Spark Imagination, Inspire Self-Expression, Encourage Inquiry & More

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Take STEM to New Heights by Volunteering

Volunteers for eCYBERMISSION, a web-based STEM competition free to students, help to create experiences for sixth through ninth graders nationwide. Volunteers are vital to the success of the eCYBERMISSION program; the competing teams depend on the valuable resources provided by volunteers to help in the STEM learning process. If you are looking for a fun and meaningful way to give back to the STEM community, a project for your workplace to get behind, or a way to get introduced to the eCYBERMISSION competitions, then check out the options on the program’s website.

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Explore Antiquity's Legacy in Contemporary Life

AntiquityNOW (AN) and Archaeological Legacy Institute (ALI) have called for entries for the 2016 LegacyQuest International Children’s Film and Video Festival. Held in conjunction with The Archaeology Channel (TAC) International Film and Video Festival (May 11–15, 2016, in Eugene, Oregon), the LegacyQuest festival invites students to explore how the ancient past influences their lives today through visual storytelling. The competition is open to students between the ages of 12 and 15 in the United States and abroad. Films must be five minutes in length, produced in 2015 or 2016, and focus on subject matter related to antiquity’s legacy in contemporary life. For example, how does today’s green technology have roots in ancient people’s use of thermal energy and wind power to heat their homes and pump their water? Creative and varied perspectives of historical and modern connections can be captured in a range of video forms, including documentary, narrative, and journalistic, as well as interpretive styles using music or art. The video entries may be submitted by an individual student, group, or class under the guidance of a teacher.

Deadlines: Letters of Intent (in English) with a description of the video or film due December 11, 2015; final submissions due February 26, 2016

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Share Creative Approaches to Learning

Next Vista works to help students and teachers share creative approaches to learning, and as part of that effort, Next Vista invites educators and students to take part in the Creative Storm educational video contest. To enter, simply put a little creativity into a video teaching any concept one might encounter in elementary, middle, or high school, and keep it to 90 seconds or less. The video can be about sculpture, negative numbers, supply and demand, alternative energy, adverbs, or anything else for which you have a clever insight. Creative Storm is really a set of three contests: one for students, one for teachers, and one for collaborations between the two (specifically, the planning and/or editing is done by a team of at least one teacher and at least one student). Each category will be judged separately, with the finalists and winners in each receiving prizes of certificates, gift cards, and more.

Deadlines: Each video and its entry form must be submitted by 11:59 p.m. on December 18, 2015. Videos submitted by 11:59 p.m. on November 20, 2015, will receive a bonus in scoring.

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Supplement Your Stretched Budget

GetEdFunding is a free website sponsored by CDW•G to help educators and institutions find the funds they need in order to supplement their already stretched budgets. GetEdFunding hosts a collection of thousands of grants and other funding opportunities culled from federal, state, regional, and community sources available to public and private, preK–12 educators, schools and districts, higher education institutions, and nonprofit organizations that work with them. GetEdFunding offers customized searches by six criteria, including 43 areas of focus, eight content areas, and any of the 21st century themes and skills that support your curriculum. After registering on the site, you can save the grant opportunities of greatest interest and then return to them at any time. This rich resource of funding opportunities is expanded, updated, and monitored daily.

Click Here to Search for Funding Opportunities

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Appreciate Diverse Experiences

Scholastic Reading Club and the nonprofit organization We Need Diverse Books are teaming up this holiday season with a specially curated book club flyer, for grades 4–8, featuring more than 75 books with diverse characters and storylines. Spotlighting award-winning titles, beloved classics, and new releases, this special edition Scholastic Reading Club flyer will reach more than 100,000 classrooms and 2.5 million students in time for the holidays. The collection showcases a wide variety of titles highlighting important themes about race and ethnicity, multiculturalism, different religions, LGBTQ stories, individuals with disabilities, and more. The range of titles and the diversity of the authors will resonate with the widely diverse population of young readers served by Scholastic Reading Club through schools nationwide and help them understand and appreciate people, cultures, and experiences different from their own. Titles beyond those featured in the flyers will be available on Scholastic Reading Club’s website. All book orders should be submitted by a teacher on behalf of his or her classroom, and for every purchase the classroom earns reward points that are redeemable for books and other classroom materials.

