Soil,Food and Society
An open,online science resource for primary school teachers and students.
The Soil, Food and Society project team is calling on all educators for their observations and evaluation of the www.soilfoodsociety.online science teaching tool – ahead of an upgrade later this year.
The free, web-based resource which helps Year 5 – 8 students understand scientific concepts and critical thinking (using examples from ‘the story of food’), has been accessed by over 1200 people since the beginning of the 2017 academic year.
It will be refined in line with user feedback, and a final version will be launched in late November.
“We want to make this resource even more valuable and relevant using feedback from teachers and educators who have used it as a teaching tool over the past two and half terms,” says project leader Dr Tessa Mills of AgResearch.
If you have used it in school, in the home classroom or in an Ag or Enviro group we are keen to hear what you have to say, as we are now carrying out this revision.”
Dr Mills says feedback so far has been really positive. “Users say it is ‘easy to teach’ and that students are engaged with the lesson plans, videos, animations and the fun experiments – which include following the chain that leads to the food in their lunch boxes, and then finding out why it goes mouldy.”
She adds that educators particularly like the fact that the resource is linked to the New Zealand curriculum. “Many teachers have said that this is an aspect that could be highlighted more in the final version.”
Please send feedback to Ralph Springett, ralph@regearlearning.com by 31st October 2017.