March 2, 2015 by Adam

Episode 13: Preparing Science Fair Presentations

On today’s podcast I talk about preparing students for Science Fair day. It will include how I prepare students for their oral and visual presentations, the technology we use to do it, and how our Science Fair day is different than a tradition science fair.

Hear about using Google apps to make your Science Fair tri-fold board free! Not only that, but creating cloud-based Science Fair “boards” allows students to collaborate in school and at home, virtually. In addition it allows you to give feedback right on their documents from your computer.

Check out the links below for resources to use in your classroom.

Google Presentation Instructions (Gdoc) (PDF)

Oral Presentation Instructions (Gdoc) (PDF)

February 12, 2015 by Adam

Episode 11: Teaching Math in Science

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Science Fair is an excellent opportunity to build math skills into your Science class. In this episode, I detail how I guided students in organizing their data into presentable form. I used tutorial videos to help students develop 21^st century cloud based data analysis skills. Listen to hear how students researched graph types, selected the most appropriate graph and turned it all into a document that could later be used in a final science fair report.

Video Tutorials:

Making a graph using your Google drive

Inserting a Google graph into a Google document

Instructions and Resources

Organizing Data (Gdoc) (PDF)

Creating a Science Fair Graph (Gdoc)(PDF)

Results and Reflection Writing (Gdoc)(PDF)

Data and Results Rubric (Gdoc)(PDF)

February 5, 2015 by Adam

Episode 10: Analyzing Science Fair Data with Students, part 2

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In this episode I continue to share my experiences with students in organizing and graphing their data. I discuss the methods for taking all their data and displaying it in a single table. In addition, I outline how students gain expertise on graph types and decide what type of graph to use for their data. Click the links below to download copies of materials I used with my students.

Organizing Data (Gdoc) (PDF)

Creating a Science Fair Graph (Gdoc)(PDF)

Results and Reflection Writing (Gdoc)(PDF)

Data and Results Rubric (Gdoc)(PDF)

January 8, 2015 by Adam

Episode 9: Analyzing Science Fair Data with Students, part 1

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Analyzing data always presents challenges for students. In this episode, I discuss how I approached data analysis with my students. Hear about the hangups we ran into and how the activity unfolded in my classroom.

November 16, 2014 by Adam

My Science Fair Book Cover Has Arrived!

I’m super psyched to announce the arrival of the cover for my book, “Why Science Fair Sucks and How You Can Save It.” The cover is off to the formatter and should be available on Amazon.com with in a week or two. Thank you so much to Dave Fymbo at limelightbookcovers.com for all his design work.

Interested in finding out the moment the book is for sale? Sign up for my newsletter by clicking here or fill out the form on the right side of this page.

November 8, 2014 by Adam

Science Fair Podcast Episode #5: Setting Up Science Fair Experiments

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In episode 5, I describe how my students put their procedures into action. I detail how students self pace the activity and how I offer tailored support. I also discuss how I have my students reflect on the process to revise their experimental procedures. Below are links to the web based resources mentioned in the episode.

Reflection

Critical Thinking Rubric (This is a rubric created by my school and used across the grades)

November 6, 2014 by Adam

Science Fair Podcast Episode #4: Writing Experimental Procedures

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Want to know why I do Science Fair in this unusual way? I start this episode with a brief outline of how I do science fair and why. Then I go into how I lead students in writing procedures to test their hypotheses.

November 5, 2014 by Adam

Science Fair Podcast Episode #3: Hypotheses

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In this episode, students return to science class with background research in hand. They use this research to generate hypotheses. I discuss the way students debate predictions and use their research to back up their ideas. I also explain the hypothesis format I use and how it helps students envision the entire experiment.

October 13, 2014 by Adam

Science Fair Podcast Episode #1: Introducing Science Fair

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If you’ve been struggling to make Science Fair a meaningful experience for your students and you, join in the conversation on the Science Fair Podcast.

In this first episode, I talk about how I introduce the science fair concept to my seventh grade students. The whole podcast is recorded on my commute to work, so it lasts less than fifteen minutes . Check out this podcast each day as I talk about my day-to-day experiences and challenges working through the science fair process with my students.

Please email me with your experiences and questions at adam@sciencenugget.com.