Middle School Teachers Can Learn Better Ways to Sequence Science Lessons with a New NSTA Book

ARLINGTON, Va. – Business Wire – Instructional Sequence Matters, Grades 6–8: Structuring Lessons With the NGSS in Mind, shows how simple shifts in the way teachers arrange and combine activities can help improve student learning. The new NSTA Press book introduces the “explore-before-explain” method while making it easier to put the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) into practice.

Instructional Sequence Matters discusses two popular approaches for structuring science lessons: POE (Predict, Observe, and Explain) and 5E (Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate, and Evaluate). The book explains what contemporary research says about sequencing and how you can make the needed changes. Ready-to-teach physical science lessons use either a POE or 5E sequence to cover heat and temperature, magnetism, electric circuits, and force and motion. Detailed examples show how specific aspects of all three dimensions of the NGSS can translate into the classroom.

The book helps both novice teachers and classroom veterans discover the rationale and the real-life examples they need to restructure the hands-on approach they now use.

Browse sample pages of this title for free at the NSTA Science Store website.

For additional information or to purchase a copy of Instructional Sequence Matters, Grades 6–8 and other books from NSTA Press, visit the NSTA Science Store.

Featured

  • Opportunity by Design Framework

    Opportunity by Design

    Educational improvement efforts often focus on curriculum, instruction, assessment, professional development, and intervention systems while treating the physical school building as background. But school design is not a passive backdrop to learning — it is a structural lever for equity.

  • University of Mary Washington Selects Builder for New Theater, Dance Facility

    The University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Va., recently announced that it has selected construction and development firm Skanska to lead a series of renovations and upgrades to fine arts facilities, according to a news release.

  • Texas A&M Opens First Building at Fort Worth Campus, Breaks Ground on Research Facility

    The Texas A&M University System marked a major milestone in the development of its Fort Worth campus by opening its first completed academic building and breaking ground on a second facility designed to expand research and industry collaboration.

  • Esports are Growing in Popularity

    Video games and esports are a popular social hobby, and it’s one that’s accessible to a wide variety of physical ability levels. Some esport student-athletes have started to earn scholarship opportunities, and high schools are beginning to form teams equipped with the same degree of resources as their physical sports teams. However, the two have very different needs.