Science Literacy Resources
Tips for Reading Nonfiction
Need help reading Science text and articles? Use these core strategies to tackle even the most complex informational texts, focusing on Key Ideas and Details, Craft and Structure and Integration of Knowledge and Ideas. Tips for Reading Nonfiction
Science Notebook Strategies
Scientists keep notebooks. The scientist’s notebook is a detailed record of his or her engagement with scientific phenomena. It is a personal representation of experiences, observations, and thinking. A scientist’s notebook is a continuously updated history of the development of scientific knowledge and reasoning. Below are some examples to help get you started.
Guide to Using Interactive Notebooks in the Science Classroom
NSTA Science Notebooks Collection - Articles in NSTA journals on the topic as well as other online resources
Examples of Student writing – K-12 Science - Writing samples that have been annotated to illustrate the criteria required to meet the State Standards for particular types of writing—argument, informative/explanatory text, and narrative—in a given grade. Each of the samples exhibits at least the level of quality required to meet the writing standards for that grade.
Note-taking: A Research Roundup – Podcast and collection of note taking resources for K-12 students
California Academy of Sciences – Science Notebooking Resources
Using Sentence Frames – Student Examples – Constructing Explanations
Collecting and Analyzing Data – Gallery of Student Examples
Talk Strategies with Science Notebooks
Sketchnotes
What are Sketchnotes? Sketchnoting in the Classroom
Sketchnote in Science Sketchnotes in Earth Science
Cornell Notes
The Cornell Note Taking System
Improving Cornell Notes with Sketchnoting
Free Nonfiction Literacy Resources
FYI – This is a free resource that allows you to search for quality nonfiction science articles by topic or grade level (K-12 grades).
CommonLit – delivers high-quality, free instructional materials to support literacy development for students in grades 5-12. Resources are: Flexible; Research-Based; Aligned to the Common Core State Standards; Created by teachers, for teachers. We believe in the transformative power of a great text, and a great question. That’s why we are committed to keeping CommonLit completely free, forever. (6-12 grades)
DOGO Media – is a next-generation online network empowering kids to engage with digital media in a fun, safe and social environment. “DOGO” means young or small in Swahili. While our young fans may be small, they act BIG as they engage with our websites and express their opinions on the content that interests and inspires them.
SVVSD Digital Library
Sora is St. Vrain’s digital library. All students, teachers, and staff have access to SORA with their district credentials. Offers eBooks, AudioBooks and Streaming Media, including over 52,000 copies for elementary, middle and high school students. Many titles have both an eBook and AudioBook version, and many titles have multiple copies. Reaching all readers and interests, there are also over 900 titles available elementary students including embedded audio with more books to be added. You can enjoy this library anytime and anywhere on a computer, iPad, smartphone, or eReader.
To access this application, users must login using ClassLink. Add the application from the App Library. If you are using an iPad, the iOS app is not required but can be used. Audiobooks require the iOS app.
Nature Journals
Great for connecting with nature, building observational skills, and learning more about the biodiversity in your back yard. You can access this book FREE here
Here’s the preview of content - anyone can do this and it works just as well from your home as it does on a walk in your neighborhood: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/cams/
Claim Evidence Reasoning (CER)
Communicate As A Scientist - Student Slide Deck for Intro to CER
CER Rubrics, Sentence Starters & Research Articles - This is a collection of templates to help students to get practice at identifying a claim, selecting evidence, and writing up the reasoning for the link between the two. Most rubrics include sentence frames to guide their writing.
NSTA - The elements of Claim, Evidence, Reasoning - This column provides how-to strategies and practical advice for the science teacher. The CER framework helps students synthesize science investigations, data analysis, and scientific concepts by having them focus on elements: Claim, Evidence, Reasoning.
Edutopia - Designing Science Inquiry: Claim + Evidence + Reasoning = Explanation - The Claim, Evidence, Reasoning framework is a scaffolded way to teach the scientific method.
Modeling Teaching - An Introduction to CER - Tips for Teachers - We all want our students to “think like a scientist,” but often they fall short in connecting the dots between the lab results and the science concepts. Claim-Evidence-Reasoning (CER) is a writing strategy that can develop a student’s analytical thinking and argumentative writing skills to turn that “I don’t know” into “aha, so that’s why we got those results in the lab.”
Argument and Explanation - Tools for using them together while keeping them separate