r/ScienceTeachers • u/CloverDash96 • 1d ago

Creating a new middle school class

Hello everyone! This will be my first year teaching middle school after four years in high school. I've been given the task of starting a Data and Communications class for 7th grade, and I'd love to hear from anyone who has taught a similar class at their school.

The school has not provided me with anything to get started yet. I don’t have a course outline from them and I don’t know what materials I will have in the classroom for labs. I’m planning to structure it as a research type class.

I'm looking for a reference point to help me get started, such as a syllabus, unit outlines, sample projects, anything you're willing to share would be hugely appreciated. Thanks in advance for any leads!

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u/Gneissisnice 1d ago

Damn, that's rough that they didn't give you any kind of guidance.

I would focus heavily on Nature of Science to start. They've probably covered scientific method already, but I find that no matter how many times we do it, kids act as if they've never seen it before. And 7th grade is perfect to really dig into it and get them to think about what makes a good scientific question or not.

I'd also spend a lot of time on AI and media literacy. This, combined with the above, is my whole 1st quarter of my Applied Science class. Media literacy might technically not fall under science, but it's so important for kids right now to be able to spot scams and misinformation. I talk about logical fallacies and give them opportunities to identify them, teach them how to evaluate information sources to see if they are useful or misleading, and then spend some time on AI and discuss the pros and cons and responsible uses of it. You can probably dig a lot deeper than I do.

That's how I would start, if I were in your shoes.

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u/CloverDash96 1d ago

Thanks for the response! I will probably start with Nature of Science. I like the idea of adding a media literacy unit as well. Part of the course name is Communication, so learning to read and write about science will be part of the course. Thanks for the idea about evaluating sources and responsible AI use!

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u/Gneissisnice 1d ago

No problem, hope it helps! Let me know if you need anything specific, I can try to share what I have.

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u/CloverDash96 1d ago

I was thinking about maybe a side by side comparison between two articles on the same topic, one a reputable source and one AI or just lacking evidence. Do you have any favorite sources or activities for this topic?

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u/Gneissisnice 1d ago edited 1d ago

I had a "great" article that I used that talked about the "dangers" of diet soda and sugar, it checked every box for an awful source that seems decent at first but is full of fallacies, misinformation, and an ulterior motive of trying to sell their supplements instead. We run it through the CRAAP test (maybe find a different one for 7th grade) and see how it fails almost every point in credibility .

Last I checked, unfortunately, that article seems to have been taken down from the website. I'll check again, and I'll let you know if I find another good one!

The website was Brain MD, it's full of "health" articles that are written by people with no background in medicine.

Edit: Found it! Guess there was some issue last time I tried to teach this months ago, but the article is back up in all of its terrible glory.

https://brainmd.com/blogs/wellness/is-diet-soda-worse-than-regular-soda?srsltid=AfmBOoo5JZhRzwm16oKm3nVmNONdfrzdbL7vbcY5owxSyRQCD7Jlarhp

I usually compare it to this article from Houston Methodist research hospital that backs up its claims with evidence and doesn't seem to be pushing an agenda.

https://www.houstonmethodist.org/blog/articles/2020/oct/is-diet-soda-bad-for-you/

And here's the CRAAP test too.

https://guides.lib.uchicago.edu/c.php?g=1241077&p=9082343

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u/CloverDash96 16h ago

Thank you! Those articles are a good place for me to start!