Science

A link to an OER STEM resource for adult learners. 

https://lincs.ed.gov/programs/oerstem

This Link: open.NASA.gov is NASA's open door to your innovation future using NASA's data and tools.

https://open.nasa.gov/

NOAA Educational Resources

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration offers resources related to climatology, geography, environmental science, marine biology, history, and collections of open data for research.  There are even links to citizen science programs that learners of all ages can participate in! 

https://www.noaa.gov/education

NOAA Fisheries 

This division of NOAA supports educational opportunities for all sectors of the public—from preschoolers to postgraduates and educators to fishermen. Explore this website to find educational resources, professional development opportunities, and upcoming events. 

https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/outreach-and-education

View and download digitized images and documents from manuscript and photograph collections at UCSF. Useful to medical librarian and medical researchers. Not closed access. Over 90 collections. Focus is mostly on AIDS research anti Anti Smoking/Anti Tobacco research. 

https://calisphere.org/UCSF/collections/

CitizenScience.gov is designed to accelerate the use of crowdsourcing and citizen science across the U.S. government. The site provides a portal to a catalog of federally supported citizen science projects, a toolkit to assist federal practitioners with designing and maintaining their projects, and a gateway to a community of hundreds of citizen science practitioners and coordinators across government.

https://www.citizenscience.gov/ 

The Paleobiology database, is a free service that provides information about the history of life on earth cross referencing geography and geology as well as written works and articles about fossils and their locations. It would be useful to a student life sciences or earth sciences that is seeking an understanding of the history of life, including where and when specific forms of life could be found. It also provides information as to how many and what type of fossils can be found in specific fossil bearing locations.

The Paleobiology Database. https://paleobiodb.org/#/

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1bJOOVaorP-Ev4-ZgaVD7MjvssACOhV9tJiib74oyGHI/edit?usp=sharing 

This link takes you to a short presentation covering how to use the Paleobiology Database. It also includes a brief description of some of the uses of the Paleobiology Database.

Additional Videos 

Paleobio Database Navigator Intro

Retrieving images with PBDB

Summarize occurrence data from PBDB with Excel

Downloading occurrence data from PBDB and find genus ranges 

The Digital Atlas of Ancient Life provides, for free, a virtual collection of fossils from a wide array of life forms. It sorts its collection by their taxonomic classification and allows for exploration of similar forms of life. The collection is made up of 3D models that can be manipulated by the user to examine the fossils in more detail. In some cases they provide 3D models of what the fossil may have looked like in the flesh.

https://www.digitalatlasofancientlife.org/vc/

Virtual Collection. Digital Atlas of Ancient Life. (n.d.). https://www.digitalatlasofancientlife.org/vc/. 

The Natural History Museum of Los Angeles provides access to the databases of their many collections for free through this website. They provide information on paleontology, anthropology, entomology, and mineralogy through their various collections. Since the museum is connected to the La Brea Tar Pits it also provides access to the database of this important fossil site.

https://collections.nhm.org/

Picco, M. (n.d.). Our Collections: Natural History Museum of Los Angeles. NHM Collections. https://collections.nhm.org/. 

The University of Michigan Online Repository of Fossils is a collection of paleontological information presented in both images and 3D models. They also provide taxonomic information for the specimens, historical drawings, and images and models of exhibits that were previously on display at the University of Michigan Museum of Natural History. This collections is available for free.

https://umorf.ummp.lsa.umich.edu/wp/

UMORF: University of Michigan Online Repository of Fossils. UMORF University of Michigan Online Repository of Fossils. (n.d.). https://umorf.ummp.lsa.umich.edu/wp/. 

Visitors of Space.com can explore astronomy, innovation, the latest news and discoveries and more.

https://www.space.com/

The archives of the California Institute of Technology. Categories in the collection include images, oral histories, lab notes and more.

https://archives.caltech.edu/collections/digital-collections.html

This Learning Lab is a collection of resources about scientific topics. The site includes tabs to discover, create, share, and learn. Within this website there are a number of more specific collections that cover a range of topics such as: social studies, language arts, science, and arts. This website could be used as a learning tool for students or as a way to supplement lessons and instruction for teachers and teacher librarians.

https://learninglab.si.edu/ 

Smithsonian. (2021). Smithsonian Learning Lab. https://learninglab.si.edu/ 

The ultimate STEM guide for kids: 239 cool sites about science, technology, engineering and math.

Science Snacks are hands-on, teacher-tested activities that bring explorations of natural phenomena into the classroom and home. Each activity uses inexpensive, easily-available materials, offers detailed instructions and images, provides a clear explanation of what's going on, and is adaptable to a wide range of curricula, content areas, grade levels, and settings.

https://www.exploratorium.edu/snacks

Exploratorium. (n.d.). What is a science snack? Retrieved March 23, 2021, from https://www.exploratorium.edu/snacks?gclid=Cj0KCQjwo-aCBhC-ARIsAAkNQiuvKb3sKAV08_Im0G6Kkv4zDU8udtJPN2RY8wz7zzlIGjlKabVwAXsaAtL2EALw_wcB This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Attribution: Exploratorium Teacher Institute

Collection of resources, including lesson plans, from the USGS for teachers and school librarians working in K-12 classrooms as well as those seeking informal educational activities related to geology and ecology. The Teacher Resources page links to a weekly "Learn from Home" project as well as maps, learning activities, and multimedia resources organized by grade range.

https://www.usgs.gov/science-support/osqi/yes/resources-teachers

TED-ed brings us a collection of videos with accompanying lesson plans including interactive online questions, discussion questions, and additional resources to use in K-12 education. Many topics are included like science, geography, and history. Each lesson has a short, animated video that grabs the attention of students and gives a visual representation of the lesson, creating engaging and meaningful connections.

https://ed.ted.com/lessons?category=science-technology&direction=desc&sort=featured-position

Lessons worth sharing. (n.d). Retrieved from https://ed.ted.com/lessons?category=science-technology&direction=desc&sort=featured-position

This article explores the idea of using Digital Natural History Collections in K-12 education to increase engagement, foster connections to content, and expand accessibility for students. iDigPaleo brings collections of fossils to students wherever they are which can be utilized to support the Next Generation Science Standards in the classroom. For example, students can explore and access collections of insect fossils, fossils from the cretaceous period, and fossils from the Florissant Fossil beds. By creating a free account, educators can gain access to lesson plans and functionality of a learning management system for their students through the site. This gives students the ability to measure fossils, explore their backgrounds, and even annotate pictures.

https://idigpaleo.org/

Flemming, A., Phillips, M., Shea, E. K., Bolton, A., Lincoln, C., Green, K., Mast, A. & Cubeta, M. A. (2020). Using digital natural history collections in K-12 STEM education. Journal of Museum Education, 45(4), 450-461. DOI: 10.1080/10598650.2020.1833296

Link to Article: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10598650.2020.1833296

Link to Collection: https://idigpaleo.org/