THAT’S AMAZING!!! How to Create Phenomenon-Based Lessons that Will Have Your Students Screaming for More with Steve Spangler
Grades K-12th
If you really want to get your students excited about STEM, it all starts with your “hook”… the way you grab their attention, pique their curiosity and engage them at the highest level. That’s right… It’s all about the presentation. Join Steve Spangler as he uncovers some of his best practices and instructional strategies for creating highly effective phenomenon-based learning lessons that are guaranteed to get your students hooked on learning. Guaranteed to have you laughing, learning and implementing these ideas the very next day.
Everyday Superheroes: Women in Energy Careers Panel with Charmayne Lonergan, Natalie Currie, Sarah Davis, Amanda Polematidis, Tatiana Stein
Moderated by Erin Twamley
Grades K-12
Let’s talk Energy Careers! Join Charmayne Lonergan, Natalie Currie, Sarah Davis, Amanda Polematidis, Tatiana Stein and Erin Twamley (author of Everyday Superheroes: Women in Energy Careers) for this panel discussion.
Last year Pamela presented robotics inside the Makerspace. In this session, you will learn new updated robots for elementary and middle school teachers. Also, some ways to integrate circuits and electricity in your lessons. Along with some new organization tips.
Ice Breakers in Stem with Cristina de Vega Benavides
Grades PreK-12
Starting a class can be very challenging. As a teacher, one needs quick and captivating activities to not only spark but maintain focus in a classroom. These activities will be based on creativity, easy to prep, and most of all attention-grabbing, allowing the class to run smoothly.
Starting with STEAM: Establishing Your STEAM Learning Community in 5 Lessons with Dia Charley
Grades 3-5
Set the stage for a successful year of STEAM learning. This session will provide ideas for establishing a solid STEAM learning from the start of the school year. Participants will leave with a plan for helping students understand STEAM and its role in the classroom community.
The Magic of Maker Story Stations in Your Classroom or Media Center with Trina Deboree
Grades K-2
Maker Story Stations focus on design thinking and allow students to work through the Engineering Design Process using literature as a guide. Maker Story Stations focus on building a classroom community through creativity, collaboration, critical thinking, community, and curiosity, focusing on reading without taking up a ton of space.
In this session, you will learn how to create easy maker stations for your classroom or media center that will engage and motivate even the most reluctant learners.
Let’s build those STEM libraries! We can never have too many read-alouds to set the stage for an engaging STEM challenge! This session features a diverse collection of new favorites read-alouds for elementary students, paired with simple STEM challenges that are sure to “hook” your students and provide meaningful connections between literacy and STEM!
Inspiring Creativity and Student Voice with Digital Storytelling with Caitlin Arakawa & Carrie Willis
Grades K-5
Storytelling sparks creativity and deepens student learning. Through illustrative examples used in real classrooms, across multiple grade levels, attendees will leave with a concrete idea of how they can leverage digital storytelling in their classroom. Presenters will showcase a variety of examples in which students illustrate their understanding through creative videos, digital design, coding, animation, robotics and more.
Do You See What I See? – How to Help Your Students View the World Like Scientists Using Picture Books with Emily Starr
Grades K-8
Do you love picture books!? Would you like to use them to teach students to “think like scientists”? Let Emily show you how to use science picture books to help your students view the world just like real scientists by using the crosscutting concepts (energy, matter, structure, and function, etc.). She’ll share when you should (and shouldn’t!) use picture books during a science lesson, which picture books are best for highlighting each crosscutting concept, and how to easily develop questions that will get your students to think deeply about the science found in picture books.
How to Build a Year-Long STEM Scope & Sequence with Natasha Wilkerson & Claire Meschkat
Grade K-8
Knowing what to teach and when to teach it in a STEM program can be challenging. We will help you build a robust STEM scope and sequence to develop your students’ STEM skills. Learn how to plan your year of lessons and activities that meet appropriate standards and engage your students!
Let’s Talk! Leading Intentional Discussions to Support STEM Learning with Loren Thorpe
Grade 1-4
STEM naturally provides many opportunities for discussions to take place. So, how can we guide these discussions in a way that encourages students to get talking while supporting their understanding of the content? This session provides strategies to use to make the most of STEM discussions in the classroom in a way that supports students’ knowledge and understanding of STEM topics and keeps them engaged.
Beyond the Narrative: Claiming Our Voices As Leaders in Education with Dr. Yen Verhoeven
Grades PreK-12
Educators have been blamed, villainized, and demoralized in the public eye for the failure of the education system. Because non-educators make many of these policy decisions for us, we end up fixing the problems that they cause. Yet, our expertise is often overlooked. This session is about taking a stand as educators, and it is an invitation to claim your voice in the public space. It is time to change the narrative that society has on educators. In this session, Dr. Yen Verhoeven will show you exactly how to do this, and how to find allies who are willing to support you.
