1. NGSS Why, What, and How

2. Opening Discussion What do you think about Standards in General?
What do you know about the NGSS?
What are your concerns about the NGSS?
Content?
Implementation at OB?

3. Agenda
Standards
Why the new standards and what is different about them?
Tour of the NGSS
Resources to access the NGSS
Tools for implementation

4. History A Nation at Risk 1983-
"The education foundations of our society are presently being eroded by a rising tide of mediocrity that threatens our very future as a nation and a people. … We have, in effect, been committing an act of unthinking, unilateral educational disarmament" (National Commission on Excellence in Education, 1983, p. 5). 
1989 Bush Sr. brought nations Governors together and called for a collective effort to upgrade the k-12 Education System in the US.
6 goals were identified to be accomplished by 2000
The results has ultimately been standards across grade levels and content areas
Issues:
Too much Content
Measurement of achievement impossible because all of the too many standards are multi dimensional. A single score cannot simultaneously and accurately measure two different things.

5. New Standards
Continuous progression from K-12, required for students to build a conceptual framework in which to incorporate new information.
Focus on the practices of science and engineering and concepts that span over all sciences and even outside of science as opposed to “straight content”
Reflect student expectations and not curriculum and aim to include students ability to use content knowledge not just regurgitate it, therefore shifting instructional focus to teaching for understanding and not memorization

6. Tweak in Philosophy
At great Personal Risk… If Social Constructivism and Realism mated and produced a single offspring blending the best traits from both, NGSS would advocate incorporating that way of thinking into your teaching.
Cognitive Structures or Schema for how the world works are built by individuals based on their observation and interaction (experimentation) with the Natural World, the actual behavior of which is independent of how we as human being perceive it.
These structures and explanations are refined through further experimentation, reflection, and analysis of data as well as social interactions with others, coming to a consensus on what the interpretation of that data is
When Students are engaged in this process, they are learning and open to real meaningful modification of their schema.
Providing a setting for, guidance during and opportunities for this process is the role of the Science (some might argue, Every) Teacher
THIS IS GOING TO REQUIRE DIFFERENT WAYS OF ASSESSMENT, CHANGES TO CURRICULUM AND POSSIBLY EVEN STRUCTURES WITH IN THE SCHOOL DAY
Starting from the “ground up” with teachers- Be a part of the change.

7. Best Resources for Accessing the NGSS
NSTA website and app
“The Framework” itself is a little tough to use…
Handout
Youtube has great stuff
Share any good ones you have?

8. Tools for the Classroom and what does it look like.
Whiteboarding- Homework, prelab, postlab
Using labs to Introduce a topic
Very little instructions
Allow students to discover/discuss the need to take certain data
Iterative labs or lab components that students will get better at over time
Lots of classroom discussion and presentation, exchange of ideas between students, let them correct eachother
CER’s Claim, Evidence Reasoning for argumentation or assessment
Simply producing the right answer isn’t enough, just adding a why or a “E and R Line after a MC question
Less Content on assessments and covered during the year
A change in curriculum based on what teachers deem required.