Time: 9:30am - 11:00am (90 minutes)

Facilitators: Angela Francis, Anthony Canestaro, Dom Fantacone Ph.D.; Jeff Radloff, Ph.D.; Angela Pagano, Ph.D.

This presentation will explore how two NYS Master Teachers from the CNY Region developed and implemented integrated STEM units focused using the 7E model of inquiry-based science instruction. This work was completed as part of their participation in a research grant between SUNY Cortland and the Office of Naval Research. The session will begin with an introduction to the grant and the 7E model of instruction. Angela Francis (CNY Earth Science Teacher) and Anthony Canestaro (CNY Physics Teacher) will then describe their use of the 7E model of instruction to guide their lesson planning and implementation, including the use of 3-dimensional learning and engineering design tasks, in meeting learning objectives. The goal is to provide attendees with a window for creating similar units of study for the secondary classroom as we continue the transition to NYSSLS. This session is most suitable for middle school and high school science teachers.

Intended Audience: High School (9-12) Educators & Integrated STEM

Time: 10:30 - 12:00pm (90 minutes)

Facilitators: Erin Bell, Lisa Fort, Rachel Linehan

In this 90 minute session, we will take a look at how equitable grading practices can support student learning and growth. Looking through the lens of Joe Feldman's three pillars (accuracy, bias resistant and motivational), we will discuss the impact of some of our grading practices and ways to incorporate more equitable ones in our classrooms. We will briefly discuss standards based grading, rubric development, and other small changes that will have a big impact in your classroom.

Intended Audience: High School (9-12) Educators & All Subjects

Time: 8:30 - 10:00am (90 minutes)

Facilitators: Connie, Buchinsky; Mary Pat Keenan; Beth Baldwin; Ange Driscoll; Liz Barvinchak; Maria Fiori; Erin Mellander; Trina Leonard; Keri Teribury

Participants will study, discuss, and practice ways to address the importance of self-care and deal with the secondary trauma that teachers are experiencing. Teacher self-efficacy has been defined as the extent to which a teacher is confident enough in his /her ability to promote students’ learning (Bandura, 1994). Studies have shown that teachers who have a strong self-efficacy are better at increasing student academic performance and motivation to learn. Teachers with a strong self-efficacy perform better in the classroom, foster caring relationships with their students and colleagues, and educate students who are more motivated to learn and succeed. How can a teacher improve their self-efficacy? We will share practices that we have studied and found useful for both ourselves and our students. Teachers of all grade levels and content areas are welcome to attend.

Intended Audience: Educators of All Content Areas AND Grade Levels

Time: 9:00am - 10:30am (90 minutes)

Facilitators: Andrew Ferrone, Toni Lynch, Rana Hughes, Braiden White, Sara Verga, Edie Houle

Are you searching for ways to help your elementary students connect with nature? Would you like to talk with fellow elementary teachers who know the valuable role that nature can play in a student’s learning? A group of NYS Master Teachers, inspired by the positive impact of nature in student learning, have written a read-a-loud text for use in the elementary classroom. They will share the process for creating the text, the connection to specific NYS Learning Standards, and engage the participants in ways to use the text in your classroom.

Intended Audience: Elementary Educators (K-6) & Nature

Time: 9:30am - 11:00am (90 minutes)

Facilitators: Elisa Margarita and Maria Giambanco

With the move towards three dimensional learning, this workshop will focus on using fossils from the Clarkia fossil beds in Idaho as a case study to promote the NGSS standards. The Clarkia area is so dense with well-preserved fossils that it is referred to as a “lagerstätte,” a German phrase meaning “Earth Treasure.” Many fossils in Clarkia are so well preserved, in fact, that leaves look as if they have just fallen from their trees. Paleobotany lends itself to a larger story about life on Earth, connecting easily to both the physical and life sciences. In this workshop, teachers will use actual fossils to identify species and explore the story of the relationship between plants and climate. This activity connects SEPs and CCCs such as analyzing data, drawing conclusions, and generating predictions with processes such as sedimentation, evolution, and climate change. In addition to learning about Clarkia, studying the fossils, and solving the mystery of missing plants, we’ll have two experts we’ll have two experts, Dr. Bill Rember, a paleo-botanist and geologist, and John Cunningham, both of whom have been studying the site for nearly two decades. This course is suitable for all science teachers of any grade level.

Participants who register by June 21, 2022 9am will most likely receive their fossils (sent by USPS) prior to the workshop. Those who register after this date will work with images during the workshop if their fossils do not arrive by June 28, 9:30am. This session is limited to 25 participants.

