WSST Conference 2025

In this session I will show you how I use the various DNA Kits in my classroom from 3D Molecular Designs. I will also show you how I tie them together. I use these kits with my students in Project Lead the Way Principles of Biomedical Science when we discuss DNA structure and function and genetics. I use them to demonstrate types of chromosomes, where genes are located and the why behind the letters we use in Punnett Squares. I use these models to show the differences between heterozygous and homozygous alleles to allow the students to see what happens at the DNA level so they understand why we have those differences and how they show up in proteins. I use this kit with the Flow of Genetic Information kit and protein folding when we talk about protein synthesis and the dynamic DNA kit when we talk about genetics and DNA.

Obtaining food to meet our energy and matter needs is a basic requirement of humans, in addition to helping define our cultural practices and ways of life. This presentation will share how to use elements of the three dimensions of the NGSS and Framework to engage students in making sense of phenomena and problems related to the production and consumption of food. Strategies for how to use driving question boards, 3-dimensional learning outcomes, and engagement of all learners will be shared.
Students will ask questions for how perfect apples are mass produced, how nutrients and environmental factors affect the quality of fruit, and how to attain the right balance of sweet-tart flavor. This storyline weaves together concepts such as meiosis and mitosis, pedigrees and probability, plant structure and function, nutrient cycles, and the role of photosynthesis in producing food in order to explain why it took 30 years to produce the Honeycrisp apple.

Have you ever posed a scientific question to your students only to hear crickets? Have you ever planned an intriguing investigation only to have it flop because of lack of student engagement? In this session, science teachers will explore practical strategies to cultivate a classroom culture that inspires curiosity, fosters collaboration, and maximizes student engagement. Participants will learn how to create an environment where students feel valued, safe to take risks, and excited to explore the wonders of science. Through guided discussions, case studies, and hands-on activities, teachers will discover techniques to promote active learning, build a sense of community, and develop classroom routines that support inquiry-based and student-centered teaching. By the end of the session, educators will leave with a toolkit of strategies to strengthen student connections, enhance participation, and create a dynamic classroom atmosphere where students are motivated and eager to learn.

In the OpenSciEd Instructional Model students are presented with puzzling phenomena that elicit a variety of questions that motivate the learning in the unit. These anchoring phenomena draw students into the storyline by presenting the natural challenge of explaining something or solving a problem. Other phenomena may be introduced at key points in a storyline to maintain interest or push students to delve more deeply. To help teachers and students advance through a unit storyline, the instructional model takes advantage of five routines—activities that play specific roles in advancing the storyline with supports to help students achieve the objectives of those activities. The routines typically follow a pattern as students kick off a unit of study, surface and investigate different questions they have, put the pieces together from those investigations, and then problematize the next set of questions to investigate. In this session participants will engage as “students” with an OSE lesson to experience these routines from both the teacher and student lens. Additional supports and resources will be shared so that teachers can go back to the classroom ready to teach a 3-dimensional lesson.

How do you assess young elementary students in science? How do you measure progress in the NGSS Science and Engineering Practices? I have developed rubrics that allow me to chart the growth of my grades 1-4 students, using the SEP as my standards. I will share students' work samples from a variety of units and show how I use the rubrics to record and share their progress. My rubrics can be used with students to set goals, clarify expectations, and teach explicitly. They can also be used to share progress with parents, and they can support a standards based report card system. This session will allow participants to review the rubrics and discuss the pros and cons of using them in their own teaching practices.

Milk is an important food product that provides all of the nutrients that young mammals need to survive early in life. Learning from populations that can digest dairy can help provide solutions to humans who choose to consume it into adulthood, despite the inability to do so naturally. Because of this demand, milk and dairy products altogether continue to be an important aspect of agriculture.

Participants will engage in a new storyline that tasks students with constructing and revising explanations based on evidence for why dairy is such an important agricultural product and source of food energy. The Milk storyline is the 7th in a series being developed by a group of 25+ educators from the midwest for science and agriculture teachers that engage students in developing explanations for agricultural phenomena and solving real-world problems. Students utilize the three dimensions of NGSS as they learn about food systems or the production, processing, distribution, and consumption of food products and interactions with the natural environment. Intentional emphasis is placed on developing skills related to the Scientific & Engineering Practices and building Crosscutting Concepts.

In this professional learning session, participants will explore the power of science notebooks as tools to deepen student sensemaking and engagement in the science classroom. Science notebooks offer students opportunities to document their observations, make connections, and reflect on their learning in ways that support critical thinking and collaboration.
Through interactive activities and real-world examples, you’ll leave with ideas and resources to make science notebooking a meaningful part of your students’ learning journey. This session is ideal for educators seeking to empower their students as independent thinkers and problem solvers in the science classroom.

