WORKSHOP DESCRIPTIONS
Getting F.R.E.E. While Helping Students Learn
Presented by: FREE, Truckee Meadows Community College
FREE (Faculty for Radical Education and Enlightenment) is the longest-standing continually operating learning community at Truckee Meadows Community College (TMCC). Students engage in interdisciplinary learning, present their own findings visually, linguistically, mathematically, statistically, with performance, or media. FREE culminates in a big idea theme across disciplines with results in a holistic assessment outcome, such as a mural, display, or performance. The idea of a FREE assessment is discovery, collaboration, and imagination. The intent is to push for crucial thinking breakthroughs during the assessment activity. This assessment display often uses the Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics (STEAM) interdisciplinary approach.
Session: 1
STEAM Powered Maker Spaces
Presented by: The Generator
The Generator is an inclusive art space in greater Reno for anyone who wants to make art and be part of a creative community. We dream. We convene. We create. We make. We combine forces and share resources in the name of creative growth and community involvement for all. We’re here to encourage professional artists and beginners alike to make art and to learn from each other as a creative community. Join the team from The Generator to learn about the power of the Maker Space and how students and teachers can access these resources.
Session: 2
Atomic Arthaus: The Making & Meaning of Mushroom Clouds
Presented by: Aimee Littlewood Allen, Littlewoodcreative.com
The mushroom cloud, an iconic confluence of science and nature, beauty and ugliness, that elicits an almost singular association with nuclear blasts; and yet, a phenomenon few have ever witnessed first-hand. Join artist-educator, Aimee Littlewood Allen, for this dynamic STEAM workshop, touching on NextGen Science Standards as well as the new Nevada standards for Fine Arts. Participate in easy and creative methods for engaging students directly with the science involved in the creation of clouds, as a means for developing even greater visual literacy and appreciation of their aesthetics.
Sessions: 2 (Session 1 is FULL)
The Sub-Atomic Structure of Matter (K-5)
Presented by: The Terry Lee Wells Nevada Discovery Museum and the Las Vegas Discovery Children's Museum
We invite you to join The Terry Lee Wells Nevada Discovery Museum and the Las Vegas Discovery Children's Museum to explore the progression of the Next Generation Science Standard PS1: Matter and Its Interactions. Learn how to examine this standard in the classroom through hands-on exploration and engaging demonstrations. Mastery of this standard in the elementary grades will prepare students to understand the sub-atomic structure of matter through chemical and nuclear processes. This workshop is targeted for K-5th grade teachers and will address the science standards 2.PS1.1 and 5.PS1.1 using STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) based presentations and interactive demonstrations that are easily transferable to the classroom.
Sessions: 2 (Session 1 is FULL)
The Art of the Nuclear Landscape: Inquiry Based Gallery Tour
Presented by: The Nevada Museum of Art, Gallery Education Team
Join the Nevada Museum of Arts’ Gallery Education Team on an interactive, inquiry-based tour exploring the contemporary art of the Nuclear Landscape. These conversations help us contextualize they ways that artists respond to our Nuclear Legacy, drawing meaningful connections between the art on display and an interdisciplinary philosophy of STEAM-based arts integration.
Sessions: 2 and 3 (Session 1 and 4 are FULL)
Arts Integration: Authentic and Engaging Arts Strategies for STEM Learning
Presented by: Sierra Arts Foundation
Join the Arts Integration experts at Sierra Arts Foundation and the amazing community of artists they work with to explore authentic and engaging arts integration practices for your classroom. Learn how to link content areas across the artistic disciplines and participate in lesson planning and engagement strategies.
