This article from Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle provides ideas on how school librarians can work with elementary teachers to teach about the Sun's impact on weather and climate. The author introduces the Standards for the 21st Century Learner, developed by the American Association of School Librarians. The author focuses on Standard 1, which calls for students to inquire, think critically, and gain knowledge through developing and refining questions, investigating answers, seeking divergent perspectives in information, and assessing whether the information found answers the questions posed. The free, online magazine draws its themes from the Seven Essential Principles of Climate Literacy, with each issue focusing on one of the seven principles.

School librarian Marcia Mardis describes what the library can offer to teachers and students who want to produce a focused, engaging, and effective science fair. This article appears in the free online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle, which explores the seven essential principles of the climate sciences for K-grade 5 classrooms.

Science and education experts caution that climate-change topics can overwhelm and frighten young children. Science lessons chosen for this article focus on general environmental issues, such as the effects of litter, air pollution, and water pollution. The lessons also include actions and solutions to environmental issues. The free, online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle focuses on integrating age-appropriate science learning with literacy experiences.

This issue of the free online magazine, Beyond Penguins and Polar Bears, examines how elementary teachers can introduce the Arctic and Antarctica and use science, geography, literacy, and technology to help students compare and contrast these two dramatically different areas as well as their own home.

For teachers in K-Grade 5 classrooms, the author of this article reviews the reading comprehension strategies known as Summarizing and Synthesizing. She provides links to web sites and to a book that will provide more background information and lessons. The article appears in the free, online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle, which focuses on the seven essential principles of climate science.

This article offers constructive suggestions for parents seeking ways to support their mathematically able children both academically and socially. It includes options to discuss with teachers for providing appropriate challenge in the classroom and addresses ways to meet children's social and emotional needs. The article contains links to parent resources.

The Take Action column provides resources that help teachers engage students in activities that connect their science learning to their lives. In this article, students are introduced to household appliances and devices, called energy vampires, that continue to draw electrical current even when turned off. The article offers a few simple activities that students can take to reduce the impact of energy vampires. The Take Action column regularly appears in the free, online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle, which focuses on the essential principles of climate literacy.

In this regular column of the free, online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle, the author looks at the importance of conserving water and practicing good conservation habits daily. The column is designed for teachers in K-Grade 5 classrooms and presents concepts of climate literacy that are appropriate for young children. Identified online resources provide data collection activities, lessons, and games.

This four-page article describes four basic approaches children use in understanding fractions as equal parts of a whole. Topics covered include working with equal shares, partitioning regions and units, understanding of fraction equivalence, and ideas for teaching fractions more effectively. References are given.

This article introduces ARKive, a digital library of photographs and videos of the world's wildlife. The library gives special priority to at-risk species. The author notes how this interactive resource can be used by K-5 teachers to support other activities connected to the theme of this issue of the free, online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle -- We Depend on Earth's Climate.

This ultimate frisbee skills list will help students practice and develop their skills in throwing, catching, and defense. 

In this article Pennant and Woodham discuss the importance of rich tasks in the teaching of fractions. In order to prepare for new more rigorous standards, the authors have compiled a list of rich tasks and a description of others that aim to improve how children think about fractions.

Suggestions are made on how to use the resources featured in the issue of Beyond Weather and the Water Cyle in a unit on the greenhouse effect. Hands-on experiences and nonfiction text are provided to help students answer the question "How is Earth like a greenhouse?" Suggestions are also made for formative and summative assessments.

Unit plans for Grades K-2 and 3-5 are a regular feature of the magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle. The plans draw on articles and resources in a themed issue and are aligned with national science and language arts standards. This unit is designed to provide elementary students with the opportunity to investigate how the annual rings in trees help scientists learn about past climates. It uses hands-on experiences and nonfiction text to answer the unit question: How do trees help scientists learn about the past?

Four unit plans provide opportunities for in-depth explorations of important foundational climate concepts -- weather, water as a solid, liquid and gas, and the water cycle -- that are appropriate for K-2 and 3-5 learners. These unit plans incorporate many of the lessons highlighted in other articles in this issue of the online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle. The magazine is structured around the essential principles of the climate sciences.

In this article, teachers find two unit plans (grades K-2 and 3-5) that use resources featured in the science and literacy articles in the magazine. The unit plans are modeled after the five key steps in the learning cycle: engage, explore, explain, expand, and assess, or evaluate. The plans are aligned with the science content standards of the National Science Education Standards and the English language arts standards of the National Council of Teachers of English and the International Reading Association. The plans appear in the free, online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle.

The author of this one-page article describes the pedagogical benefits of using math games in the classroom. She analyzes the game context in terms of the kinds of learning that takes place, the behaviors that students exhibit, and the social-emotional experience of students. She concludes by recommending strategies for effective introduction and management of games. [While the author's observations were in the context of geometry games, they generalize to most topics.]

This brief article defines "low threshold high ceiling" mathematical tasks (LTHC) and explains how they allow all students to develop mathematically. They provide a simple entry point so that struggling students can succeed, and at the same time involve rich mathematical concepts that challenge high achieving students. The article cites examples of LTHC problems from all levels of the NRICH archives. Several are cataloged separately: Magic Vs, Noah, Incey Wincey, Square It.

This article states that research shows 93% of teacher questions are focusing on recall of facts and that type of questioning does not stimulate the mathematical thinking of students who are engaged in open ended investigations. To improve the quality of teacher questioning techniques, the author suggests dividing questions into four main categories: starter questions, questions to stimulate mathematical thinking, assessment questions and final discussion questions and then to follow with a rigorous question. A link to an addendum to the article provides a table of generic questions that can be used by teachers to guide children through a mathematical investigation, and at the same time prompt higher order thinking, as espoused by Bloom and others.

Visualizing is a reading comprehension strategy that can be applied to science-themed texts, according to this article from Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle, a magazine that integrates literacy and science skills instruction. The author identifies six online resources that have activities, lesson plans, and more information.