Activate Learning has partnered with OpenSciEd to create a digital learning platform where students can benefit from an interactive, engaging online experience when using the OpenSciEd curriculum. Students can record their observations and reasoning and receive feedback from teachers. Students benefit from modeling supports like drawing tools and stamps, as well as writing supports with sentence starters and reading supports through recorded audio, highlighting, and annotations. The OSE lessons are designed and aligned to the Framework and the NGSS. They are based on research regarding how students learn, what motivates learning, and the implications for teaching. Participants will experience first-hand our intuitive digital platform with features that enhance the OSE curriculum and help make science teaching and learning more accessible.

This presentation highlights the journey of the Wauwatosa School District Biology team as they transformed from a fragmented collection of experts to a strong, mission and vision-aligned force. The Wauwatosa Biology team has become a lighthouse within the district and across the state as they are deeply committed to continuous improvement and providing a rigorous, 3-dimensional, storyline experience for all students, through the use of OpenSciEd curricular resources.

In this session, we will discuss the importance of a strong vision, sound process for selecting curriculum, ongoing instructional coaching, teamwork, and strategies for building system-wide capacity in building a movement and driving change. We will share ideas and tools, including grading practices, for districts or departments interested in transforming the student experience in science to be more coherent, impactful, rigorous, and equitable.

Transform your classroom into a hub of innovation and leadership with a STEAM mentorship program! In this dynamic workshop, discover how middle school students can develop hands-on STEAM challenges for younger peers, fostering confidence, communication, and cross-curricular learning while implementing the engineering design process. Using real-world examples from St. Mary School in Richland Center, where students created agricultural-based projects like the Cranberry Bog, you’ll explore how to guide your students in crafting and presenting their own challenges to elementary students.

Learn essential tips and tricks for building students’ presentation skills, encouraging them to take ownership of their work, and differentiating activities to meet diverse learning needs. Discover how to introduce college and career readiness skills through mentoring opportunities that emphasize critical thinking, problem-solving, and collaboration.

You’ll also dive into strategies for gaining stakeholder buy-in, building community partnerships, and organizing lesson plans across multiple grade levels using Google Drive. This interactive session will provide you with practical tools, templates, and strategies to inspire your students to lead, mentor, and create—while promoting a love for STEM and agriculture. Walk away with everything you need to launch a successful cross-curricular STEAM mentorship program in your school!

Join us for an engaging professional development session designed for teachers to come together, share, and brainstorm solutions around the OpenSciEd instructional materials. This workshop provides a collaborative space where educators can discuss their experiences—the good, the bad, and the challenging. Bring your successes and amazing resources to share with fellow teachers, and don't hesitate to bring your concerns and problems. Together, we will explore practical solutions, offer support, and enhance our collective understanding of how to best implement OpenSciEd in the classroom. Let’s turn challenges into opportunities and elevate our teaching practice as a team!

The IL Biology Storylines provide a free, complete curricular replacement for any introductory biology course. 3-D learning incorporates the disciplinary core ideas, the science practices and the crosscutting concepts and is the driving force of the Next Generation Science Standards. In order to better integrate the different topics typically taught in the high school biology classroom, storyline units that are coherent and phenomenon-driven have been created so that students can make sense of how science works in real world situations. This workshop serves to introduce attendees to how the IL Biology Storylines have proven to be incredible models for sensemaking opportunities, equitable instruction, and how to lead to students becoming self-directed learners and critical thinkers in an ever-changing world.

This roundtable invites educators to share strategies, curriculum resources, and innovative teaching ideas for anatomy and physiology. Discuss challenges, exchange effective practices, and help to create a shared drive with valuable teaching materials.

This presentation will explore the development and implementation of Driving Question Boards (DQB) to foster student-led scientific inquiry. Attendees will gain insight into how DQBs serve as a powerful tool to inspire curiosity and drive learning through real-world phenomena that connect to students’ cultural resources. The session will feature classroom examples of student-created DBQs and practical strategies and procedures for guiding students in the question development process.

Participants will engage actively by stepping into the shoes of students and experiencing the DQB process firsthand as I model the teacher’s facilitation techniques and preparation. Through this interactive approach, attendees will observe how DQBs align with the Next Generation Science Standards by emphasizing student-centered inquiry, phenomenon-based learning, and three-dimensional teaching practices.

