Mid-Year Reflection

I am now slightly past the mid-year point in my position as Citizen Science Resource Teacher . I started this blog in September to provide a record of the thinking, philosophy, experiences and questions that are the ongoing framework for my new role. Like any blog, however, it is also a place for personal reflection and self-evaluation which arguably is the intent of most blogs unless one has a professional need and/or interest in launching a public forum.


To date, I believe Mindtalker has succeeded in the following ways:

• it has explained the shift in focus I made from looking at supporting lower school students as Citizen Naturalist as opposed to Citizen Scientists - the number of posts related to this change reflect its importance in how I now view my position
• followed the areas I have experimented with that are outside of the original description of my job - and yet relevant to my role a participant in the development of the Harley Commons (e.g. "design thinking" post)
• offered insights into the PLN (personal learning network) that stimulates and challenges my thinking

The current limitations of this blog have been that it has highlighted such a small area of my work that it does not provide a good overview of what I am about day-to-day, week-to-week, month-to-month. In part this is the result of wanting to keep the posts short enough in length and few enough in number that they could realistically be used for outside evaluation. However at this point, I believe it is worth adding a number of annotated links to provide a more complete picture.


The Harley Green Pages
I created The Harley Green Pages to showcase environmentally related science activities, programs, etc. at N-12

• it is added to weekly
• it is linked to the main Harley Web page
• it was in response to a NYSIS recommendation that Harley better highlight the work being done in the area of science N-12

PB Afield
This links to an ongoing record of the Primary B Project which was initiated in September 2012 by myself and the Primary B teachers, Marilyn Fenster and Gail Hanns. It includes:

• a sequential unfolding of project activities
• video and slide presentations
• it also links back to The Harley Green Pages

Nature Photo Club
Research I did as part of the Primary B project supported my intuitive belief that photography can be a powerful way to connect students to the natural environment. For this reason, I agreed to run a weekly Nature Photo Club as part of the Middle School Club Program. The link above is a slide presentation of examples of students' work and was created to provide a focus point for critical self-evaluation by students as well as for discussions/suggestions.

 Grade 6 Shade-Coffee CS Project
I created this site of resources for the grade six students who have elected to undertake a Citizen Science project to bring the issue of Shade vs Sun Coffee to our local retailers. This project is being undertaken during advisory periods when time allows. That the students have created three presentations, including a play for lower school, in the limited time available for this work is testimony to their enthusiasm and conviction. I have served as adult mentor for this project since its inception.

Water - Grade 10 General Science
I am working with Mary Anne Evans to create an environmental water study unit for her Grade 10 General Chemistry class. This link is a collection of resources, including 8 short video links, that are relevant to this project. Mining the Internet for teachers has emerged as one of the most important aspects of my position. To locate age-appropriate, stimulating, scientifically accurate and useful resources requires more time than any full-time teacher has.

There are a half dozen other areas in which I am providing feedback, resources and other support, but I feel this post represents a good sampling of my work through February.