Education

APS Receives Science Education Partnership Award

APS Represented at the National Association of Biology Teachers
2008 Professional Development Conference in Memphis

Margaret Shain (New Albany, IN), a science teacher affiliated with APS education programs since 2000, assisted APS Education Office Coordinators, Melinda Lowy and Mel Limson, in representing the APS at the National Association of Biology Teachers (NABT) 2008 Professional Development Conference in Memphis, TN. The annual national conference attracts middle and high school teachers, as well as community college and four-year college instructors or faculty from across the nation. Shain, Lowy, and Limson showcased APS education programs, fellowships, and awards at the exhibit booth throughout the three-day conference in October.

During the K-12 Outreach Symposium of education programs across the nation, Limson highlighted the development, successful growth, and expansion of the APS’ Physiology Understanding Week (PhUn Week). PhUn Week is the APS’ annual outreach program to K-12 classrooms.

Limson and Shain also presented a PhUn Week workshop that engaged teachers in hands-on activities developed from PhUn Week events, including a Dress-A-Scientist activity to address stereotypes and misconceptions of scientists and a group skit on the comic book The Science of Life, Physiology Research in Action.

Shain shares APS Education programs, resources, and the Frontiers in Physiology fellowship with life science teachers. Visitors to the APS exhibit booth appreciated the APS teacher-developed resources and give-aways, including PhUn Week backpacks, squeezy stars, the book Women Life Scientists, comic books, physiology timelines, career posters and brochures, and lesson plans.
Science educator Margaret Shain asks the workshop audience to Dress-A-Scientist with their perceived notions of a scientist. The demonstration invariably includes a lab coat, goggles, pens, gray hair, a test tube rack, a lab animal, and a microscope. This exercise engages a discussion to debunk the stereotypical characteristics of a scientist.
Teacher participants enjoy acting out the text and drama found in the comic book, The Science of Life, Physiology Research in Action. The comic book explores the field of physiology, and introduces careers in physiology.

APS Receives Science Education Partnership Award
The APS Education Office received a Science Education Partnership Award (SEPA) from the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in support for enhancing the APS’ Frontiers in Physiology Professional Development Fellowship Program for precollege science teachers (http://www.frontiersinphys.org). The APS was one of 16 new awardees in 2008 through the NCRR SEPA program (http://www.nih.gov/news/health/oct2008/ncrr-30.htm ).

Entitled “Six Star Science for Student-Centered Learning,” the APS program provides middle and high school science teachers, their students, and the general public with tools to help them learn about the important contributions that both basic and clinical research make to public health. Through the research and professional development experiences of teachers in the program, they become knowledgeable advocates for the importance of both types of research to our understanding of the human body in both health and disease, and our development of both treatments and prevention of disease and injury. The products developed through the three-year project will be freely accessible online to teachers, students, and the general public in free, easy to access formats and will be promoted via the APS website and the National Science Digital Library.

The Frontiers fellowship program provides science teachers with a framework for creating effective student-centered learning environments within their state-mandated curricula. The project will develop and evaluate a new model summer research program for teachers that retains proven components from the established Frontiers program. The new SEPA program is built on Six Star Science, the APS framework for supporting excellence in science education for diverse students. The “Six Stars” are:
  • Instruction: Student-centered instruction is at the heart of exemplary science education.
  • Diversity: Valuing diversity among students is a defining characteristic of excellence in education.
  • Technology: Integrating technology to enhance learning is particularly important in science.
  • Authentic Assessment: To be authentic, assessment must focus on both content and process skills.
  • Current Content: Utilizing accurate and timely content information is central to scientific study.
  • Reflection: Reflecting on teaching and learning is essential to maintaining excellence in education.

The project has four major goals: develop, evaluate, refine, and disseminate a model and materials to help teachers create Six Star Science learning environments within the context of their state standards-based curricula; build ongoing working relationships between basic and clinical research scientists and science teachers through research, in-service experiences, classroom visits, and online communications; promote the effective implementation of state standards for K-12 content and pedagogy—especially inquiry-based teaching, diversity strategies, and technology use; and provide a model for biomedical research societies and organizations for promoting the public understanding of basic and clinical research and facilitating improvements in science education.

Major products from the project will include the following and will be freely available online: Six Star Science Lab Activities are “cookbook” lessons that are part of RTs’ state-mandated curricula and have been enhanced to promote student-centered learning; “Bench to Bedside” (“BTB”) Primers are four-page handouts that highlight the RT’s summer research project, related clinical research, normal physiology, and health issues.; “Bench to Bedside” (“BTB”) Podcasts are audio/video Podcasts of the BTB Primers; “Bench to Bedside” (“BTB”) online WISE Units for Teachers and Students provide an interactive lesson on basic and clinical research, research ethics, and public health benefits.

If any APS member is interested in hosting and mentoring a teacher for a seven to eight 8 week research experience during the summer of 2009, email Mel Limson, APS K-12 Education Programs Coordinator, at: mlimson@the-aps.org. Program information and applications (jointly submitted with a teacher) are available at: http://www.frontiersinphys.org. Applications are due no later than January 8, 2009.

[Index] [Generating Support for Science in the 111th Congress] [APS News] [Chapter News] [Membership]
[APS Meeting Report] [Mentoring Forum] [Science Policy] [Communications]
[Experimental Biology 2009 Preview] [Positions Available]
[Senior Physiologists’ News] [People & Places] [Books Received] [The Wine Wizard] [Scientific Meetings and Congresses]
[2008 APS Intersociety Meeting] [APS Membership Application]