By the end of the session, participants will leave with practical knowledge, sample student work, and ready-to-use resources for implementing DQBs in their own classrooms. This session is designed to equip educators with the tools and confidence to harness the power of student questions in driving deeper scientific understanding.

Facilitators will bring their 15+ years of background in science to help lead discussion in lab and investigation safety. In this session attendees will share ideas for science investigation facilitation. This will include informal exploration activities as well as formal and multiple day investigations. Ideas will be shared as to how to make classroom safety student centered. Attendees will also test their knowledge on best practices and apply new understanding of best practices to their science classroom by exploring science classroom safety plans.

By combining the best of NGSS and Ambitious Science Teaching, we will show you how our department revolutionized our assessments to grading to the skills. We will share sample activities, grading rubrics, gradebook set-up, and stories along the way.

Join this session to discover how incorporating simulations into your 3D learning experiences can revolutionize Grades 3-12 science lessons. Join this session to discover how incorporating simulations into your 3D learning experiences can revolutionize science lessons for Grades 3-12. We'll create an environment where students become inquisitive explorers, tackling challenging concepts and phenomena through engaging discourse, modeling, and designing solutions to real-world science problems.

This interactive session will demonstrate how simulations can enhance conceptual understanding, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills. We will reflect on how the experiences connect to the 3-dimensions of NGSS. Don't forget to bring your device to make the most of this hands-on experience!

This session focuses on empowering educators to teach climate change in a locally relevant, meaningful way by leveraging the Wisconsin Climate Hub as a resource and connecting climate educators across the nation. Participants will explore how collaboration among state leads fosters state-specific climate education while offering opportunities for nationwide connections. The session will begin with a discussion of the challenges and opportunities in teaching about climate change, followed by a deep dive into the Wisconsin Climate Hub—a platform designed to support educators with credible, engaging resources, lesson plans, and professional development opportunities. Attendees will be guided through a walkthrough of the Hub, including its navigation tools, state-specific resources, and pedagogical support articles. The session will also provide an opportunity for educators to create accounts, explore resources, and share their discoveries with peers. Key topics will include Earth Day, math integration, plastic pollution, and climate education for younger students. Finally, attendees will be introduced to the free SubjectToClimate courses available to educators, empowering them with additional tools to enhance their climate education curriculum. The session aims to foster collaboration, build knowledge, and inspire action in the classroom.

Learning Objectives:
1. Reflect on the challenges and opportunities of teaching climate change.
2. Navigate and utilize the Wisconsin Climate Hub for state-specific resources and professional development.
3. Engage in hands-on exploration of resources, with an emphasis on pedagogical strategies and local context.
4. Discover additional tools and courses to enhance climate education in the classroom.

Time tends to be the limiting factor on how well a teacher can truly dive into using the NGSS standards. A flipped classroom can give time back to the class period and allow for more student collaboration in their learning. In my presentation, I will go over the key elements of managing a flipped classroom. These elements include: the pre-class learning and the technological logistics involved, how to hold students accountable for the pre-class learning, the way a teacher's role is shifted from direct instruction to facilitator, and how to fully utilize the freed up class time for group work, case studies, review activities, and hands-on learning. I will make sure to address the difficulties that also come with a flipped classroom. To keep this session interactive I will have audience members model numerous examples of the interactive review activities that I have used over the years.

Attendees will look closer at the CASEL SEL competencies and the Learning for Justice Standards, both of which aim to bring equity and SEL into the classroom. This presentation is step one of getting familiar with the resources, as well as having time to implement one of the strategies in their current curriculum.

Join us for a roundtable discussion centered around Physics, Physical Science, or teaching in general. Have ideas to share? Great! Have questions you need help with? Bring them! Looking to connect with Physics teachers and grow your network? Fantastic!

Attendees will learn the core principles of Universal Design. From there, attendees will have an opportunity to 3D think and implement how to connect NGSS standards to strong UD principals in a practical, realistic, sustainable way. With extra time, attendees will take an upcoming lesson they are planning and apply these principles to that time to ask questions while integrating.

After reading Ambitious Science Teaching in 2022, I began to approach my classes much differently. Ambitious Science Teaching is a methodology which encourages student engagement, discussion, problem solving, and modeling. As with any new pedagogy, the desire to implement change can be daunting. Do I need to start from scratch? Can I implement new methods, without having to find new curriculum and materials?

I say you can! Come and hear about my journey to implement Ambitious Science Teaching methodologies, increasing student engagement without completely reinventing the wheel. Student work samples will be shown, so you can get an idea of how implementation of these ideas has increased student achievement as well.