Intended Audience: Educators of All Grade Levels & Science

Time: 10:00am - 11:30am (90 minutes)

Facilitators: Annmarie Lipinsky and Mary Velez

As STEM educators, how do we ensure our classrooms are culturally responsive? In this interactive workshop, we will explore parts of the NY State Framework for culturally responsive and sustaining education, as well as excerpts from A FRAMEWORK FOR K-12 SCIENCE EDUCATION: Practices, Crosscutting Concepts, and Core Ideas. We will share some of our learning, as well as collaborate and strategize together. There will be time for planning, sharing and interacting.

Intended Audience: Educators of All Grade Levels & All Subjects

Time: 10:30am - 12:00pm (90 minutes)

Facilitators: Meridith Jackson and Heather Pizza

During this session, we will provide an overview of the critical issues within elementary school mathematics classrooms, as outlined by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) in its text, Catalyzing Change in Early Childhood and Elementary Mathematics: Initiating Critical Conversations. As a group, we will discuss current policies, classroom practices, and challenges affecting how students learn mathematics and the NCTM’s recommendations for addressing them. We will share the work our collegial circle has done this year, along with the resources and routines we have collected and implemented to help students develop deeper conceptual understanding, to remove structural obstacles preventing all students from learning, and to implement equitable instructional practices.

Intended Audience: Elementary Educators (K-6) & Mathematics

Time: 12:00pm - 1:30pm (90 minutes)

Facilitators: Kelly Hudson

Are you interested in having student-led discussions in your mathematics classroom? Do you want to push your pedagogy to the next level with regard to questioning and discussion? Then the Socratic seminar is just for you! The Socratic seminar allows students to engage in authentic discussions, take ownership of their opinions and research, and build relationships with each other through conversation. During this workshop, teachers will learn about the traditional use of Socratic seminars, best practices for designing and implementing them, and discover ways of adapting them to meet the needs of their students, both in-person and remotely. Time will be given at the end of the workshop to share ideas and brainstorm how to implement these techniques. This course is intended for middle school mathematics teachers, but can easily be adapted for high school as well.

Intended Audience: Middle School Educators (6-8) & Mathematics

Time: 3:30 - 5:30pm (120 minutes)

Facilitators: Jacqueline Ashley Grey and Jerry Citron

From nuclear waste disposal challenges to air pollution in communities of color, environmental problems are some of the most pressing issues in our world today. In light of these issues, how can we engage our students to analyze environmental problems and propose appropriate solutions? In this session, we will investigate environmental problem-solving strategies. We will describe the systems-based approach to analyzing major selected environmental issues. We will also highlight how case studies and dimensional analysis can be used to implement problem solving in an environmental science classroom.

Intended Audience: High School Educators (9-12) & Science

Time: 8:30 - 10:00am (90 minutes)

Facilitator: JoEllen Schuleman

Ignite your students’ love of engineering through a 3D printing unit rooted in space. Students begin by engaging in a real world 3D design project then transition to space to become immersed in an iterative design process, while creating stomp rockets for a self-imagined mission to space. This sessions is geared to upper elementary (4-6) grades but teachers of all grades and content areas welcome to attend.

Intended Audience: Elementary Educators (4-6) & Engineering

Time: 9:00 - 10:30am (90 minutes)

Facilitator: Alexandria Margiotta and Thomas Tokarski

Calling all STEM teachers! This workshop is being presented by the Mid-Hudson Real World Data PLT and will work through exploring various resources and opportunities to engage your students in incorporating real world data into their STEM learning. Throughout this 90 minute session we will share resources for incorporating real world data into your classroom teaching, ways that you can assess students using real world data, and incorporate real world data into 3D learning and the NYSSLS. If you are interested in utilizing real world data into your STEM teaching and getting students to be engaged in reading and analyzing graphs, then this is the workshop for you. There will be time to share your data resources and work together to explore student work and classroom learning opportunities.

Intended Audience: High School Educators (9-12) & Integrated STEM

Time: 9:30 - 11:00am (90 minutes)

Facilitator: Corey Levin

How do we ensure entry points for all learners while creating group dynamics that focus on practicing mathematical habits of mind? This talk will utilize a station lesson structure that can be implemented for a plethora of topics across grade levels.

Intended Audience: Upper Elementary Educators (4-6) & Mathematics

Time: 10:30 - 12:00pm (90 minutes)

Facilitator: JoEllen Schuleman and Shakira Provasoli

Are you currently using hydroponics in your classroom and seeking ways to extend and link your lab to the current climate change crisis? Would you like to inspire agency and activism in your students as they engage in hands-on, authentic, and self-driven experiences? Hydroponic systems are ripe with opportunity for student-designed investigations that model real climate concerns. Learn how to support your students in setting up multiple climate investigations utilizing any of your systems.

