Kindergarten...Where the Wild Things Are

      On Friday, I had the opportunity to visit Sanborn School and spend some time with the students of Mrs Carlson and Mrs Woo's kindergarten classes.  Woodland Animals is one of the science themes for the kindergarden program, so I brought along a selection of animal pelts (fox, beaver, bobcat, skunk, raccoon, otter, coyote) from Andover High School's collection for an afternoon show and tell. Each of the pelts was presented individually along with some information about the animal and few questions and stories from the students.  We talked about how mammals all have hair/fur and how each one has its own special adaptations for its lifestyle.  After the presentation, each student had the opportunity to touch the fur from each of the pelts and experience the differences in texture and color patterns.

Sanborn kindergarten students have close encounters with wild animals

     The visit was an enjoyable learning opportunity for myself as well as the students.  Being an educator whose career has been spent teaching high school and middle school students, the experience of interacting with some of our youngest students renewed my awareness of critically important role that kindergarten and preK teachers play in introducing students to learning in a school environment and facilitating the development of important social and learning behaviors needed in this environment.  It's not too difficult to impress kindergarteners  - they are fascinated by many things as they naturally strive to understand the world around them.  Science is fundamentally just that - the effort to understand the world around us.  The naturally curious minds of kindergartners and other young children ideally position them for developing a capacity to think scientifically about their world.  Kudos to the teachers of our youngest students for the critically important work they do building the foundation on which teachers in later years will continue to build.

Steve Sanborn

Middle School Engineering Teachers Work and Play For a Day at the Center for Engineering Education Outreach at Tufts

After about a month of implementing and integrating new Legos Mindstorms learning resources into 8th grade middle school engineering classes, all three engineering teachers, Dan Miley (West Middle), Steve Tisbert (Wood Hill Middle School), and Tiny Helinski (Doherty) joined me for a day long visit to the Center for Engineering Education Outreach (CEEO) at Tufts University (http://www.ceeo.tufts.edu) for the opportunity to have some conversation with researchers at CEEO about best practices for teaching with Mindstorms resources and for the opportunity to work with the Legos resources ourselves while sharing experiences and ideas generated since the start of school

Upon our arrival at CEEO, Dr. Chris Rogers, director of the CEEO gave us each a Mindstorms EV3 Core Kit, the exact same kits that we use with Andover students, and were presented with the Silly Walks Challenge - to design a vehicle that moves forward without using wheels.  "I'll be back in an hour" Chris told us as he left to meet potential Tufts freshmen, turning us over to Dorit Assaf, a post-doctorate research associate who was present to help with technical issues, offer moral support, and share some insights about engineering education but had few directions on how to complete the challenge.

Setting to work on the Silly Walks challenge

     I think I can safely speak for all four of when I say that the first 20 minutes or so of the challenge were marked with uncertainty, frustration, and an acute awareness of how as educators, we are typically in the position of holding the answers and controlling the situation.  The recognition of this reaction really made clear how important it is for teachers to be as with comfortable making mistakes and struggling with uncertainty as we aspire our students to be in a classroom environment promoting creativity and risk-taking.

Tony Helinski - Doherty Middle School

After any number of dead ends and false starts, a design direction began to emerge and take shape for each of us.  It was fascinating to see how differently each of us approached the challenge - each of our designs were completely different in design.

Steve Tisbert - Wood Hill Middle School

Dan Miley - West Middle School

When Chris Roger's returned around noon, he was sporting shorts and a tee-shirt and clutching a couple of frisbees.  We were swept along to join other members of the Tufts engineering department for their weekly lunchtime game of ultimate frisbee - "it clears the mind out for a while so you can think better after" Chris tells us.  The good news was that we all made it through without injury or incident

After lunch, we returned to our projects with the challenge of adding sensors to our vehicle to prevent it from driving off of the table.  This step provided us some time to puzzle with the Mindstorms software and deepen our understanding of coding patterns.  We all came a long way both in the construction of our vehicles but also in our appreciation of how it feels to operate in an environment where there is no one right answer and mistakes and dead ends are a necessary part of doing business.

Our remaining time at CEEO was spent with Chris and Dorit discussing the direction of Andover's new program, best practices for maximizing student learning, and discussing research findings and how they might inform our instruction and curriculum development. We came away with a lot of great ideas for projects and activities that can be build into our students' experience.  The CEEO offers a variety of engineering education programs and resources to teachers and students in the Greater Boston area and we are hopeful that we can continue and grow our relationship with this group as our own engineering programs grow and evolve.

Rich and productive conversation with Dr. Chris Rogers about engineering education using Legos Mindstorms resources 

All in all, it was a tremendously productive, growth-filled, and enjoyable professional development experience, one that will certainly have an immediate positive impact on the learning of our middle school engineering students.


Steve Sanborn    

AHS Oceanography and Marine Biology Students Hit The Beach

     On an overcast yet pleasant Monday afternoon (Sept 29th), 75 Andover High School students loaded up a pair of buses with research equipment and field guides and headed for the beach at the Parker River National Wildlife Reserve on Plum Island in Newbury, MA.  The students were all enrolled in Andover High Schools Oceanography/Marine Biology or Marine Science courses taught by AHS science teacher Jennifer Rodier.  The purpose of the trip was to observe and investigate first hand many of the concepts presented and explored in the classroom in each of these courses.

AHS Science Teacher Jen Rodier checks in with a work group.

    Upon arrival, students divided into two main groups - one for tidal pool survey and investigation and one for a beach walk/scavenger hunt/landforms observation.  Ms. Rodier supervised and supported small student groups setting up one by one meter transects at different positions of the tidal zone.  Students collected specimens for observation and recorded data for comparison with other student groups set up in different areas within the intertidal zone.

Teacher Sarah Fisher talks about geological aspects of the beach environment.

     While one group worked among the rocks and tide pools, another group walked along the beach with AHS science teacher and earth science specialist Sarah Fisher to both search for specimens to identify and observe, to learn about the dynamic nature beaches as a land formations, and to gather up as much trash along the way as possible.  Also joining the group was retired math teacher Bill Drummond, a nationally recognized expert birder, who helped to identify numerous species of birds in the area.

Fending off the sandwich thieving gulls while enjoying lunch

     Aside from some mechanical problems with one of the buses on the return trip, the beach excursion was enjoyed by all students who were able to both apply their coursework learning in an authentic setting while squeezing in a little picnicking and football before returning to Andover High.