Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, April 1944.  After many years of discussion, two separate associations—The American Science Teachers Association and the American Council of Science Teachers — proposed and adopted a constitution that merged their members and joined their forces to organize as one national group for science education. By the end of 1944, the seed that had been planted broke through the surface and emerged as the National Science Teachers Association. Its founding purpose to “stimulate, improve, and coordinate science teaching at the elementary, secondary, and collegiate levels of instruction.”

There is no doubt that since its inception, the importance of science teaching and science learning has been the driving focus of the association. The ongoing need for this driving force has been society as a whole and the need to provide students with instruction that helped to understand scientific and technological advances of the time. Robert Carleton penned the following at the 25^th anniversary: “The challenge to NSTA and to the profession is to tie science education together with the lives of people and the problems of society in a truly functional manner.” As science educators we have the ability to make connections between new advances and everyday life, influence the future, and to extend the reach of science to many.

At our 50^th anniversary, then President Gerry Madrazo likened our Association to a giant Sequoia which has grown slowly by planting deep roots, and reaching wide but had yet to realize the fullness of the tree’s expanse. The challenge to tie people’s lives and science together and need for us to continue to develop and expand our reach still exists! Throughout the last 75 years, NSTA has weathered many changes from programmatic offerings to the location of our headquarters to changes in our governance structure to the overall manner in which we engage with our members and meet their needs. These events, strategies, and changes offered opportunities to interact with our members and look towards the future of science education and the growth of our association. While history provides us context, the future provides us promise.

NSTA has become the largest organization in the world devoted to the science teaching and learning and at its core has always been our mission statement “…to promote excellence and innovation in science teaching and learning for all.” Like the Sequoia, we have grown with time and arrive at a new era where our historical roots are deep and there is strength in our message. Our potential reach and growth still hold promise by modifying our strategies to meet the future of science education and needs of our members.  

Join us throughout 2019 as we uncover and reveal some of the new features of NSTAs digital presence and overall engagement strategy. As we look to the past with an eye to the future, it is clear that the science taught and need for science educators who create a love of learning and interest in students is as necessary today as it was in 1944. 

How, we engage ALL students in science learning and ensure that all science educators continue their own lifelong, lifewide, and lifedeep learning process is the focus for our future growth. With that goal in mind, the voice of the science teacher and need for all educators to advocate and speak out for science education is more prominent than ever before.

The mission of NSTA is to promote excellence and innovation in science teaching and learning for all.

Future NSTA Conferences

2019 National Conference
St. Louis, April 11–14

2019 STEM Forum & Expo
San Francisco, July 24–26

Follow NSTA

I have a few students who chatter excessively and need advice on methods that have worked to quiet the disruption. I also need to involve students who are reluctant to participate in a group setting.
—H., Arizona

I like a chatty, active classroom— provided the students are on task. I would give students opportunities to chat and work in groups but kept them focused on thought-provoking topics or problems. Organize the groups yourself to minimize off-topic socializing. Limit discussions to keep them moving forward and have follow-up or extension activities for those who finish quickly. Requiring groups to present overviews of their discussions can be a good way to wrangle the talkers and channel their discussion to the work.

When you don’t want students chatting, have assigned seats and be sure to separate friends who chat too much.

My advice for handling shy students changes with different types of group work.
Labs: Create roles that each member has to assume for hands on or lab activities. Here is a link to a resource in the Learning Center describing the responsibilities I assigned for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) projects: https://goo.gl/EshMpi

Discussions/Workgroups: I believe shy students sometimes need more time to gather their thoughts and are less likely to join ongoing conversations. “Think-Pair-Share” approaches build in time for individual reflection and ensure that everyone in a group has a turn.

Employ some self-assessments or group assessments as part of the process. You are welcome to use these from my resource collection in The Learning Center:
Group Evaluation: https://goo.gl/UbqmNX

Hope this helps!

When you have a moment to plan for teaching in January, reach for the 2018 November/December issue of Science and Children for inspiration. With a focus on visual literacy the activities discussed in the columns and articles promote helping children learn from and use images and models to understand science concepts. 

In The Early Years column, “Analyzing Media Representations of Animals,” I wrote up an activity using guidance from the National Association for Media Literacy Education (NAMLE) to analyze, evaluate, and create media. Many children’s books show images of animals that are not at life size, either to fit on the page or for convenience of design. If children have seen the animals they may be able to understand that the image is not at life-size, but if the animals are unknown, children can’t know what the actual size is. Engaging children in exploring how images accurately represent size or are possibly misleading, perhaps showing animals such as mice and horses at the same size, is part of teaching media literacy. Helping children create their own illustrations and photos of animals develops their understanding of how others use images.

What size is this animal in “real life”?

Can one of our senses fool another one? The Poetry of Science column, “Visual Poetry,” presents a poem, and science activity, and internet resources for additional support!

The Engineering Encounters column, “Bears on a Boat Plus,” is a visit into a second-grade classroom where we learn from science educators and English-language Learner specialists about their work revising the classic plasticine clay activity into a problem-based learning one. They used the 5E model (Bybee) for two one-hour lessons on consecutive days. (Karen Nemeth of Language Castle posted additional resources for “Working with an English Language Learner” on the NAEYC Hello social media site.)

Have your students ever drawn pictures of scientists or themselves as scientists? In the Methods & Strategies column, “Draw a Scientist,” Laura Beth Kelly offers suggestions for teachers who want to broaden their students’ ideas about science and scientists.

These four columns are only part of the helpful materials shared by educators in the 2018 November/December issue of  Science and Children.  Don’t miss reading pages 74, 75 and 80 where you can read the “Call for Papers” and be inspired to share your own science teaching practice!

Resource

Bybee, Rodger W. 2014. The BSCS 5E Instructional Model: Personal Reflections and Contemporary Implications. Science and Children. 51(8): 10-13.