Intended Audience: Elementary Educators (4-6) & Science

Time: 10:30 - 12:00pm (90 minutes)

Facilitator: Matthew Slauson

This session will go over the basics of setting up an Arduino microcontroller. It will cover sourcing components and creating mechanisms. The focus will be on sensing and control with simple inputs and outputs with a goal of creating simple automations. The general focus will be on motor control examples where you can create a variety of devices that require movement. Examples of automated device and coding will be demonstrated.

Intended Audience: High School Educators (9-12) & Engineering

Time: 11:00 - 12:30pm (90 minutes)

Facilitator: Grace Bennett

How might we rethink the “explain” phase of NGSS-aligned 5E sequences? Have you ever considered letting students do the explaining? In this PLT, teachers will learn how the 5E model supports the NGSS and will develop skills to design a captivating, student-driven, and phenomenon-based "explain" phase -- the most critical step to students achieving mastery of the NGSS. We will begin by reviewing the 5Es, select an NGSS performance expectation to plan around, and determine relevant phenomena. Then, we will share examples of engaging “explain” phases to guide teachers as they collaboratively plan for their own virtual or in-person classrooms. Finally, teachers will share student work cultivated during the “explain” phase and exchange feedback with the group. This course is intended for middle and high school science teachers who want to utilize the 5Es to better align their curriculum with the NGSS. Teachers of all grade levels are welcome to attend.

Intended Audience: Middle School Educators (6-8) & Science

Time: 12:00 - 1:30pm (90 minutes)

Facilitator: Aziz Jumash

The talk will demonstrate non-standard applications of quadratic equations and the quadratic formula. The problems covered include denesting nested radicals such as sqrt(2+sqrt(3)), finding the range of a rational function, solving higher degree equations, and demonstrating that Cardano's method of solving cubic equations involves the quadratic formula.The presentation can be modified based on the time and audience preferences.

Intended Audience: High School Educators (9-12) & Mathematics

Time: 12:30 - 2:00pm (90 minutes)

Facilitator: Michelle Layer and Kirsten Provenzano

Join NYS Master Teachers from Western NY to discuss effective mentoring practices for supporting colleagues in various stages of their career, from preservice to multi year in-service teachers. the discussion welcomes a broad range fo topics incuding teaching virtually, implementing co-teaching models, high-leverage practices, assessment of candidates in their field experience navigating virtual/remote learning, and other related issues will be discussed. Participants will be encouraged to share their mentoring experiences too. This workshop welcomes teachers of all grade levels.

Intended Audience: All Educators (K-12) & All Subjects

Time: 8:30 - 10:00am (90 minutes)

Facilitator: Barbara Butka, Jennifer Rightmyer, Deb Henry, Nick Darrah, Heidi Libertella, and Joanne Demars

A group of NYS Master Teachers inspired by several different pirate-themed books (Teach Like a Pirate, Tech Like a Pirate, Play Like a Pirate, Explore Like a Pirate) will share how they use the texts as a launching pad to design strategies tailored for their own classrooms to boost student engagement and achievement, including games (traditional and digital), tech tools (high and low tech), exploration (near and far), and the concept of “piracy.” Participants will leave the workshop with a multitude of examples to use in the classroom (i.e. March Math Madness, Headbands, Action Figures, Trading Cards, etc.). Teachers of all grade levels and content areas are welcome to attend.

Intended Audience: All Educators (K-12) & All Subjects

Time: 10:30am - 12:30pm (120 minutes)

Facilitator: Theresa Smith, Greg Bartholdi, and Mark McGuire

How can you get your students out of the classroom? Or, do you want to bring the outdoors inside? We will discuss lesson/trip/activities that will help you bring some excitement and adventure into your classroom! Our PLT has gone on a few adventures and we can't wait to share them with you! Bring your sense of adventure and go where few teachers dare to go! Extensive knowledge of science is not needed. The presentation will focus on science but teachers of all content areas are welcome to attend.

Intended Audience: High School Educators (9-12) & All Subjects

Time: 2:00 - 4:00pm (120 minutes)

Facilitator: Alexander Lord and Maria Leon Chu

Are you looking to incorporate more projects into your Calculus class but unsure where to start? Join us as we explore some of the in-class and long-term projects that have successfully been implemented with calculus students. Topics addressed will include limits, optimization, area, volume, and more. We will showcase sample student projects and address any questions to help teachers design calculus projects for their classrooms. This session is recommended for all current and prospective teachers of calculus.

Intended Audience: High School Educators (9-12) & Mathematics

Time: 8:30 - 10:00am (90 minutes)

Facilitator: Lauren Couto

This April, Lauren Couto spent an unforgettable week, collaborating with science teachers from around the country on conservation projects in Yellowstone National Park. She will share about her fellowship with Ecological Project International and we will learn more about their trips and explore their resources.

Intended Audience: High School Educators (9-12) & Science