Sierra Nevada Classroom Project Teacher Institute

Teachers from around the state gathered for two weekends in the Sierra Nevada mountains for the 2008 Sierra Nevada Classroom Project Teacher Institute. They immersed themselves in scientific journaling, learned new hands-on indoor and outdoor science activities, received valuable teacher resources, and were able to network and make connections with their fellow educators. All this plus a knowledgeable and experienced staff made for a very successful teacher institute! Here's what the teachers had to say:

Video Documentary from Teacher Participant

"I am forever grateful for this course. I have learned so many things that I’m going to be taking back to my classroom. I’ve been teaching for 20 years and I have learned so many new things here that have inspired me to teach my students this coming year." - Mimi, 9th-10th grade General Science teacher, Costa Mesa, CA

"This has been a fabulous training. There is a natural field next to our campus and I wanted to find ways to make that a learning environment for my life and earth sciences students. All the emphasis on keeping a field journal, the details of that and the different exercises and games that I learned, I’m ready to use right away and I’m really excited about it." - Linda, 4th grade teacher, El Cerrito, CA

"I’ve been experimenting for a long time, probably 7-8 years, with the idea of using drawing as a way to improve kids’ observation skills. And this has just given me a lot more material and a lot more opportunity to explore that idea. So I plan to go back and see how many places I can get that across.” – Terry, K-5 science teacher, Piedmont, CA

"What has really been impressive about this experience is the level of expertise in presentation. And on a little personal reflective note, whenever you can hook teachers into experiences like this that alter their personal experience so that they enrich their lives, you change the way that they teach forever. And each teacher goes back and touches the lives of hundreds, if not thousands, of students. So, there’s a lot of bang for your buck here." - Joel, 9th-12th grade teacher, Fresno, CA

"I found that this program is very much aligned with the 4th grade standards that we have to teach as far as science, and I think also many of the activities are applicable across the other subjects – language arts, math, social studies. Everything we've learned here for these two weekends is extremely useful and will be applied directly." - Tony, 4th grade teacher, San Francisco, CA

"I came up here with two objectives. One was to reinvigorate myself and the other one was to become a better teacher and I feel like both of them were really met. I learned techniques and activities that are going to allow me to take my passions and share them with the kids: ways to integrate science and drawing, ways to integrate language arts, activities that I can do in the schoolyard, activities that I can do in local parks. All the staff was extremely knowledgeable, so I feel like a much more knowledgeable person, and hopefully a much better teacher." - Fran, 4th grade teacher, El Sobrante, CA