Reflect on a course that you currently teach. What crosscutting concepts are most important to understanding your course? How could you make those i

[Eric Brunsell]

2.  Reflect on a course that you currently teach.  What crosscutting concepts are most important to understanding your course?  How could you make those important crosscutting concepts more explicit for your students?

[Kirsten Wiesneski]

As I looked through the HS standards by topic and reflected about the Chemistry class I teach, there were three CCCs that seamed to fit  best with the course:

1) patterns

3) scale, proportion, and quantity

5) energy and matter: flows, cycles, and conservation

To make these concepts more explicit to the students, I think something I would try would be to have the students figure out which of these three cross-cutting concepts their learning target or "I can..." statement for the day best fits into.  I normally have the learning targets written on the board each day, but if they were each printed out on their own piece of paper (with large enough font to read across the room) then the students could just tape the "I can..." statement on a wall (that has these CCCs written on larger, laminated posters) underneath the CCC that it best relates to.  If it fits into more than one CCC then they could put string going from the learning target to each of the concepts it relates to.  This would essentially create a concept map of how each unit relates to the cross-cutting concepts.

(And...since administration LOVES seeing learning targets, this also yields for a way to display the previous days learning targets and not just the one's that are being covered that day.)

[Tammy Huenink]

I currently teach both cell structure and function and atomic structure.  We do look at patterns that are similar in both topics.  Many students don't know that we use some of the same terminology in both topics.  I think I need to focus more on how topics we talked about with atomic structure and atoms can impact cell structure.  Many times I find myself running out of time and skipping over this important connection.

On Saturday, May 25, 2013 10:16:52 AM UTC-5, Eric Brunsell wrote:

[pat...@wolfnet.net]

On Saturday, May 25, 2013 10:16:52 AM UTC-5, Eric Brunsell wrote:

> 2.  Reflect on a course that you currently teach.  What crosscutting concepts are most important to understanding your course?  How could you make those important crosscutting concepts more explicit for your students?

I think it would be interesting to allow my students to link the crosscutting concepts to each chapter they learn. Perhaps at the end of each chapter exam, given the list of 7 concepts allow them to choose and explain which was the most important in understanding that particular chapter. I've often thought about keeping track of how concepts link through an interactive concept map - drawing lines and making connections between concepts throughout the year. This would visually show students that what they learned in Chapter 1 links to Chapter 2 & 7, etc. to make and entire course. Someday...

[Deborah Hilscher Middle School]

There are 2 crosscutting concepts that are focused upon in 7th grade life science. They are: Energy Flow, Systems and System Model and Structure and Function.

 

At the beginning of the year I do a lot of teaching on concepts and skills  that will be used throughout the year such as: measurement, use of equipment, scientific processes etc. I believe that I would do the same with these concepts. I would teach their definitions and pertinent vocabulary. I would display these in my classroom on the word wall. I would include the one focused upon when I post the daily goal. I also would have the students create pages in their science notebooks so that we could continually add examples from each unit.

On Saturday, May 25, 2013 10:16:52 AM UTC-5, Eric Brunsell wrote:

[emq...@gmail.com]

Love the idea of having the students reflect and explain their thoughts on the crosscutting concepts!!  Thank you!

[emq...@gmail.com]

My background is as an elementary school teacher, so looking back I would say Patterns, Cause & Effect, and Scale/Proportion/Quantity are extremely important because not only do they tie science concepts together, they carry over from/to math, and even ELA. From very early on, students are taught about all three of these concepts throughout the school day, throughout the school year, and over their elementary school careers. I think explicitly teaching students the connections among the different content areas would allow for deeper understanding in all areas.

[Theresa Stockel]

Applying the Cross Cutting Concepts

In my physics class, it is hard to point to one or two cross cutting concepts as most important , but the most obviously applied are probably : Energy and Matter: Flows, Cycles, and Conservation and Cause and Effect: Mechanism and Explanation. From conservation of energy to conservation of momentum, we discuss the energy in a system and the idea that total energy theoretically stays constant, even as the type changes. What forces cause the change is always being touched on.

Having the students reflect on the 7 CCC's and explaining where and how they apply is a necessary part of training them to think like scientists and ask good questions.