The importance of being flexible:

1. The importance of being flexible: Adapting ARMs for varied audiences

2. GK-12 Project Goals: • Goal 1: Improve Fellows’ communication, teaching, and team building skills to prepare them for their role as communicators either in academia or in the broad range of careers open to them beyond academia.* • Goal 2: Enhance high school science teachers’ ability to deliver research-and-inquiry-based instruction to urban students. • Goal 3: Develop high levels of science interest and achievement in high school students, especially in their early high school years, through participation in interdisciplinary ARMS* activities. • Goal 4: Institutionalize the Science Now GK-12 activities within CUNY and the NYC public high schools. • Goal 5: Document and disseminate project outcomes and activities and develop a replicable model for use of authentic research experiences in the secondary school science curriculum. http://web.gc.cuny.edu/case/gk12/info.htm

3. Our ARMs were developed in a variety of classrooms: • classes culminating in a Regents exam • research classes • extra-curricular clubs • classes with advanced students • classes with struggling students • classes with mixed ages, abilities, or level of interest Although the course we develop is intended to be free-standing, we must be aware of our audience’s needs.

4. Regents classes • Familiarize yourself with the curriculum; ask for your co-teacher’s course outline. • Get a list of important vocabulary terms. • Go through your planned lessons and create a supplemental list of Regent’s vocabulary that is applicable to each lesson. • Emphasize those words while conducting the lesson. • Explicitly state the ideas from the Regents curriculum that are applicable to your lesson/activity.

5. Research classes • Can be one of the most conducive environments for the intended goals of GK-12 ARMs. • Assess your students’ levels of interest and aptitude. • It is difficult for students to think of a research project; guide them and be prepared to make suggestions • have several questions/ hypotheses they can choose from. • show them how to find papers that identify gaps.

6. Extra-curricular Clubs • Most similar in format to actual College Now courses • Student members have joined willingly; allowing you an interested (not captive) audience. • Longer time per meeting, but fewer meetings per week • harder to learn names! ( labeled photo? name tags?) • important to maintain communication between meetings (blogging? emails?) • Can be difficult to find a teacher who will devote additional time beyond the school day. In this case you must make it as easy for the teacher as possible: • email your lesson plan far in advance and ask for input • handle photocopying and requests for supplies well in advance of meeting.

7. Classes with Advanced/Struggling Students • Most difficult in classes of mixed-ability: requires multiple activities/plans (differentiation). • Identifying who’s who (this may vary with the type of activity/topic of lesson) • Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences. • Students can work on the same concept from different angles and different levels of complexity • Bloom’s taxonomy

8. Nine Types of Curriculum Adaptations Quantity* Time* Level of Support* Adapt the number of items that the learner is expected to learn or complete. For example: Reduce the number of social studies terms a learner must learn at any one time. Adapt the time allotted and allowed for learning, task completion, or testing. For example: Individualize a timeline for completing a task; pace learning differently (increase or decrease) for some learners. Increase the amount of personal assistance with a specific learner. For example: Assign peer buddies, teaching assistants, peer tutors, or cross age tutors. Input* Output* Difficulty Adapt the skill level, problem type, or the rules on how the learner may approach the work. For example: Allow the use of a calculator to figure math problems; simplify taskdirections; change rules to accommodate learnerneeds. Adapt how the student can respond to instruction. For example: Instead of answering questions in writing, allow a verbal response, use a communication book for some students, allow students to show knowledge with hands on materials. Adapt the way instruction is delivered to the learner. For example: Use different visual aids, enlarge text, plan more concrete examples, provide hands-on activities, place students in cooperative groups. Participation* Alternate Goals Substitute Curriculum Adapt the goals or outcome expectations while using the same materials. For example: In social studies, expect a student to be able to locate just the states while others learn to locate capitals as well. Adapt the extent to which a learner is actively involved in the task. For example: In geography, have a student hold the globe, while others point out locations. Provide different instruction and materials to meet a learner’s individual goals. For example: During a language test one student is learning computer skills in the computer lab.

9. Estuary Explorers adaptations • Term 1: Living Environment class, grades 8 and 9 • Term 2: After-school program, grades 9-11, one disabled person • Term 3: After-school program, grades 4-7, some special needs kids

10. Activity: Bloom’s taxonomy and your ARM • Create 6 question or activities that support the overarching goal for your ARM, or the goals for one of your units. • There should be one question/activity for each level of Bloom’s taxonomy

11. Example from Estuary Explorers ARMGoal: Students develop increased understanding of local environment and scientific process • Level 1: Knowledge Identify 6 plants/ birds/etc… that you see on our nature walk. • Level 2: Comprehension Compare two of the birds. How are they different? Are they adapted for the same habitat? • Level 3: Application Create a list of 5 plants and 8 animals that live in the same habitat. Draw lines with captions to show how each of these organisms depend on/ interact with each other • Level 4: Analysis What could negatively impact some of these organisms? Which human activities could help/ hurt these organisms? • Level 5: Synthesis Create a hypothesis about your favorite animal. (Suggestions: what influences its population or whereabouts; favorite foods; correlation with other species). Design an experiment to test your hypothesis. • Level 6: Evaluation Write a literature review pertaining to your experimental design, citing 10 peer-reviewed journal articles, OR select 5 peer-reviewed journal articles. Write down the hypotheses and conclusions from each. Prepare bibliography.