Click Here for More Information About Scholastic Reading Club

Click Here for More Information About We Need Diverse Books Organization

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Examine the Legacies of History

The Reconstruction Era and The Fragility of Democracy from Facing History and Ourselves helps students examine how a society rebuilds after extraordinary division and trauma, when the ideals of democracy are most vulnerable. The unit presents educators with materials they need in order to engage students in a deep study of the pivotal era of American history that followed the Civil War. It provides history teachers with dozens of primary and secondary source documents, close-reading exercises, lesson plans, and activity suggestions that will push students both to build a complex understanding of the dilemmas and conflicts Americans faced during Reconstruction and to identify the legacies of this history that extended through the 20th century to the present day. The unit includes a variety of interdisciplinary teaching strategies that reinforce historical and literacy skills. Downloadable writing strategies will help to guide students through the process of organizing their ideas and crafting a thesis in response to the writing prompts, writing and editing drafts, and sharing their essays and reflecting on the writing process.

Click Here to Access Videos and Lessons

Click Here to Download Free Writing Strategies

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Learn the Fundamentals of Digital Driving

Just as motorists take driver’s education to learn how to recognize and react to road situations, digital-age students need a course in how to navigate precarious situations online, such as cyberbullying and copyright infringement. That’s what led ISTE to develop the Digital Driver’s License (DDL) project, a free and easy-to-navigate resource that schools or individuals can use to teach and measure digital citizenship proficiency. DDL is both a platform and curriculum. The “license” is a set of scenarios, or cases, designed to expose students to crucial concepts and build their skills in the elements of digital citizenship. The content covers a broad range of topics, such as digital communications, etiquette, security, commerce, law, media fluency, and health and wellness. The cases are embedded with two types of assessments: practice-its lay out the cases and then provide feedback; prove-its begin with a quiz and provide an overall score but do not provide feedback on which questions were incorrect. Students can take prove-its when they feel they are ready and retake them as many times as necessary. The system will email a designated teacher when a student passes a prove-it and is ready to go on to the next level. Recently a reviewed prove-it was added for schools that require a performance assessment. For this type of prove-it, students link to their evidence (a Google Doc, a YouTube video, a Twitter chat they moderated), and a designated educator can view it and approve the submission. School and district personnel can access summaries that show which students have completed licenses and get detailed reports of assessments. After they pass all the cases required by their school or district, students get their digital citizenship license.

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Improve Classroom Teaching and Learning

The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC, has released hundreds of test questions that were given to students in 2015—roughly equivalent to a full test’s worth for each grade level and subject. Some of the questions will look familiar to anyone who’s taken a standardized test in the last 20 years. Other questions show how this new test departs from the old multiple-choice fare: PARCC often demands that students not just answer questions but also explain their thinking. Besides test questions, PARCC is also releasing scoring guides and actual student responses that have been scored.

Click Here to Access PARCC-Released Items

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Meet the Challenge and Regain the Balance

Located at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education, Challenge Success provides schools and families with information and strategies to create a more balanced and academically fulfilling life for their children. The program is based on the belief that effective change happens when all stakeholders— administrators, faculty, parents, counselors, and students—come together to identify problems and work on solutions. Schools involved in the program send full teams to attend intensive conferences where they work with a coach to design action plans to implement best practices in areas such as curriculum, assessment, homework, school schedule, and a healthy school climate. Each school is unique, so each team designs an individualized plan for change. Work with families is also based on best practices from research. The courses, workshops, videos, and other resources offer parents guidelines and tools to help their children regain their balance, strengthen their sense of self, increase their motivation and critical thinking skills, and learn how to deal effectively with the inevitable challenges of life.

