Educator Learning Opportunities

This one-day course will equip teachers with the background and rationale necessary to develop and conduct a field experience at the Poudre Learning Center using Grade Level Expectations (GLEs) from the Colorado State Standards. Teachers will become familiar with how to use the PLC GLE-based field experience template to design an inquiry-based field experience for their students that uses claims, evidence, reasoning and justification in a real-world context. This course is for teachers currently bringing students to the PLC as well as teachers new to the PLC field experience.

This course is designed to assist science teachers in shifting the paradigm from abstract and unconnected classroom activities, worksheets, and fact-based assessments to a well-organized learning progression that includes real problems, real measurements, real data from real places, real conclusions, real communications, and real cultural significance. The overarching themes of water, biodiversity, carbon, and climate change will be addressed by the study of one of our most precious resources: soil.

Upon completion of this course, the student will be able to apply astronomical concepts and techniques to organize and run a community astronomy night with specific observational goals for the participants.
Questions to be addressed:
1. How is the celestial sphere organized to locate objects?
2. What type of observations can be made using different techniques and technology?
3. What historical observations were made to develop the current model of our universe?
4. How does satellite data help us understand our past, present and future place in the universe?
5. What are the essential components of a community observational astronomy group?

This 4 day workshop will be a hands-on water education with a focus on Inquiry based learning. Project Wet Curriculum will be used along with Waterwise Colorado materials. The workshop includes a field tour, a daylong canoe trip and a "graduation" BBQ. Participants will receive Project Wet and Waterwise Colorado curriculum.