Key advice for teachers supporting students working at home

• When working remotely, you should plan purposeful activities to keep students on track. Studying remotely or independently does not mean that anyone needs to work alone, ensure your students have access to regular communication tools.
• Teachers should encourage students to continue revising the content covered, and to take note of any questions that they find difficult and keep going. Make a list of the question number and location, along with a brief comment. These can be addressed on a digital platform for peer and teacher input.
• Textbooks generally include a wide range of practice questions with answers and explanations that can be useful in testing and refining your understanding.

Online resources:

• Past HSC Biology Papers
• The Garvan Institute has a range of videos and interactives
  
• DNA learning centre has a variety of high-quality resources and animations
• HHMI Biointeractive: Award-winning multimedia resources, including apps, animations, videos, interactives, and virtual lab. 
• The Genetic Science Learning Centre in UTAH has a variety of high-quality activities.

Key advice for teachers supporting students working at home

Teachers should download the syllabus from the NESA website. Also download the examination and written feedback from 2019 HSC examination pack. The course content begins with the content of the Working Scientifically Skills.

Guide students to review the working scientifically skills by:

• Identifying the working scientifically content examined in the 2019 examination.
• Set draft responses to 2019 examination questions for students to submit via a preferred digital platform and check the written feedback on the NESA site for each question; revising the working scientifically content already taught so far in the course.
• Teachers can support students to continue working on your depth study, ensuring students are submitting their log book and drafts for teacher feedback.
• Encourage students to revise the modules, using a relevant text for the course and websites such as HSC study lab, Kahn academy, and PhET. Revision should include the taking of notes and the practicing of calculations and questions.

Advice for Science teacher on delivering remotely:

• Lessons that are designed for face-to-face classroom delivery usually cannot be easily delivered on online platforms.
• The lessons need to be adapted and adjusted for asynchronous delivery.
• Remember that if your students cannot see you, a significant part of traditional instructional modes cannot be used for online instruction. This is a new situation for everyone. In the absence of teacher-led instruction, student learning may be slower.
• Different literacies are in operation when conducting online learning. Don’t expect that the delivery and learning will be as efficient as usual.
• Practice routines and expectations before going digital, making sure students know how to access, undertake and submit the work.
• Prepping the students will make the transition relatively seamless. Try to have 2 live sessions per week.
• Experience of teachers in other jurisdictions, that have been in this situation for the last 1-2 months, says that students really miss the opportunity to interact with each other and their teacher.
• Flipgrid is a platform in which students can post videos so that they can see each other. Don’t be afraid to post a video of yourself. The students won’t judge you as harshly as you do yourself! Give clear step by step instructions that clearly explain what you want and when you want it.
• When you deliver, ask questions and have a protocol to allow the students to ask questions too.
• Give meaningful and purposeful feedback on all submitted work. It is important that students feel that they are still cared about as individuals.
• Set times of the day when you will respond to students and let the students know when this will be. Set time for yourself and family and encourage your students to also.
• Keep it simple. It is easy to get caught up in gadgets and websites, but the most important thing is to maintain your connection with your students,

Key advice for teachers supporting students working at home

• Teachers should download the syllabus, the examination and written feedback from 2019 HSC examination pack from the NESA website. The course content begins with the content of the Working Scientifically Skills. Guide students to review the working scientifically skills by:
• Identifying the working scientifically content examined in the 2019 examination. Set student draft responses to 2019 examination questions and check the written feedback on the NESA site for each question.
• Revise the working scientifically content already taught so far in the course, keeping a track of any questions you have
• Support students to continue working on their in-depth study, ensuring students regularly submitting their logbook and drafts for teacher feedback.

Useful websites:

• NESA's Syllabus guide and 2019 HSC Exam Pack
• HSC Study Lab
• Introduction to Geology
• Earth Science Simulations
  

Key advice for teachers supporting students working at home

Many portions of the Investigating Science course are amenable to online teaching. It is recommended that teachers schedule regular online interactions on their school's LMS or other systems. Some other considerations include:

• Textbooks: When assigning readings or other learning activities from textbooks or other resources, ensure that the activities are contextualised and purposeful (e.g. provide learning goals). Textbook activities may be suitable for both Y11 and Y12 students.
• Online resources: There are many useful online resources that complement the Investigating Science syllabus. When assigning such activities to students, ensure that students are able to access the relevant websites. Teachers may use educational sites (e.g. PhET, Learn Genetics, etc) to assign investigations and other learning activities. Module support resources development by the Science Curriculum team contain numerous teaching strategies and learning activities for teachers of Y12 students.
• HSC Exam: For teachers of Y12 students, the 2019 HSC exam paper may be used as a revision tool.
• Formative assessments: Teachers should continue to use formative assessments regularly to ensure that students are keeping pace with the course. This is particularly important in asynchronous learning environments, where students have to bear a greater responsibility for their learning than in the classroom.
• Assessment tasks: while some assessments tasks may be conducted while students are not at school, teachers may need to be flexible when applying assessment rules. Students may not communicate their workload effectively and may not have opportunities to clarify doubts. Some tasks (e.g. practical tests, or those that require modelling or presentations) may also need to be adapted for online delivery modes.
• It is important that students receive regular and timely feedback (especially in the asynchronous learning environments). Students will need additional support and guidance with their learning when they are not in regular classrooms.

Key advice for teachers supporting students working at home

When working remotely, you should plan purposeful activities to keep students on track. When guiding students through revision, encourage students to make a list of learning goals along with some activities that will help them achieve their goals:

• Teachers should encourage students to take note of any questions that they find difficult, and keep going. They can make a list of the question number and location, along with a brief comment. These questions can be addressed in an online session with you or their peers.
• Encourage the student to use their textbook: Textbooks generally included a wide range of practice questions with answers and explanations that can be useful in testing and refining your understanding.
• Download the Physics 2019 HSC exam pack including marking guidelines with sample answers. Complete all questions based on modules covered in class so far. The mapping grid on pages 15-16 identifies the topic addressed in each question.
• Previous exam packs are also useful for revision, however, exams prior to 2019 are based on a previous syllabus. Whilst much of the content is very similar, many of the questions from previous exams would be considered outside the scope of the current syllabus.

Websites

A wide range of websites provide study notes and exercises. These can be used for revision of topics or for reading ahead on upcoming topics. Sites that are structured around the current NSW Physics syllabus are generally the easiest to navigate independently.

Visual Physics Online: Developed specifically to support NSW Physics students. This site is arranged by module and includes detailed explanations and diagrams.

HSC Physics: Fathoming Physics: Developed specifically to support students studying the Year 12 NSW course, this site is easily navigated and contains extensive notes, examples and diagrams.

Lumen learning Physics: although not based on the NSW syllabus, it provides clear notes along with questions with solutions for topics in the Stage 6 course.

Key advice for teachers supporting students working at home

Teachers should ensure that Science Extension students are able to continue with their research projects in a safe manner.

If this is not feasible, then the Scope and Sequence should be modified and adapted accordingly. For example, teachers should focus on the syllabus content areas, while leaving the research component of the course to a later point in time when such activities become feasible.

However, students can continue to develop their inquiry questions, hypotheses, conduct literature reviews and develop the materials and methods sections of their research reports.

The Science Curriculum team has provided a number of resources to support the teaching of various content areas of Modules 1-3.

Teachers may continue to assign the two assessment tasks (1 and 2), as they may be completed online.