS:
Lauren Saenz (Researcher: , ME), Alison Miller (Bowdoin College: Brunswick, ME)

Oil spills, climate change and other environmental disasters significantly impact our ecosystems. How can visual data from these events be quantified to make informed, scientific conclusions? Come experience how deep-sea photos help scientists analyze ecological effects of these disasters.

TAKEAWAYS:
Attendees will learn how they can incorporate the STEM-integrated module Under the Sea: A Deep-Sea Ecosystem Challenge, into their science classroom to promote visual literacy within the context of ecology and the interdependence of living things. Attendees will receive access to the curriculum.

SPEAKERS:
Sabrina Grossman (CEISMC, Georgia Institute of Technology: Atlanta, GA), Jayma Koval (CEISMC/ Georgia Institute of Technology: Atlanta, GA)

Moths play key roles in food webs, as pests, and as nocturnal pollinators. The MothEd Project invites students and teachers to investigate moths in local places by building blacklight traps, developing hypotheses, collecting and analyzing moth data in collaboration with others using a web platform.

TAKEAWAYS:
Teachers will prepare to engage students in science investigations of moth ecology by building blacklight traps, developing research questions/hypotheses, collecting/analyzing data from local habitats, and using technology-enhanced curricular materials to foster collaboration & agency among students

SPEAKERS:
Peter White (Associate Professor: No City, No State), Brian Keas (Research Associate)

New science curricula use effective pedagogy to provide young people opportunities to explore the prevalence and impacts of plastics, learn about emerging work on sustainable bioplastics, and plan authentic projects to help mitigate environmental impacts in their communities.

TAKEAWAYS:
How to use this new peer-reviewed curriculum to engage youth in environmental science and civic engagement.

SPEAKERS:
Martin Smith (University of California, Davis: Davis, CA)

Learn about Conserve It or List It, an exciting series of inquiry investigations driven by student questions that you can use to teach environmental and life science. You will participate in one of the investigations, receive the project guidelines, and get strategies for classroom implementation.

TAKEAWAYS:
Conserve It or List It is an exciting way to engage students in environmental and life science through inquiry-based lessons driven by phenomena and student questions, with the goal of helping students invest in science and bringing the outdoors into classroom instruction.

SPEAKERS:
Allison Pagliaro (Wade Institute for Science Education: Quincy, MA), Sandra Ryack-Bell (Wade Institute for Science Education: Quincy, MA), Rachel Stronach (Lloyd Center for the Environment: Dartmouth, MA)

What does scientific observation look like? How do students get there? Through GMRI’s Nature Note framework, students connect what they see with what they know to become curious observers. Join us to explore how this model can be adapted to support scientific observation in your classroom.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will come away with strategies, writing frames, student work samples, rubrics, and ideas to help students make connections between background knowledge and their local environmental and ecological observations.

SPEAKERS:
Catherine Bursk (Science Instruction Specialist: , ME)

A skyrocketing global population is making us rethink how we feed people. Traditional protein sources are unequally distributed and can have devastating effects. We will be investigating how insects could help us feed the world in a more equitable and sustainable way. Bring your appetite!

TAKEAWAYS:
Attendees will learn how traditional ways of farming protein (poultry and cattle) negatively affect the ecological communities and explore how insects could help rectify this problem.

SPEAKERS:
Courtney Ologbosele (Teacher), Curtis Martin (Teacher)

People learn better when they are having fun. This session will use Project WET’s guide—Climate, Water and Resilience—to effectively teach about local and global climate change using fun, hands-on, interactive lessons for middle and high school educators.

TAKEAWAYS:
Educators will feel more comfortable teaching about climate change using fun, hands-on activities such as the ones demonstrated in this session.

SPEAKERS:
Julia Beck (Project Wet Foundation: Bozeman, MT)