My original intent was to begin preparing for the conference weeks ago. But, life has a funny way of ruining plans. Having your car die on the interstate and spending the next week trying to find another car is just one example. Does anyone actually enjoy the process of buying a car?
Anyway, I finally have some time this weekend to work on it. I’m giving an hour long presentation on why you should use blogs in science education. Here’s my rough draft outline:
Brief Introduction – 1 minute
Discuss the value of using blogs in science eduction (I’m going to assume that if they showed up to the session they are already somewhat convinced of the value of blogging so I plan on this part being fairly short); Show video of my students’ thoughts on blogging; Discuss the great opportunities that can develop due to blogging and how to make those happen – 15 minutes
Show several science teacher and student blogs; discuss different styles – 15 minutes
Hand out packet and discuss: contents include several possible student/parent contracts, grading suggestions, student post and comment writing checklist, etc. – 20 minutes
Q&A – 10 minutes
It would be nice if there was a way to have at least a general sense of my audience prior to giving my presentation. Will the audience be absolute beginners or have some blogging knowledge? I’m hoping it will be a mixed audience. To break up the monotony of just having me talk, it would be great to have others in the crowd who can bring ideas to the discussion.
How does this sound? Suggestions? If no one comments and leaves any suggestions I’m going to assume it’s perfect.
Instead of using the “cookbook” method for this 9th grade general biology enzymes lab, I tried to make it more inquiry-based. While it still isn’t true inquiry because I gave the students the questions to answer, it was a lot more fun than the cookbook way. Pictures and a video of the lab plus one student’s results from the first experiment are available here.
I like doing the lab this way because it also helps the students practice designing experiments. Ideally, they should be designing every experiment they perform.
A lot of the students immediately believe that substance X will be more effective than water alone, but most incorrectly believe that substance X will work even better when boiled or with a lower pH. This leads us into a really nice discussion of what enzymes are and what happens when they become denatured.
My student (Yahoo web hosted) website is down for the first time in 3 years. Of course, this would happen the day I told the Head of School to check out the website. He said he’d look at it this evening. Figures. Tried to call customer service, but there’s an hour wait time.
Do…not…panic. I check it about every 1.2 minutes to see if it’s working. No, I’m not panicking. Ironic that earlier today I wondered what would happen if my blog just disappeared and the 3 years of work I spent building it up was gone. The amount of anxiety I felt with that thought makes me wonder if I have a problem.
Nope, still not working.
This got me thinking. What are some reasons I’d stop blogging?
Death
Sent to prison
Well, after about 5 minutes of thinking that’s all I could come up with. While #1 is certainly out of my control, I’m definitely sure #2 is not going to happen.
I guess now would be a good time to share my new favorite thing to do when I’m bored: explore Vimeo. Right now there’s a great competition called Climate Matters. Here’s one of my favorite entries, a very child-like view of global warming:
I wouldn’t usually post a private email, but I’m sure Mr. Updyke wants me to publish this information. It doesn’t belong on my student-run blog, but I can post it here.
Your Name: Brian Updyke
Your Email Address: brian.updyke@gmail.com
Subject: New FOX TV Show Looking for Teachers!
Message: Hey there!
The Osbournes are coming back to TV with a brand-new comedy/variety show for FOX and we’re currently looking for real-life teachers to have as guests! One of the segments we want to do for the show involves allowing teachers to get “revenge” (in a funny way!) on a student that was a terror. The show is totally fun and upbeat, not at all mean-spirited and humiliating! Ideally, we’d want a student who gave his teachers trouble in elementary or high school and is now grown-up. Think along the lines of a student who used to shoot spitballs all the time; on our show, we’d have the teachers as surprise guests and maybe have them knock him with a giant spitball.
In doing research, your teacher site came up as one of the most popular out there and, obviously, would be a huge resource for us in getting the word out to teachers about this show. Obviously, this wouldn’t be for everyone but if there are teachers out there who are fun-loving and would just love to go on TV to get back at (in a fun way!) some of their past students who gave them a hard time, I’d love to speak with them!
No matter how big or small, we’re looking for all stories. Obviously, if you have any more questions about the show or how this will work, please let me know!
Look forward to hearing from you!
Brian Updyke
Segment Producer
Osbournes Variety Show
I promised last year to continue listing case studies I’ve successfully used in my 9th grade biology or AP biology classes. Listed below are a few more. For my previous list go here. The comments to that original post also contain some additional cases.
All of these case studies can be found in a list with teacher guides here.
Rising Temperatures, Different Viewpoints - short and very sweet. Teaches students the importance of critically evaluating the news and more importantly, how to do it.
I’ll be presenting at the NSTA regional conference in Portland at 9:30-10:30am on Friday, November 21. My topic is Using Blogs to Promote Science Literacy and it coincides nicely with the conference strand,”Integrated Literacy: Connecting Reading, Writing, and Science”.
