Weeks 6,7,8

If you have been following along with this blog, a few things have changed over the past several weeks (especially Week 5). Although we originally planned to teach some density lessons when introducing this unit, I have taken them out to save time and since they are not found in the standards. We did, however, include lessons on the periodic table because many of us find it difficult to teach atoms and elements without first looking at the periodic table. At Utt middle school, students were most interested in learning about the periodic table on a survey. We do not need to go in deep, just surface level organization and characteristics of the elements.

I was working with two teachers at Currie Middle School to track their pacing through the curriculum, but both have been adding their own teaching styles into the mix so that it is hard for others to follow. Of course, it is OK to find your own style within the curriculum.  Just be careful to not take too long on old practices that could probably be taken out as we shift to the NGSS. We are finding big differences in pacing among teachers and we are currently looking into why this might be the case in PLCs.  An emphasis on hands-on labs with formal lab write ups is definitely taking up a lot of  instructional minutes in science classrooms at Currie as well as having students complete journal entries. These are still valid practices in teaching science, but as we shift to NGSS make sure you are asking yourself:

• Is there a clear learning goal of this learning activity?
• Does it meet at least two of the three dimensions of NGSS?
• Is it helping support students to meet the NGSS standards we are working on?
• Are students receiving feedback to help grow their science skills?

If you are finding it hard to answer yes to the questions above, it is probably a practice that it is time to get rid of.  Our curriculum is taking very long to get through and it will be tough to teach all of the standards in one year. Taking the time to really reflect on the value of our practices will help gain instructional minutes back in our classrooms.

As we move forward from this point, I will be looking at the weekly agendas of several 7th grade teachers as they work their way through our curriculum to try and piece together a weekly agenda.  I may need to adjust the pacing a bit, but here are the next several weeks that will include NGSS assessment 1.1  on atomic structure and begin to introduce 1.2 on states of matter.

The modeling for 1.2  can be done in a variety of ways. Here is an example of how some students are attempting to explain their understanding in Jana's class.

Week 6 Agenda

Week 7 Agenda

Week 8 Agenda

Week 5 Agenda

For those of you who may have been following along, you will  notice that this agenda has been edited to remove the lessons pertaining to density. Several of us have decided that we feel it necessary to introduce the periodic table in order to move into the first assessment on molecular modeling. However, we do not feel it is necessary to explicitly teach density since this is not one of our standards in middles school. This concept will be easily covered in high school.

In week 5, students use the IOS app Elements 4D to test predictions on the reactivity between elements. We will come back to this app in unit 2 when we begin chemical reactions.

Below is a video that shows how Soo Lee uses Elements 4D in her classroom.

Week 5 Agenda

Week 4 Agenda

In order to look ahead, I wanted to post a tentative agenda for week 4. We will be introducing the concept of density and how to use this physical characteristic of pure elements to determine unknown substances.

Click Here for Week 4 Agenda

Week 3 Agenda

Angelica and I met at the start of this week to discuss our next steps moving forward transitioning from ecosystems into atoms and molecules. One way to do this is to bring back the organization of life that students learn about in 6th grade. In 6th grade, they mostly focus on the levels of cells to organisms. Now, we go down to the levels of atoms and up to the level of ecosystems or even biosphere.

We also felt that it is important to teach some of the periodic table, although we are not asked to do this in the NGSS. Two teachers at Utt Middle School, Melanie Formaneck and Claire Mathews with the support of digital learning coach Michelle Ciecek, created an interactive periodic table with articles at the top of each row to help students find the patterns and trends among the elements. You will find this in the agenda below.

Click Here for Week 3 Agenda

Week 1 & 2 Agendas

We have had a change of plans as we begin the 7th grade NGSS blog for TUSD. I will now be meeting with Angelica Jimenez on Monday afternoons to create the agenda for the week. She began implementing Unit 1 last week on Wednesday, so the agendas below reflect that change.

As the week progresses, Angelica or I might edit the agenda as timing or activities need to be adjusted. We will reflect on this at the end of the week, but know that it might work best if you are a week or two behind us so that we are not changing the agenda while you are following along.

Thank you, Angelica, for opening your classroom doors for all of us and helping us document the pacing of our lessons through the unit!

Click Here for Week 1 Agenda

Click Here for Week 2 Agenda 

Coming Soon.....

We will post our first weekly agenda for Week 1 the week of October 17th and will begin implementing soon after.

We intend to post a weekly agenda and weekly reflections as we blog our way through the NGSS.

Stay tuned!

Background on Unit 1

Throughout the year, I will be working closely with my current TUSD Connect fellow, Jana, and her teaching partner and one of the TUSD Robotics coaches, Angelica, to help determine weekly agendas that will connect each unit's overarching concept into a variety of lessons using new instructional models to try and meet the requirements of the NGSS. Both Jana and Angelica were on the curriculum design team that met for a week in August to begin designing the day to day lessons in Unit 1. Together, we will reflect on the implementation of these lessons to hopefully help others in their transition to the NGSS.

In Unit 1, we will be focusing our lessons around the overarching concept  that "Living and nonliving things are made of atoms."

We begin the unit by looking at the big picture of ecosystem dynamics in Earth's web of life. We will build on the 6th grade curriculum, going deeper into the atomic level of living systems with the organization of life. This shift will begin our study of chemistry, learning about the structure and function of atoms and molecules that make up living and nonliving matter (MS-PS1-1). We will also discover how the physical and chemical properties of the elements could help us identify a mystery metal, like the coins found by a California couple known as the Saddle Ridge Hoard.

We will then transition into molecular motion and states of matter where students will model how thermal energy is added or subtracted within systems in order for states of matter to change. We will investigate states of matter further and the law of thermodynamics with several hands-on labs (MS-PS1-4).

We will end this unit with a look at the distribution of natural resources and the state in which they exists around the globe. We will conclude with student presentations on how the amount of or lack of a particular natural resource affects the ecosystem in given areas around the world (MS-ESS3-1, MS-LS2-1).

Throughout this unit and the entire year, our focus is to try and create a student-centered culture in our classrooms that promotes student inquiry and requires students to formulate their own understandings rather than simply providing the information they need to know. We will also be focused on meeting the district's TUSD Connect Vision which is:

We will continue to focus on including and increasing the rigor of scientific literacy in our curriculum to meet individual school site writing goals and the goals of CCSS and the NGSS.

I want to mention how appreciative I am to Jana and Angelica for taking this huge risk of opening their classroom doors and sharing their reflections with the rest of us who are following along. Thank You!

Here We Go!

The time has come and we are all about to begin implementing the NGSS in middle school classrooms in TUSD! Our transition units are coming to a close and many of us are not sure exactly where to start. This blog is dedicated to  those of you who would like someone to follow.

As a part of the TUSD Connect Fellowship, I will be coaching teachers through our first year of transition to the NGSS. We will posting together on this site and providing a sample weekly agenda. Do not feel you need to follow us the way we are implementing the lessons, go ahead and make it your own. Hopefully, our reflections on the curriculum will help you learn from the risks we are taking as we dive into this great big ocean of the unknown.