KnowAtom's Blog

“Culture eats strategy – and programs—for breakfast.”

This quote is KnowAtom’s take on the quip attributed to management guru Peter Drucker, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast,” which emphasizes the critical role that an organization’s culture—even more than any strategy it might develop—plays in that organization’s success.

With the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) at or near the classroom implementation stage in most states, principals and teachers have come together to discuss their interpretations. Everyone involved is doing their best to understand where they need to be in September.

The problem facing all educators, early elementary through high school, is that few classrooms have ever taught science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) effectively. While "science classes" have been taught PK-12 for decades, many educators are now questioning if they've ever really taught students science, and if not, what effective STEM instruction is and what it looks like.

Innovative companies like iRobot face many of the same challenges as teachers and school districts that are adopting and beginning to implement the Next Generation Science Standards.

The Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy are the next generation of K–12 literacy standards.

In grades 6-12, Common Core State Standards require teachers of history/social studies, science, and technical subjects to use their content area expertise to help students and ELA teachers meet the particular challenges of reading, writing, speaking, listening, and language in their respective fields.

For this reason, there are a number of crossovers between the Next Generation Science Standards and Common Core ELA standards.

To implement the Next Generation Science Standards well, prepare yourself for the major shifts in teaching and learning that are involved in your classroom, your building, and your district.

The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) are changing the K-12 science classroom. Memorizing facts and recalling demonstrations aren't enough under these new standards.

Classrooms now need to focus on engaging students in the practices of science and engineering, teaching students to analyze, evaluate, problem-solve, and create – facilitating the development of higher order thinking skills through STEM experiences.

Educators sometimes underestimate the shifts in teacher practices that are required under the Next Generation Science Standards.

The Next Generation Science Standards call for dramatic shifts in teaching and learning. It will be important to go about implementation carefully and thoughtfully.

There are concrete steps that educators and administrators can take to ensure a successful implementation.

The Next Generation Science Standards envision students learning as scientists and engineers. This is really a new approach to learning that sets students up to be critical thinkers and innovators. It's no longer about doing science but about being scientists; not doing engineering but being engineers.

As classrooms begin to implement NGSS and work to achieve this vision, there are inevitably some challenges that will come to the forefront.

Every year, teachers move. Sometimes they move within their schools to teach a different grade or subject matter, and sometimes they change schools entirely.

Called churn, this is a very real issue in public schools. This is common with both administrators and teachers, and it affects both the speed of implementation and student achievement levels.

Educators frequently want to know what kind of investment is expected in order to implement NGSS in schools. This is a difficult question to answer.

The Next Generation Science Standards are inquiry-based standards, which inherently require students to be put into the role of scientist and engineer.

That requires certain materials because the NGSS standards are all about investigative phenomena happening in the classroom in real time.

Budgeting enough science time on learning will go a long way toward helping districts successfully implement the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS).

If you don’t have enough time on learning for science, your implementation of NGSS will likely run into some significant hurdles.

This is because of the importance of effective STEM instruction under NGSS . The National Research Council definition of effective science instruction is that it capitalizes on students’ early interest experiences and builds on it. 

Summer is winding down, which means that most educators are back in the classroom.

In short, NGSS-aligned curriculum does not demonstrate the same depth of thinking as curriculum intentionally designed to help students think critically, meet the performance expectations, and step into the shoes of scientists and engineers. To see why, it’s helpful to look at specific differences between aligned and designed curriculum, then discuss how we might go about designing classrooms for true alignment to the Next Generation Science Standards.

According to the National  Research  Council’s  2011  definition of effective STEM instruction (a definition that helped lay the foundation of what would become the Next Generation Science Standards), "Effective STEM instruction capitalizes on students’ early interests and experiences, identifies and builds on what  they  know, and provides them with experiences to engage them in the practices of science and sustain their interest."