UtSTA 2024: Out-Of-This-World Science Teaching

This presentation delves into a SEEd storyline lesson sequence where students take charge of their learning through model-based and student-designed investigations around a homemade electric speaker. Participants will make their own electric speaker to investigate and take home. Participants will also learn how to guide students across a storyline that bridges the electromagnetism and waves strands in a natural way. This will be accomplished through students developing cause-and-effect models based on the speaker phenomenon, designing and carrying out experiments, using evidence to refine models, and collaborating to build a class consensus model. All attendees will receive a detailed instructional guide to know how various ambitious science teaching strategies and science practices are sequenced for this unit.

As a first grade teacher I know it can be overwhelming to teach young children complicated Science and Engineering practices. However, with a few simple changes and techniques what once felt overwhelming can suddenly be simple and engaging for students when we connect these practices to students own schema and experiences. Using the SEPs is essential to the SEEd standards across multiple disciplinary core ideas. I am choosing to focus on how to engage students in Obtain, Evaluate, and Communicate, as this is a building block towards more advance scientific practices. I really want to help share the importance of helping students build the understanding of these processes by integrating them into many different areas. This is a concept we use in math, literature, art, etc, Its a basic principal that facilitates students scientific thinking. I will show fun props and picture cards to remind students of the steps involved in this process, and then allow participants to explore in several engaging center based activities to determine which methods, materials, or information best supports their individual learning targets in a way that is natural through play and exploration.

Center 1: student use photos feed and models of animals to obtain needed information and to evaluate which animal left marks along a trail, and then communicate that in a journal or with a partner....?

Center 2: Students use qr codes to view videos and photos of the sun, moon, and sky patterns to obtain information, evaluate the information to determine why they moon changes shape in the sky over a period of time, and be able to communicate that with a picture, model, or a written or verbal description.

Center 3: Students determine which type of material would be best to block out the light of the sun on a hot day by experimenting with different types of materials to obtain, evaluate, and communicate why some materials are better at blocking out light.....

This presentation will build quantum ideas- starting with what is a photon and how can we control what state it is in and moving on to using photons in cryptography for quantum key distribution, quantum cloning and finishing up with quantum teleportation.

Teachers will leave with a digital copy of the support materials and activities used in the training (and hopefully then used in their classes). Quantum Information is highly relevant to our future and connects as an extension on the 8th grade standard 8.2.5 - as this is essentially just a model of light waves. The content of this presentation also connects with SEEd standards phys.4.4 and phys.4.5

The presentation will include content created as part of a NSF sponsored summer research opportunity with the BYU physics department and the Quantum for All summer camp with the University of Texas at Arlington. These materials were also used at a workshop for AAPT national conference in Boston, summer 2024 and at the Utah-Idaho chapter meeting of AAPT in April 2024.