INTRODUCTION TO TEACHING RESOURCES
GO WILD IN NYC, in partnership with the Urban
Science Education Center of Teacher's College at Columbia
University, is dedicated to creating resources that help
teachers bring environmental education into the classroom
and get the class into the urban environment. The following
material and lesson plans were created by the team at
the Urban Science Education Center under the direction
of Doctors Angela Calabrese Barton and Anne Rivet with
support from Nurture New York's Nature.
Also in the section:
Integrating Go Wild in New
York City to the Science Curriculum:
A Backwards Planning approach
Overview of the Sections
Nature is everywhere in New York City,
and we only have to become aware of it to start enjoying
its wonders. Go Wild in New York City provides fun and
interesting information to design classroom projects that
allow students to discover the nature and science present
in their everyday contexts, while engaging in direct action
to preserve the city natural environment. In this Teachers’
Resources section we show concrete examples of how to
use the text Go Wild in NYC to design relevant, standards
based science curriculum. We provide ideas and examples
to make Go Wild in NYC a helpful resource to science teachers
who want to teach their students the adventure of living
in a city full of nature.
Learning and doing science allow students to develop
the kinds of literacies (knowledge, skills, ways of knowing,
and discursive practices) necessary to make informed decisions
about the science, mathematics, and technology-related
matters that they encounter in their daily lives. For
that reason, the activities and resources we propose in
this Teachers’ Resources section seek to connect
science to students’ lives and communities, while
fostering students’ scientific literacy through
their participation in inquiry projects. In these activities
students will pose questions, design and conduct experiments,
interpret their results, communicate their conclusions
to other students and engage in debate.
New York City multicultural student population provides
teachers with the unique opportunity to incorporate students’
varied backgrounds into the science classroom. Bringing
students’ diverse knowledge and experiences into
science instruction allows teachers to create meaningful
projects connected to students’ interests and cares.
In this way, students’ resources can become an essential
tool for teaching which promotes students’ active
engagement in learning.
Also in the section:
Integrating Go Wild in New
York City to the Science Curriculum:
A Backwards Planning approach
Overview of the Sections
