News from Georgia State University's College of Education

COE teacher candidates sharpen skills at summer science program

While some children were playing at the pool or watching TV, about 70 pre-kindergarten through fifth-grade students were using their summer vacation to learn more about science.

The Summer Science Experience, a program offered through Georgia State University and DeKalb County Schools, brought teacher candidates and alumni of the university's Urban Accelerated Certification and Master's Program together to teach science lessons twice a week at Idlewood Elementary School in Tucker.

"The program represents a tiered approach to education: children learning about science and literacy, pre-service teachers learning about teaching and learning and veteran teachers learning about mentorship," said Brian Williams, assistant professor in Georgia State's Early Childhood Education Department and the Summer Science Experience coordinator.

For three weeks in June, children participated in different activities to learn about the way things change. They grew small plants in cups of soil, made homemade ice cream, recycled newspaper to make new sheets of paper and learned to be keen observers on a nature trail behind the school.

In addition to the science curriculum, the summer experience also put an emphasis on literacy. Students wrote sentences and poems using science vocabulary words, learned how to search for words and definitions in the dictionary and read books about recycling.

To read the entire story, click here.

For more information on the Urban Accelerated Certification and Master's Program, click here.

Photo caption: Georgia State University teacher candidate Lauren Kempema and first-graders Jacquavious Shaw and Eyobed Teclehaimanot watch as first-grader Emma Wilcauskas waters her plant during the Summer Science Experience at Idlewood Elementary School.