Sessions: 4 (Session 3 is FULL)
Mother Uranium and the History of the Artists’ Response to Nuclear Technologies; Interdisciplinarity, Disruption and Innovation: Real Lessons for the 21st Century
Presented by: Laura Fillmore
Mother Uranium, aka performance and new media artist, educator, and activist Laura Fillmore, will present highlights of her historical and contemporary research into Nevada’s role in global Nuclear Technologies and share her firsthand experience bringing these issues to life in the classroom. Watch an introduction to the film Barefoot Gen, by Keiji Nakazawa, showing the bombing of Hiroshima from a little boy’s perspective on the ground. First person sources and interdisciplinary lessons will be available for teachers at 5 stations. Stations will cover The Museum of Atomic Surrealism, with a DIY Zine making lesson; first person historical perspectives from retired airmen as they recall buzzing the city the day after they were destroyed by Nuclear bombing, which inspire AP English Composition lessons to accompany John Hershey’s 1946 book Hiroshima; indigenous perspectives on the loss of homelands due to uranium mining and nuclear testing with photographs, children’s books, films, and videos; a ‘zero-sum’ game called “Nuclear War” that was developed in the 1960s; and collected manipulatives to help students think about nuclear radiation, half-life, and deep time through STEAM lessons that engage students in thinking as far into the future as our imaginations will allow to protect the coming generations from the effects of radioactive and transuranic materials.
Session: 3
Science Theater: Exploring Forms of Energy (K-4)
Presented by: Get in the Act! Science Theater
With Science Theater “Energy Basics” lesson plan as our step-by-step guide, participants will learn how to integrate drama into a science lesson. Teachers will use scientific inquiry methods in upbeat dramatizations that explore the different forms of energy that surrounds us every day, such as electricity, light, and sound.
This lesson uses a variety of approaches to learning; including modeling, demonstration, and hands-on activities, so that teachers gain the confidence and skills to immediately integrate drama into the science curriculum. This is a high-energy workshop, be prepared to move, express yourself and perform! Science Theater Teacher Workshops offer tools and techniques that educators can implement and connect to their own curriculum and teaching practices.
Sessions: 3 (Session 4 is FULL)
The Sounds of the Nuclear Landscape
Presented by: DRI Scientist Ted Hartwell
This workshop will explore the nuclear landscape as expressed through music. Participants will listen to several compositions from different musical genres and discuss how music has been used in this realm. He will also be sharing how educators can use the data collected through the Community Environmental Monitoring Program (CEMP) in their classrooms and also will have some hands-on components to highlight the program. CEMP is a network of monitoring stations located in communities surrounding and downwind of the Nevada National Security Site (NNSS) that monitor the airborne and groundwater environments for manmade radioactivity that could result from NNSS activities.
Sessions: 3 and 4
Nuclear Trinitite: The Science and Art of Glass Fusion
Presented by: Donna Smit, Copper Cat Studios
Resident artist of Copper Cat Studio, Donna Smit will guide students through a two hour workshop discussing the history and science of fused glass and its association with trinitite glass formed from a nuclear explosion. Each student will create their very own “nuclear explosion” suncatcher, using scraps of glass, stringers, kiln baubles, and frit. Copper wire will be an inclusion in the glass. No glass cutting experience required. All projects will be fired offsite and picked up at Copper Cat Studio, 300 Kresge Lane, Sparks, NV.
Sessions: FULL
Capturing Radiation: Painting the Power of the Nuclear Blast
Presented by: Rachel Stiff
The Nevada landscape appears at once vast and desolate, much like a freshly primed canvas. Our state’s long history of nuclear testing is not unlike that of the development and process of the contemporary painter. An idea immerges - a vision! Tests are both active explorations and patient observations. A spill of paint, the ignition of a bomb; the form takes shape. With each new attempt comes adjustments and the eventual development of a theory. The results are often unexpected, thought provoking and sublime. The artist, like the scientist is both the observer and the cause.
This experimental painting workshop explores the use of space, process and the cultivation of an idea.
Sessions: FULL
Historical Art of the AEC: Color Washing and Image Transfer
Presented by: Nevada Museum of Art
Join the Nevada Museum of Art as we explore the power of color, iconography, and the historical photography of The Atomic Energy Commission. The AEC employed color washing techniques on black and white images to appeal to specific audiences, depending on whether they were attempting to show the power and force of nuclear bombs or the appeal and opportunity of nuclear energy. Explore image transfer, historical propaganda, color washing and the use of color to change the perceived message of an image.
Sessions: FULL