Teachers are always looking for ways to keep students engaged. Several years ago, Upper School science teacher Leslie Trimble introduced student-produced websites to her syllabus in AP Environmental Science. "It has worked so well that I wanted to share my experience with other science teachers," explained Ms. Trimble.
Her article, titled "Creating Science Websites," has been published in the December issue of The Science Teacher.
"Science teachers are using multiple modalities in their classroom every day," explained Ms. Trimble. "My students are always eager to share their investigation with others, but I found that lab reports or PowerPoint presentations were very limiting." She started her own experiment and asked students to create websites to share their research with a wider audience.
"Building a website allows students to pose scientific questions, evaluate information from a variety of sources, and connect class content to real-world problems and solutions," said Ms. Trimble. "Websites are versatile so students can include photos, videos, graphs, and text. For me the most important feature of a website is how motivating it is for students," said Ms. Trimble.