Coffee and curriculum

Thanks to everyone who braved the brutal cold on Tuesday morning to participate in a conversation on our science curriculum. Together with science teachers Chris Stefaniak and Jeff Kierzek, we looked at the overall structure of the Next Generation Science Standards and examined the shifts they have brought to science education generally, and to your children's classroom experiences specifically.

Included below are the high points of our discussion - minus the contributions of parents, which were these:

• Your kids love the hands-on, investigative nature of science
• Parents appreciate the new emphasis on engineering practices
• Computer coding is an essential language of the future and merits our serious exploration
• Statistics is an important mathematical skill required for deep investigations in science
• We should explore the possibility of offering an after-school science enrichment club (e.g., FIRST Lego League, Future Cities, Science Olympiad).

NEXT GENERATION SCIENCE STANDARDS

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THE FRAMEWORK

Science and engineering Practices

• Science involves formulation of a question that can be answered through investigation
• Engineering involves formulation of a problem that can be solved through design

Crosscutting Concepts

• Apply across all domains of science (e.g., cause and effect, patterns, stability and change, structure and function)
• Explicitly taught

Disciplinary Core Ideas

• Less content (the most important/enduring aspects of science such as life science or earth science)
• Studied deeply

THE SHIFTS

1. K-12 science education should reflect the interconnected nature of science as it is practiced and experienced in the real world

2. The Next Generation Science Standards are student performance expectations – NOT curriculum

3. The science concepts in the NGSS build coherently from K–12

4. The NGSS focus on deeper understanding of content as well as application of content

5. Science and engineering are integrated in the NGSS from K–12

6. The NGSS are designed to prepare students for college, career, and citizenship

7. The NGSS and Common Core State Standards (English Language Arts and Mathematics) are aligned

Look here for more information on the standards that drive our science curriculum.