OpenSciEd Middle School Starts Here

We have recently implemented OpenSciEd Middle School Units in all of our middle school classrooms.  This past summer, as the Science Instructional Coach in Colonial, I worked alongside the Activate Professional Learning Group to implement professional learning for the units in our district and state.  In addition, I worked with many of the facilitators from Activate to provide professional learning opportunities in our district for our teachers. 

We are so thankful for the work and efforts of the Activate Professional Learning Facilitators.  I love how this group of Activate facilitators along with Tracy, the lead of the Activate PL Group, created personalized learning opportunities for the instructional coaches and teachers in this state, and specifically for our district! The Activate group is friendly, personable, understands the workload and stresses of teachers, and adapts the professional learning to our needs. Thank you Activate for helping us along with our successful implementation of OpenSciEd Curriculum!  

Overall it is going really well! The teachers and students love the hands-on labs and the teachers love that the kids are thinking like scientists.

Activate Learning was able to recommend a customized OpenSciEd/ IQWST implementation. Both curricula share the same pedagogy and even some of the same authors, providing a seamless experience to teachers and students through Activate Learning's Interactive Digital Platform. 

Activate Learning is a great support system for me, for the district, for the teachers, and for the kids. It's a one-stop-shop for everything the we need to support our science program and science instruction in our district. 

My students are more responsible for their own learning. This curriculum changes my teaching style from teaching students content to teaching students how to think.

I can't say enough about how wonderful the teacher's professional learning was over the last three days! We chose the right teachers to help with the facilitation, and Activate Learning chose the right facilitators to help mentor the teachers and co-present. Thank you, thank you, thank you! It was like all the stars lined up. I loved hearing how much the teachers loved being in the training. Most of them were not getting paid to attend the training, and they were saying the teachers that didn't come to the training are not going to be able to teach this in the fall. This group of teachers are going to be the teachers that rally for professional learning and this program.

Using OpenSciEd will mean that my students will have an authentic learning experience. The hands-on, inquiry-driven learning will deepen their knowledge and strengthen their critical thinking and problem-solving skills.

Thank you so much for a wonderful training this week!  The teachers really appreciated it and we were able to delve even deeper into OSE yesterday during our extended planning time. The teacher's and I really appreciated how you were able to capture the spirit of OpenSciEd in the workshops!

Formulating an excellent approach to an anchoring phenomenon is the start of really opening up and engaging in a collaborative fashion. The platform provides for many facets of engagement, fact finding, and a scientific approach to problem solving. The in depth approach of this platform will work well within the confines of my pedagogy.