by Bill Ritz.
These past several months have been very busy and exciting ones for the "A Head Start on Science" project. The fall months have typically been "awareness workshop" months for Bill Ritz and the project staff -- workshops presented at NSTA Regional conferences and those of one or more other professional organizations. However, an unanticipated e-mail message from Associate Professor Wang Su of the China National Institute for Educational Research (CNIER) in Beijing drastically changed the routine. Bill and his wife, Joyce, were invited to China to share information about "A Head Start on Science" with Chinese educators and to learn about the education of young children in that distant land. The 10-day visit included presentations to the staff of CNIER and at a science education conference in Chengdu, visits to Kindergartens in Beijing, Chengdu, Shanghai, and Suzhou, and an array of tours to acquaint them with the very interesting people, places, and culture of China. More details about the excursion, including photographs, can be found at the "A Head Start on Science" web site.
Awareness workshops were presented at the NSTA Regional Conference in Birmingham, AL, at a California conference for educational leaders at Asilomar, and at annual conferences of the California Association for the Education of Young Learners (Long Beach), the National Head Start Association (Nashville) and NSTA (Boston).
This spring, we welcomed Wang Su, our hostess in China, to southern California and CSULB for a reciprocal visit to better familiarize her with science education in the US. Her itinerary included visits to CSULB science education classes, to pre-K classes in Bellflower, Norwalk-La Mirada, and Long Beach as well as meetings with leaders of MESA, the Science Olympiad, and other US science education projects and centers. A major goal was that of establishing collaboration between "A Head Start on Science" and CNIER's Center for Science and Technology Education in Beijing, directed by Associate Professor Wang Su.
Our agreement brought a delegation of ten Chinese educators to campus this summer to participate in a 6-day "A Head Start on Science" workshop, details of which (including photographs) can be seen on the Project web site. Future plans for collaboration include translation of the Teachers Guide for publication in China in spring 2009, sharing of project data, a possible summer 2009 workshop on campus, and a collaborative conference in Beijing. Inside CSULB did a feature article on the CSULB-Chinese collaboration.
Meanwhile, our annual summer workshops for local educators have continued. During the last week of June, almost 60 teachers and teacher leaders came to campus for a week-long "sense of wonder" science workshop. This year, we were pleased to welcome teachers from San Diego who will introduce "A Head Start on Science" to San Diego County. Photographs of this workshop can also be seen on the Project web site.