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Integrate Authentic Engineering Design Practices into the Classroom

The National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) and Northrop Grumman Foundation have joined together to promote student achievement in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) through a comprehensive education initiative, the Northrop Grumman Foundation Teachers Academy. The program is designed to help middle school teachers (grades 5–8) enhance their confidence and classroom excellence in science, engineering, and technology, while increasing their understanding of the skills needed for a scientifically literate workforce. The Academy will initially support 25 teachers located in school districts in select Northrop Grumman communities. Through the program, selected teachers—who will be known as Teacher Fellows—will participate in a yearlong immersion in a host of science-, engineering-, and technology-related activities and professional learning opportunities. During their fellowship, recipients will participate in a five-day workshop at a Northrop Grumman facility in the summer of 2016, where they will discuss teaching strategies for integrating effective and authentic engineering design practices in their classroom; and a two-week summer externship at a Northrop Grumman facility, where they will be paired with an engineer/technologist to observe daily activities and learn the foundational and industry-specific skills required for success in the field. After completing the externship, the Teacher Fellows will develop a lesson plan, strategy, or activity linked to the thematic area of their externship experience that they will implement as part of their classroom curriculum the following school year. The Teacher Fellows will also receive a comprehensive NSTA membership package and an opportunity to participate in a variety of web-based professional learning activities, including a specially designated online learning community.

Deadline: Applications due by November 20, 2015

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Send a Spacecraft into Orbit

Rocket Science 101 is an iPad app offered by NASA to help students understand how rockets work. The app also helps students understand the differences between the four types of rockets most frequently used by NASA. In Rocket Science 101, students can build all four rockets in a jigsaw-like activity and then virtually launch their rockets. When the rockets are launched, students see the timing of each stage of the launch, from surface to orbit. After investigating the four types of rockets, students can try matching rockets to real NASA missions. In the challenges, students read about a NASA mission and then select the rocket that can carry the payload and travel the distance required to complete the mission. Cost: Free

Click Here to Visit iTunes App Store

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Give ALL Students a Voice

Flipgrid is an asynchronous, video-based discussion and reflection tool designed to boost social presence in online discussions. Flipgrid administrators create grids of short, discussion-style questions to share with their users. Grids are collections of questions around a common theme. Each grid can hold an unlimited number of questions, and each question can hold an unlimited number of user-recorded video responses. Questions are short, text-based prompts that can include basic formatting (for example, bold, italic) and links to websites or documents for critique and feedback opportunities. Response videos are limited to a maximum of 90 seconds to promote clarity, organization, and engagement. Individual response videos can be liked and shared on Twitter or Facebook, or other social media; or they can be embedded in blogs, learner management systems, or websites. For educators, Flipgrid enhances community and social presence in face-to-face, hybrid, and online classrooms. In other words, Flipgrid brings the back row to the front and gives all students a voice. The Flipgrid iPad app extends the Flipgrid online environment and creates innovative new opportunities for reflection, discussion, and demonstration. Cost: Free

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Click Here to Visit iTunes App Store

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Design and Test Robots in Real-World Situations

Designed for the iPad and iPhone, Tinybop’s The Robot Factory app lets children create, test, and collect robots. They can build with exoskeletons, zephyr mechanisms, hydrostatic tentacles, machinos locomotors,G-Force mixers, and more. They can make any robot they can imagine—robot cats, robot samurais, robot spies—from 100 parts. They can record their own robot sounds and test their robots to see if they will walk, run, hop, dance, and fly. They can try out physics-driven robot parts in real-world situations and swap them out for different results. Each child can create and save their robots in their showroom and keep an eye on them, day or night. There are no in-app purchases or third-party advertising. The Robot Factory Technical Manual, in the app or on Tinybop’s website, provides a code of ethics and details about robot parts, gizmos, and tools. Cost: $3.99

Click Here to Visit iTunes App Store

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Awaken the Force in Students

Code.org is tapping the power of the force to reach more young people, especially girls. Riding anticipation for next month’s opening of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, students can take a one-hour tutorial from Princess Leia or Rey on how to build their own Star Wars games and program the droids R2-D2, C-3PO and BB-8. The tutorial, created in partnership with Disney and Lucasfilm, is called Star Wars: Building a Galaxy with Code. It teaches logic and problem solving through basic computer programming. Students can write code that helps Rey, the movie’s heroine, scavenge in a starship graveyard or guide BB-8 through a space mission. Or they can create a Pac-Man-like game in which C-3PO is chased by storm troopers, or a game of tag in which R2-D2 tries to catch mouse droids that keep multiplying. Short video lectures from a senior R&D engineer working on Star Wars: The Force Awakens and a senior creative producer at Walt Disney Imagineering guide students through the lessons. The games that students build can be played on smartphones and shared with friends and family. The Star Wars tutorial will be available starting November 16. The final version of the tutorial will be available on December 7 as Code.org kicks off the third annual Hour of Code campaign during Computer Science Education Week.