Play Deficit Disorder: A Worldwide Crisis and How to Solve It Locally with Dr. Gray
Grades K-12
Research in the United States and elsewhere has revealed a dramatic decline in children’s free play—especially their free outdoor play—over the past several decades. This decline in play has been accompanied by well-documented, dramatic increases in childhood depression, anxiety, and suicide, and by declines in internal locus of control and creativity. In this talk I will present the logic and evidence behind my claim that the decline in free play is a, if not the, major cause of these deleterious effects on children’s and emerging adults’ emotional, social, and intellectual wellbeing. I will also describe ways by which families, neighborhoods, schools, and communities can restore children’s opportunities for play.
Reignite Teacher Passion: Going from Burned Out to Fired Up! with April Lara
Grade PreK-12
Educators have had a front row seat to the learning gap that happened across schools the past few years. Not only that, with the unprecedented school violence, unrealistic expectations, impractical parents, increasingly limited time and resources, and large class sizes we wonder why we chose this profession in the first place! You will leave rejuvenated, ready to bring your loving energy and passion into the classroom.
Transform Your Literacy Centers with STEM! with Wittney Swyers
Grades PreK-1
Love Literacy centers but not a huge fan of worksheets? STEM could be the perfect thing to totally transform your daily center time and enhance your ELA block. There are many advantages to STEM based centers including decreased behaviors, more opportunities for peer-to-peer interaction/learning, and so much more!
Cross-Curricular Coding with Scratch Jr. with Carrie Willis and Caitlin Arakawa
Grades K-3
Learn how to transform your teaching and increase student engagement in your existing ELA, Math, Science and Social Studies curriculum with the free coding app, Scratch Jr.! See how students can use Scratch Jr. to demonstrate their understanding of various content areas while learning to code. Attendees will leave with integrated project examples and ideas relevant to elementary grade level content.
Secret Weapons for STEM Management with Brooke Brown
Grades K-5
Making your STEM teacher life easier….one tip at a time! This session features Brooke’s favorite strategies for classroom management and organization of STEM challenges! Learn about common instructional mistakes, easy ways to prep materials, and simple strategies for bringing more calm and less chaos to your STEM classroom. Whether you’re new to teaching STEM or a veteran teacher, this session is sure to fill your toolkit!
Questioning Bootcamp: The Key to Improving Your STEM Teaching Today with Emily Starr
Grades K-8
According to decades of research, the most effective STEM teachers are masters at questioning and facilitating student discussion. Does this scare you or excite you? Let Emily help you supercharge your questioning skills today by empowering you with proven techniques, strategies, and supports so that you can be a more effective STEM teacher starting tomorrow!
Let Them Make! Creative Freedom in STEM with Nicole Hewes
Grades K-8
To cultivate the next generation of Makers who will solve urgent problems or invent products to fill unmet needs, we must provide students with opportunities for creative freedom. STEM tasks and Makerspaces can afford learners the opportunity to play, to explore, and to tinker – essential activities that are increasingly rare in our education system. In this session, we’ll discuss strategies for granting learners more agency and making creative freedom a mainstay in your classroom.
NASA’s Art and the Cosmic Connection with Monica & Tyler Aiello
Grades K-12
Have a blast during this hands-on training for NASA’s celebrated program, Art & the Cosmic Connection. Join teaching artists and NASA program designers to discover how arts-integration fuels curiosity about our planet, solar system and beyond. Become an “artist explorer” to wonder, create, discover & collaborate. Plus, learn how NASA’s STEAM programs spark deep, equitable and accessible learning for all. This session includes extensive curricular tools, a fun art activity, implementation strategies and classroom examples. We’ll also guide participants through the FREE teaching resources to take this popular program back to your own creative communities.
The Asset-Based Approach: Unlocking the Potential of Every Learner with Dr. Sheldon L. Eakins
Grades K-12
In education, we often look at students from a “let’s give them what they don’t have” approach. This is a deficit mindset to have. In this session, Dr. Eakins will discuss what it means to view students’ individuality and talents as assets. Rather than focusing on students’ deficits, such as lower reading scores, learning loss, and statistics, we can embrace students where they are and build from there. Additionally, Dr. Eakins will discuss teaching strategies for asset-based pedagogy.
Design and Make STEAM Activities with MakerStudio with Stijn De Mil
Grade 4-12
MakerStudio is a new platform for design and fabrication, created with education in mind. In this session, Stijn will introduce and demonstrate the possibilities of the free version of the makerstud.io app.
Designing bridges, making art from dead parts, doing the math to save mamas?!? When people get steaming mad about animals smooshed on the road, their science, math, technology, and art skills come out full force. This geek-friendly talk shares design thinking, environmental solutions, informational texts, an ELA/STEM interdisciplinary unit, digital notebooks, and an engineering activity. (For the hands-on component, you will be building a bridge. This set of materials works well: 10 straws, 15 toothpicks, 1 small wad of playdoh and 1 small stuffed animal. If these are not readily available to you, please substitute with other simple building materials.)
Fitting Everything In Panel with Brooke Brown, Trina Deboree, Dia Charley, Claire Meschkat, & Cristina de Vega Benavides
Moderated by Kerry Tracy
Grades K-12
How do you divide up your limited time for ALL the things that fall under the umbrella of STEM? How do you optimize the precious minutes you have during class? How can you keep from scrambling and feeling frantic all the time? The aggression of time is REAL, y’all! In this panel, we’ll discuss it all and you’ll walk away with new ideas to make the best use of the time you have available.
