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The National Center for Earth and Space Science Education has a great motto "Inspire...then Educate." The NCESSE is a great resource for STEM teachers as it creates and oversees different initiatives, projects, and educational resources in these areas, with a focus on Earth and Space. There are a lot of different resources, from professional development, to community projects, to science news and research. There are also free Education Modules for grade K-12 that are very comprehensive and include full lesson plans, background information, activities, assessments, inquiry based hands-on activities, rubrics, handouts and more. There are 5 modules available right now and each module is broken up into three (K-4, 5-8, 9-12) or four (K-2, 3-4, 5-8, 9-12) grade levels. The modules are on topics such as the solar system, earth science, extreme environment of space, human space exploration, and the search for life in the universe. You can download any of the lessons. There is also a Lesson Layout with descriptions of each section that you can download: Lesson Layout (PDF, 490 kb

"Reading science trade books is the perfect way for students to build literacy skills while learning science content. The books that appear in these lists were selected as outstanding children's science trade books. They were chosen by a book review panel appointed by the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) and assembled in cooperation with the Children's Book Council (CBC). NSTA and CBC have joined forces on this bibliographic project since 1973, when the list was known as Outstanding Science Trade Books for Children and was primarily targeted at grades K through 8. Beginning in 2002, the list has been expanded to include high school as well. Now, we've updated the lists again, this time to include links to activities that complement each selection. And if you're looking for a list of the books, we now link directly to NSTA Recommends, where you can find a list of the last 10 year's worth of winners and generate an Excel file of your favorites. Learn more at NSTA Recommends."

Find thousands of free AP, SAT and K-12 questions from trusted sources, including Kaplan. Students--Practice questions online with immediate feedback. Educators--Create, share and modify questions on any topic with ease

"Top 10 Apps for Digital Storytelling Feb 15 Written by: 2/15/2012 8:47 PM A while back I did a post on top sites for Digital Storytelling. This has been a skill that is being taught in school districts all around the world, and is a key for developing technology literacy. With the recent wave of mobile devices and technologies, a giant step has been taken in how students develop these skills (via touch screen) in a brand new way . Toontastic - A wonderful free iPad that allows children to create animated cartoon stories. They can choose from stock characters or draw their own while animating them and recording their voice for narration. Also, Toontastic's built-in story arc takes students step-by-step on how to create a story. i Tell a Story - A excellent free iPad that works very similarly to how Garageband creates a podcast. A user uploads a photo and then can record their voice for narration while adding stock sound effects. Voice Thread App - A great free iPad/iPhone app that compliments the Voice Thread very nicely for storytelling. A user can manage their Voice Thread account as well as make digital stories by uploading photos and drawing/recording their voice. Story Patch - An iPad app ($2.99) that is ideal for digital storytelling. A person can create a story from scratch or use one of their well-designed templates to complete all the parts of a story. Sock Puppets - A free iPad/iPhone app that is a lot of fun for kids to create animated stories. This is done by selecting your sock, background, and props and then recording your voice as the socks talk. Art Maker - A wonderful free iPad app that allows children to create a digital story from scratch. A user selects their background, characters, and props and then moves them around the screen while recording. Puppet Pals - A excellent free iPad app that lets users create a

"Leaders & Laggards » A state-by-state report card reflecting the performance of the 50 states & DC on their K-12 education. See the Report Card "

"Providing a wealth of resources for K-12 science educators, Science NetLinks is your guide to meaningful standards-based Internet experiences for students."

"LearntobeHealthy.org is an online health education center that has been designed to help educators, teachers, parents, families and the community communicate physical and mental health science education concepts to students K-12 through health educational resources such as games, activities, and lesson plans. LearntobeHealthy.org's web-based kits meet many National and State Health, Science and Technology Education Standards and make health education fun."

"Reconsider the Use of the SAMR Model December 4, 2017 - Leave a comment The four-stage Substitution, Augmentation, Modification, and Redefinition (SAMR) model introduced by Rueben Puentedura back in mid-2000 has not only grown in popularity there are people building upon this its unsubstantiated foundation. The SAMR model was initially intended to help K-12 teachers move the up the ladder of technology use by using tech for the creation of new tasks, tech for a significant redesign, tech as a direct substitute with functional improvement, and tech as a direct substitute, with no functional change. SAMR not only looks like an innocuous model of using technology it also seems to appeal to the way many people tend to approach the use of technology. If we look closely at the fundamental presupposition of its use then we will see that there are serious issues in how the model can enhance learning. The first time I was introduced to the SAMR model was over a decade ago and I recall thinking that this model has a fundamental flaw that many people will tend to overlook. While using technology to simply make an activity or task more efficient or to explore ways to enhance or even redefine that activity or task may seem innocuous or even worthwhile the problem that we run into with this sort of thinking is that we are ignoring the validity of the original task that SAMR is being applied to. For example if you use SAMR to move your paper-based fill in the black worksheet to a digital model (substitution) and then add some branching questions in a google form (augmentation) and then add enabled voice responses (modification) and finally allow your class to create a video to answer the questions (redefinition) the problem is you are still asking your students to regurgitate content regardless how sophisticated the regurgitation becomes. I have also noticed in my time working with hundreds of teachers and faculty that there is a tendency for most people to NOT move beyond t

hands on inquiry based learning in science and math