STEM Ed Announcement: Science & Engineering Saturday Seminars

[Morton Sternheim <mort@k12s.phast.umass.edu>]

This is  a UMass Amherst  program.
Contact information is below.
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Science & Engineering Saturday Seminars         Fall, 2009  

Designed for science teachers; new teachers are especially welcome         
Five Saturdays each term; 8:30-1 at UMass Amherst
Educational materials, refreshments, parking, PDP's included
Advance registration is required; capacity is limited
Cost $30 per session
4 PDP's per half day session

Oct. 3.  Illuminating Life:  What's New and Noteworthy in Luminescence
Spectroscopy and Imaging? Lederle 1033. Pat O'Hara, Chemistry, Amherst
College. Many of today's advances in biotechnology and medical imaging have
been made possible through clever coupling of mature ideas from physical
chemistry and new advances in molecular biology. Over 100 years ago,
physicists such as Stokes and Rayleigh provided a framework for
understanding such phenomena as the fluorescence of light from excited
molecules and the scattering of light from large particles in solution. 
Today these ideas and others have been co-opted by incredibly clever
molecular biologists who have put them to work for in vivo tumor imaging, or
to understand disease morphology in Tay-Sachs or Alzheimer's disease.  This
workshop will explore several of these technological breakthroughs and use
them as a vehicle for exploring the foundational physical and chemical ideas
that make them possible.

Oct. 17.  Using Ecology: Making Science Real. Location to be announced. 
Steve Brewer, Biology Department Ecology is the science of organisms
interacting with each other and their environment.  Ecology activities can
offer an opportunity for students to practice hands-on science in their
local environment.  Global climate change and a renewed focus on the
limitations of the environment to support endless growth are topical means
for students to study fundamental ecological principles.  Workshop
participants will explore a variety of ecological problems and generate
ideas for making observations, posing problems, collecting data, and
developing persuasive presentations of their findings.

Oct. 31. Global Climate Change. Julie Brigham-Grette and Ray Bradley,
Geosciences. Lederle 1033. Global temperatures have been steadily rising as
we burn fossil fuels, with the biggest effects in the polar regions. We will
explore the relationship between carbon dioxide levels and temperature,
modeling the effects of climate change on ocean currents, and more.

Nov. 14.  Supporting Statistical Reasoning for Mathematics & Science
Students. Location to be announced. Sandra Madden, Math Education. Often
people are asked to make decisions in the presence of uncertainty. By
carrying out carefully designed experiments, one can generate convincing
evidence to answer such questions as

"	Is a certain medicine more effective for some condition than doing
        nothing?
"	Do plants grow better with fertilizer A than with fertilizer B?
"	Does chewing gum make students perform better on mathematics tests?

We will explore characteristics of carefully designed experiments,
investigate an innovative curriculum unit for supporting statistical
reasoning, and introduce several tools (including one free and widely
available internet-based software tool) for supporting statistical
investigations in a sense-making manner that is broadly accessible to
students and teachers.

Nov. 21. Weather cancellation makeup date if needed.

Questions: Mort Sternheim, mort@umassk12.net, 413-545-1908,
http://www.umassk12.net/sess 

Online seminar registration and payment:
https://www.umassk12.net/sess/register.html