Graphic Organizers with Cristina de Vega Benavides
Grades PreK-12
We need our students to follow directions and stay on path during STEAM Projects. Registering the information all at once can be hard but investing time in graphic organizers will help students reflect on the information they have gathered. Reflection is key in the process of understanding and can lead our students to a successful project. Join Cristina while she walks you through the process of implementing graphic organizers into your classroom.
Organization Skills for a Busy STEAM Teacher with Pamela Alba
Grades PreK-12
Having to deal with 5 subject lines and integrating them while teaching specific content is not easy but is doable. During this session Pamela will explain how she plans and structures her school year to get the best version of herself and avoid going crazy on the way.
3 Powerful Ways Makerspaces Can Support English Language Learners with Trina Deboree
Grades K-5
Makerspaces—a place where students can prototype projects, build with technology, and develop creative ideas—are an exciting opportunity for any student. But for English language learners (ELLs), the benefits of makerspaces are especially powerful. With research showing that hands-on activities increase language learning, providing a supportive environment for these students to experiment and express themselves is even more important. In this session, we’ll explore three powerful ways ELLs can get the most out of makerspace experiences as they transition into new educational environments while mastering their newfound language skills.
Launch an Out of This World STEMfest! with Catherine Cheng
Grades K-5
STEMfest is an all-day, whole-school day of STEM that students look forward to all year long. This session will contain all you need to know to launch a Space themed STEMfest, or to select your own theme and bring STEMfest to your school.
Low Prep and High Engagement STEM Challenges with Emily Gentile
Grades k-6
What if Emily told you there are STEM lessons that have 100% engagement and require little to no preparation? Low prep, low budget and high engagement lessons are closer than you think. During this session, Emily will give you tips and tricks on how to create this type of lessons for your classroom!
Welcome to #EdTech, Newcomer Edition! with Brian Lopez
Grades K-6
Are you a Newcomer to #EdTech? Do you work with Newcomer English Language Learners? If you answered YES to any of these questions, then this workshop is for you! This workshop will walk you through our experience in the Elementary #ELL / #SPED classroom in learning English through Zoom + hybrid schooling.
THAT’S AMAZING!!! How to Create Phenomenon-Based Lessons that Will Have Your Students Screaming for More with Steve Spangler
THAT’S AMAZING!!! How to Create Phenomenon-Based Lessons that Will Have Your Students Screaming for More with Steve Spangler
Everyday Superheroes: Women in Energy Careers Panel with Charmayne Lonergan, Natalie Currie, Sarah Davis, Amanda Polematidis, Tatiana Stein
Robotics in Every Classroom 2.0 with Pamela Alba
Ice Breakers in Stem with Cristina de Vega Benavides
Starting with STEAM: Establishing Your STEAM Learning Community in 5 Lessons with Dia Charley
The Magic of Maker Story Stations in Your Classroom or Media Center with Trina Deboree
New Top Read-Alouds for STEM with Brooke Brown
Inspiring Creativity and Student Voice with Digital Storytelling with Caitlin Arakawa & Carrie Willis
Do You See What I See? – How to Help Your Students View the World Like Scientists Using Picture Books with Emily Starr
How to Build a Year-Long STEM Scope & Sequence with Natasha Wilkerson & Claire Meschkat
Let’s Talk! Leading Intentional Discussions to Support STEM Learning with Loren Thorpe
Beyond the Narrative: Claiming Our Voices As Leaders in Education with Dr. Yen Verhoeven
Play Deficit Disorder: A Worldwide Crisis and How to Solve It Locally with Dr. Gray
Author Panel with Josh Funk, Christine Taylor-Butler, Vicky Fang, Margarita Engle, Laurie Wallmark
Reignite Teacher Passion: Going from Burned Out to Fired Up! with April Lara
Transform Your Literacy Centers with STEM! with Wittney Swyers
Cross-Curricular Coding with Scratch Jr. with Carrie Willis and Caitlin Arakawa
Let Them Make! Creative Freedom in STEM with Nicole Hewes
NASA’s Art and the Cosmic Connection with Monica & Tyler Aiello
The Asset-Based Approach: Unlocking the Potential of Every Learner with Dr. Sheldon L. Eakins
Design and Make STEAM Activities with MakerStudio with Stijn De Mil
STEAMED About Roadkill with Heather Montgomery
Fitting Everything In Panel with Brooke Brown, Trina Deboree, Dia Charley, Claire Meschkat, & Cristina de Vega Benavides
Organization Skills for a Busy STEAM Teacher with Pamela Alba
3 Powerful Ways Makerspaces Can Support English Language Learners with Trina Deboree
Launch an Out of This World STEMfest! with Catherine Cheng
Low Prep and High Engagement STEM Challenges with Emily Gentile
Welcome to #EdTech, Newcomer Edition! with Brian Lopez