NSTA Day 2

Howdy, from a very busy and jam packed day two of the NSTA science conference. After writing yesterday's blog, I ended up having dinner at nice Mexican restaurant with two other teachers from North Penn. Mr. Winkle (A fifth grade teacher from Gwyn Nor) and Mr. Berger (A physics teacher from NPHS). The restaurant where we ate is among many others in an entertainment district of San Antonio called the River Walk. After dinner, we took a stroll around other parts of the river walk and stopped to see the historic and famous Alamo which I have posted a picture of below.

During day two at the conference, I started my day off in another session sponsored by NASA which was about NASA's new web resource for teachers called wavelength. During the workshop, we got to participate in examples of hands on activities that are available thorough this new resource. The one activity that I participated in during this workshop was about water quality and we had to make qualitative observations about the various samples provided and try to determine whichever sample was pure water. I thought that a fun activity like this would be useful for me to use next year when discussing quantitative observations and it would be nice to modify it to incorporate quantitative observations as well. The one major take away from this session was the additional information about the new NASA wavelength teacher data base full of powerful lessons to teach students about science through a variety of instructional strategies.

After lunch, I attend two additional workshops that I thought were great. The first one was about using hands-on learning in the classroom and the two instructors showed various activities that they use in the science classroom. It was nice to see that they use a lot of similar strategies I use both with technology and the use of other science lab equipment to provide this type of learning environment. After participating in this session, I walked away with a few more ideas to try to incorporate into my teaching strategies as well.

The second workshop that I really enjoyed this afternoon was about the electromagnetic spectrum, a topic we will be studying before the end of the school year. During this workshop, I gained some new ideas or things to try to help me teach this topic to all of my students. One tool that they were using during this workshop was an almost ancient over-head projector, do any of you even know what those are? I am sure you do, but it probably won't be long before I have students who do not. For me, it has been years since I have used one, but it was cool to see how the instructor used it to introduce and teach about the visible spectrum. The presenters of this workshop also used emission tubes to show us how to analyze the spectrum of different gases. This was similar to an activity you will be doing later this year when we cover the same topic.

All and all, the day was filled with a lot of learning and fun activities. For now it is time for me to sign off and head out to grab a bite to eat. I hope that you all had a great end to your week now that PSSA's and the third marking period are over. Be sure to stop back tomorrow evening to see my Saturday update. Enjoy your weekend!