Posted on October 16th, 2011 by Mary Lord
Truancy and absences can erode student learning. But bathroom breaks? Borrowing a page from “Urinetown,” that saucy staple of high school musical comedy, Evergreen Park High School in Illinois has instituted a new policy limiting students to three bathroom passes per semester in an effort to curb excessive trips that take away from valuable class time.
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Filed under: K-12 Education News | Comments Off on Illinois School Curbs Potty Breaks
Tags: bathroom breaks, Evergreen Park High School, school policy
Posted on October 16th, 2011 by Mary Lord
In this activity, students in grades 5 – 11 will use M&Ms to learn about radioactivity, the rate at which an isotope decays, and the concept of half-life. They will count and record the number of decayed “atoms” and graph the results.
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Filed under: Class Activities, Grades 6-8, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Grades 9-12, Lesson Plans | Comments Off on Activity: Atomic Candy
Tags: Energy, half life, M&Ms, nuclear energy, Nuclear Engineering, radioactive decay, radioactivity
Posted on October 15th, 2011 by Mary Lord
A Georgia state commission voted to revoke the licenses of eight Atlanta Public Schools teachers and three administrators, imposing the first sanctions in one of the nation’s largest test cheating scandals. The decision stems from a state investigation, released in July, that revealed high numbers of wrong-to-right erasures in nearly half of the district’s 100 schools dating as far back as 2001.
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Filed under: K-12 Education News | Comments Off on Atlanta Educators Fired for Cheating
Tags: accountability, Atlanta Public Schools, cheating, erasures, investigation, Public Policy, Testing
Posted on October 13th, 2011 by Jaimie Schock
The NASA Endeavor Science Teaching Certificate Project awards one-year fellowships each year to over 40 current and prospective teachers. Endeavor Fellows receive award-winning STEM Professional Development, taking graduate courses in an innovative, LIVE (online) format from the comfort of their home or school.
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Filed under: For Teachers, K-12 Outreach Programs | Comments Off on Fellowship: NASA Endeavor Project
Tags: NASA, Programs for Teachers, Scholarships and Fellowships, Teacher Training
Posted on October 9th, 2011 by Mary Lord
The National Research Council’s framework for common state science standards, released in July, won perfect marks for “content and rigor” in a new report by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. However, the Washington, D.C.-based think tank bestowed a B+ on the “impressive document” because its strong content is “immersed in much else that could distract, confuse, and disrupt” the priorities of a high quality STEM education for all children.
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Filed under: K-12 Education News | Comments Off on New Science Standards Get B+
Tags: Achieve, Education Policy, National Research Council, Next Generation Science Standards, STEM education, Thomas B. Fordham Institute
Posted on October 9th, 2011 by Mary Lord
Recent headlines about tainted cantaloupe are grim reminders that food is not always as safe as it looks or tastes. Despite a host of high-tech efforts, E. coli and other food-borne illnesses kill thousands of Americans each year. Now, researchers in the emerging field of food-safety engineering are developing ways to protect what we eat, from farm to table. Call it the Food Safety-Engineering Network.
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Filed under: Special Features | Comments Off on Feature: Food-Safety Engineering
Tags: Agricultural Engineering, Food Industry, food processing, Food safety, food-safety engineering, research labs
Posted on October 9th, 2011 by Mary Lord
Move aside, cute kitties and other viral video hits. A new NASA contest could turn science into the next YouTube sensation. Space Lab, the competition announced by YouTube and computer manufacturer Lenovo on Monday, offers students the chance to make video pitches for experiments to perform in the International Space Station’s zero-gravity environment.
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Filed under: K-12 Education News | Comments Off on YouTube Launches Space Contest
Tags: Aerospace, Competitions for Students, International Space Station, Lenovo, NASA, space experiments, SpaceLab Challenge, YouTube, zero gravity
Posted on October 9th, 2011 by Mary Lord
In this hands-on activity designed to teach chemical-engineering principles to freshman engineering students at Rowan University, teams of high school students will melt chocolate and coat commercially available cookies, then perform several measurements and calculations. They then will write a lab report that includes nutritional labeling and recommendations for improving the chocolate-coating process.
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Filed under: Grades 9-12, Lesson Plans | Comments Off on Lesson: Guilt-Free Chocolate
Tags: Chemical Engineering, Class Activities, Food Industry, Grades 9-12, Lesson Plan, Project ENGAGE
Posted on October 6th, 2011 by Jaimie Schock
The Office of Naval Research provides several different outreach programs for students at different grade levels. The programs, which include competitions and afterschool engagement, range in size and mission.
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Filed under: For Teachers, Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Grades K-5, K-12 Outreach Programs, Web Resources | Comments Off on Resources: Programs from the Navy
Tags: After School, American Society for Engineering Education, Building robots, Competition, Competitions for Students, Museums, Office of Naval Research (ONR), Outreach, Outreach for Schools, Resources for Teachers, Robotics Competitions, Summer Camps & Programs (Students), U.S. Navy, Underwater Robot, Web Resources