Even more exciting, I’m taking eight students to the Science Online ‘09 conference at the Sigma Xi Center, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina! We’ll be talking about our experiences and ideas at the discussion “How the Facebook Generation Does It”. So many of my students want to go and I have the very difficult task of trying to determine who I should take.
It sounds like an infomercial, doesn’t it?I lost 15 pounds in 6 days and you can, too!Although it may be hard to believe, I really did grade that many essays in less than one week. I’m finishing up my stay here in Kansas City. I, along with over 500 of my peers, spent 6 days grading the AP Biology exam essays. This is Sparta! It was a rewarding experience and I recommend that all AP teachers experience it at least once. I’m not sure of the rules ETS has about releasing information on how the exam grading works so to err on the side of caution I won’t blog about it. This is Madness! But, if you’re an AP teacher and you want to ask me about my experience, contact me and I’ll give you some of the inside scoop.
Why don’t we have a pep rally for academics? Photo source
A couple of months ago I had to sit through a hour-long meeting where the importance of athletics was emphasized as a powerful way to build connections with kids and their families. Well, duh.
I love sports, but that hour long meeting left me shaking my head. Do we really need to convince people that sports are a great way to attract kids? Sports are easy. Now, by this I don’t necessarily mean the playing of sports. Building a championship team takes a lot of blood, sweat, and tears (literally). What I mean is that building enthusiasm for sports is easy.
Now, try doing the same thing in academics. This is hard. It’s also overlooked and unappreciated when it actually happens. After that meeting I mentioned to a colleague that I thought my blog was building connections with all of the 9th graders. I mentioned that those connections could lead to students caring about each other more and help build a community among them. She looked at me like I had grown two heads. As if something like academics could do such a thing. Well, I dedicate this student remark recently left on my class blog to her and everyone else out there who doubts such a thing could happen:
I love how the blog has connected us so much more to each other.
So I’ve written and submitted this blog post directly in Facebook using a new application called Blog It by Six Apart. With this application a person on Facebook can write a post and publish it on all of their blogs at the same time. I find the usability of this tool somewhat confusing, though. Why would I want to write the same thing on two (or more) different blogs? If I have multiple blogs it must be because they serve separate functions. For example, I have two blogs: one for my students and this one for me. I’m not going to post this blog to my student blog because it wouldn’t have any value to them. Who has several blogs with the same function? And what’s the point? Can someone enlighten me?
The advantage I see in this application is that all of my Facebook “friends” get a news feed telling them that I have updated my blog. Most of my friends don’t use blog readers, but they check their Facebook pages religiously. However, the downside to this is that I have purposely not become “friends” with my students (see below) and so they cannot receive one of my Blog It Facebook feeds. This is still a useful function for this particular blog, however, as I am willing to be friends with educators.
By the way, my whole entry into the Facebook world was done quite reluctantly. After much begging by my friends I finally relented and opened up a Facebook account. I was a bit nervous because I wasn’t sure how protected I would be from students viewing my profile page. To be honest, I was also worried I would see their profile pages! But, thankfully I soon discovered that unless I agree to be their “friend”, a student cannot access my information and vice versa.
So I started a group page for my students who went on a trip to Alaska with me last summer and I joined my current AP Biology students’ group. But, the question I am pondering at the moment is whether or not Facebook is a positive tool to use in the classroom. If so, what is the appropriate way to use this tool?
I’ve been successfully using the case studies found on the National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science website. I’ve used them with my AP Biology students. While some of them have been a lot of fun, others were a bit too advanced for even an AP level course.
Here are my teacher-tested, favorite cases:
My Dog is Broken - cell signaling pathways. The dog has erectile dysfunction so the students thought it was pretty hilarious.
Why Sex is Good - advantages of sexual reproduction. For obvious reasons the students loved this one.
A Bad Reaction – immune system. The students felt like doctors straight out of House or ER (okay, maybe more like Scrubs).
I loved the immune system case study so much that I created this powerpoint in order to present the case. You can also download the pre-case study notes I use here.
There are still several I plan on using this year, but since I haven’t tested them out yet, I’ll wait to see if I should recommend them. If anyone reading this post has tried out other cases studies either found on the same website or elsewhere, I’d love to hear about your experience!
Hello! My name is Stacy Baker. I’m an upper (high) school biology teacher at a school in the northeast United States. I started blogging for my students in 2006. During the first year I only used the blog to post class information. In 2007 I decided to turn the blog over to my students and have been thrilled at the results. It has greatly increased student involvement and science literacy in my classroom. I use this educators-only blog to talk with other science educators who use blogs in their classrooms or who are interested in doing so.
You can contact me at extremebiology@gmail.com