Click Here to Access Tutorial

Click Here to Participate in Hour of Code

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Feed the Hunger to Learn

Project Euler is a series of challenging mathematical/computer programming problems that will require more than just mathematical insights to solve. Although mathematics will help students arrive at elegant and efficient methods, the use of a computer and programming skills will be required to solve most problems. Project Euler provides a platform for the inquiring mind to delve into unfamiliar areas and learn new concepts in a fun and recreational context. The intended audience includes students for whom the basic curriculum is not feeding their hunger to learn, adults whose background was not primarily mathematics but who have an interest in things mathematical, and professionals who want to keep their problem solving and mathematics on the cutting edge. The problems range in difficulty, and for many the experience is inductive chain learning—that is, solving one problem exposes the learner to a new concept that allows the person to undertake a previously inaccessible problem. The Problems Archives table shows problems 1 to 523. The 10 most recently published problems appear in the Recent Problems table. Click the description/title of the problem to view details and submit answers.

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Click Here to Access Problems Archives Table

Click Here to Access Recent Problems Table

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Provide a Solid Base for AP Physics

Rice University is offering a free online course to help students prepare for the AP Physics exam. The four-part series explores AP Physics 1 concepts in an entirely new way. Students increase their skills—and their readiness—for the AP Exam through quality videos, inquiry labs, Hollywood-style Concept Trailers, Direct Measurement Videos, AP problem-solving sessions, and more. Part 1: Linear Motion includes the College Board’s Science Practices and aligns with its new AP Curriculum Framework. Students will learn how motion happens in the real world, along with ways to apply Newton’s Laws to forces and motion. They will solve motion problems using a step-by-step approach that involves them in thinking critically about concepts, experiments, and data. They’ll also practice critical thinking, writing, and problem solving with enhanced teacher and peer feedback. You can view or download the complete College Physics for AP® Courses textbook by going to the Reading Assignments page in the course website. Additional courses in the Preparing for the AP Physics 1 Exam sequence include Part 2: Rotational Motion; Part 3: Electricity & Waves; and Part 4: Exam Prep.

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View History from the Native American Perspective

During Native American Heritage Month, teachers and students can celebrate the history, culture, and traditions of American Indians and Alaska Natives in a special collection of films, short stories, and other resources from PBS. For example, students can watch online documentaries, such as Standing Bear's Footsteps, the story of an Indian chief who redefined what it means to be an American, or view American Experience’s multimedia miniseries We Shall Remain, which establishes Native history as an essential part of American history. The series’ five 90-minute documentaries span 300 years of pivotal moments in US history from the Native American perspective.

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Click Here to View Multimedia Miniseries

Plus: Vision Maker Media shares Native stories that represent the cultures, experiences, and values of American Indians and Alaska Natives in partnership with public television and public radio. Watch dozens of Native films online for free. Check your local listing for new programs airing this fall.

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Inspire a Spellbinding Event

A Night of Spells is the theme for Harry Potter Book Night 2016. Whether it is the disarming Expelliarmus or the dreaded Avada Kedavra, spells are at the heart of the Harry Potter books, so it’s the perfect theme to inspire a spellbinding event. On Thursday, February 4, 2016, fans of all ages will have the chance to celebrate J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter novels—and pass the magic on to young readers who haven’t yet discovered these unforgettable books. Masses of magical ideas, events, and activities will be announced over the coming months. Sign up on the Harry Potter Book Night website before November 23 to register for an updated event kit themed around spells and to make sure you are the first to know about Harry Potter Book Night news. Also find links to free discussion guides with a host of ideas that can be used in the classroom to encourage self-expression, inspire student writing, spark critical thinking, explore series fiction, and much more.

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