Cool Tools: Free Posters!

Hi everyone, Nancy here.

We here in the SERC are always looking for ways to save educators and families money on resources so we have a hot tip for you:

Our friends at Year of Science and Cal Berkley have put together this great resource for science educators that we wanted to pass on to you.

Here is a link to an electronic version of the "Understanding Science" poster that they developed. You can print this out in color to give to your students or have a local copy shop enlarge the file poster-size and laminate to post in your classroom.

Speaking of posters, did you know the SERC has a closet full of posters that you can use in your classroom? Many of you know we have books, artifacts and equipment you can sign out like a library book to help support your science explorations, but we also have posters about mammals, reptiles, astronomy, ecology and several other topics that you can sign out as well. It is a favorite resource of many of our Duke University Student U and their Elementary Pre-service program students to use during their field experience in Durham Public Schools.

One of our members organized a "Bug Week" in her neighborhood for all the neighborhood kids for Summer enrichment and our collection of bee posters were a huge hit!

Drop us a line and let us know how we can provide materials support or if you know of a cool resource to share, pass it along!

Stay tuned and stay curious,
-Nancy

Citizen Science: 2009 Year of Science (YoS)

YAY! YoS, finally a whole year dedicated to learning, teaching, communicating and discovering more about science!  I am very excited about 2009:)

To many teachers and parents science can be a little bit over whelming and understandably so...but if you break it down to the fundamentals, it is pretty easy to develop a child's curiosity and desire to investigate and learn more about science.  

The scienctists behind YoS have set out to make science easy and fun to communicate to one another. They have broken science down into 12 topics, one per month, then into grade groups, giving examples of activites, images, teacher resources and assesment tools...these folks have really covered their bases!  

January's topic is : Process and Nature of Science; Communicating Science.  The title sounds a bit long and once again over whelming....but use this flow chart to help you discuss science with your kids.  Start by asking them what they want to learn about (science related), read them stories about that topic and about the scientists involved.  Ask them questions to get their wheels spining, try to re-create the experiment or do an activity that goes along with their topic.  

You can rent a Science in a Suitcase kit that includes activities and materials already prepped and gathered, our Schoolyard Science kit  would be GREAT for understanding the nature of science & communicating science!!  If you would like to set up an appointment to come in and see the resource center, email me at kristenw@ncmls.org.  

I will be back to talk about Febuary's topic:  Evolution.  If you have any Evolution activities that you would like to share, please do so!