Teacher Resources

Making data sing so everyone can dance and tell the stories. 

Teaching/Coaching Resources

Teachers of any subject can get their students involved.  Whether your students focus on historical trends, scientific poetry, or creative mathematical visualizations, we want to support you and your students throughout this competition! 

• Please visit our “Content & Skills support" page for free activities, videos, articles, and more.

• A more extensive list of relevant videos is available on our "Content Support Videos" page

• Participation in Data Jam can fulfill NGSS and MA STE Curriculum Guidelines. Click the link to learn how.

• Click here for advice and encouragement from veteran Data Jam coaches from Hudson Data Jam, sponsored by the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies. NES LTER is building our list of veteran coaches and would love to share your advice and encouragement if you'd like to share it!

• Veteran DJ teacher, Christine Adamson, shares her timeline for doing Data Jam with ALL of her 8th grade students, developed through experience. Links to other valuable resources are included on the pdf below.

How to support a great Data Jam project:

Step 1: Familiarize yourself with the resources on this webpage.

Step 2: Attend webinars/workshops (optional!) offered by or shared through our Schoolyard program.

Step 3: Pre-register your students for the competition.

Don’t worry if you don’t know how many teams of students you’ll have or what they’ll be studying yet. Registering tells us that you’re planning to get involved and gives us a chance to help your teams out. This also helps us plan the contest judging.

Pre-registrations are required by May 1. ***All team information will be entered during project submission, not during registration.

Step 4: Submit parent/guardian consent forms.

Please distribute the link https://tinyurl.com/NES-DJ-PermissionForm or printable consent forms to each participating student. Receipt of a digitally signed form will be confirmed by an email to the listed teacher/team advisor. If using the printed form, copies must be uploaded (digitally) with project submissions.

Step 5: Support your students in their projects.

We encourage you to register early and request a classroom visit if you'd like, and email us if you have any questions about the data or your projects. 

You can find great Data Literacy support through Dataspire.org for K-12.  Annette is a huge fan!

Don't hesitate to reach out (abrickley.edu at gmail.com) with any questions that you or your students have about the competition or the individual datasets. We can forward your questions to the appropriate person to get your students the most helpful answers about the science! We are truly passionate about data and supporting you in your work, so don't hesitate to reach out!

TEACHER Professional Development- links to webinars and workshops are available on the FAQ page. Scroll down to "Workshops".