Overview

• A three-year science curriculum aligned to the Illinois Learning Standards and the PSAE:
  
  
  • Biology, 9th grade,
    
  • Biology: A Human Approach (BSCS),
    
  • Chemistry, 10th grade,
    
  • Chemistry in the Community (ACS), and
    
  • Physics, 11th grade,
    
  • Active Physics (It’s About Time).
    
    
• Inquiry-based instructional strategies are utilized in each course. Research suggests students who traditionally lag in science achievement perform best in an inquiry-based model.
  
  
• The curriculum is integrated across 3 years by revisiting critical concepts (i.e. matter and energy, force and motion) and important skills (i.e. using evidence, communicating scientifically) with a consistent set of instructional practices and materials, lab investigations, technology, and assessment tools.
  
  
• Teachers are more engaged in facilitating and managing classroom discussions of student generated ideas and experimental designs.
  
  
• Teachers receive intensive and ongoing support in learning how to:
  
  
  • manage and guide classroom discussion;
    
  • implement a meaningful and consistent strategy for laboratory notebook use;
    
  • use technology and probeware in their classes, and;
    
  • interpret formative assessment items to make informed decisions about pedagogic strategies for classroom activities