These stories are a collection of educator professional learning experiences and opportunities provided by ESD, CBO and Tribal School partners.
IslandWood’s teacher professional development opportunities are designed to support powerful learning experiences that connect to students’ lives and communities. In this time of increasing awareness and activism, IslandWood is joining with teachers in working to address the vast racial, economic, and environmental disparities in our communities and classrooms.
Over the course of the 2024-25 school year, more than 60 teachers from across Western Washington connected Amplify Science units to their students’ funds of knowledge, experiences, and communities. They were introduced to a unit-specific “localizing guide” that...
On May 28th, teachers from across the Puget Sound region came together with district leads, developers, and IslandWood staff to share and celebrate the work they did this year on eight new “localizing guides” for OpenSciEd and Amplify Science units. Each localizing...
In the face of escalating climate and sociopolitical challenges, the Community Education in Action program promotes collaborative learning, bringing together diverse voices to bring communities together and co-create educational resources that address climate and...
Guided by teachers participating in IslandWood’s “Community-Centered Climate Action” teacher professional learning course, students make a change in their school community. At Emerald Heights Elementary, Karrie Coombe and Chantal Fleck’s students took on a global...
The Community Education in Action program is a collaborative series of workshops to exchange ideas and promote the co-creation of climate justice and environmental justice educational resources, using the Just Transition framework as a guiding model. Front and...
On August 7th, science educators from the Puget Sound region gathered for a two-day Localizing Amplify Science Teacher Institute at IslandWood’s Bainbridge Island campus. The educators were excited to collaborate on curriculum adaptations towards incorporating student...
This year, Rising Star Elementary students restored their green space, rejuvenated their school garden, and engaged in science learning with the schoolyard, community and community partners. All of this came out of a two-year ClimeTime-funded partnership that...
This Spring, teachers used a simple clump of dandelions to anchor a Next Generation Science Standards-aligned storyline that motivated their students to go outside and engage with outdoor science observations and investigations. They questioned their own conceptions...
This spring, IslandWood launched a new teacher professional development course called Community-Centered Climate Action, geared towards Third through Fifth grade teachers from around the Puget Sound. During the five-part Community-Centered Climate Action Course,...