Our immersive programming fosters curiosity and blends fun and facts for little minds with big questions! At an early age, all children have the capacity and propensity to observe, explore, and discover the world around them (NRC 2012). SOAR offers exploration and experiences for inquisitive minds that help develop critical thinking skills through play and opportunities for discovery.
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The two most natural settings for learning are the outdoors and home. Young children begin explorations by engaging all senses while under the guidance and support of parents and key family members. Connecting to nature and science concepts is experienced dynamically and organically, allowing independent discovery. Adult family members nurture this discovery by encouraging discussion and by participating in activities that allow children to expand on newly acquired knowledge that they enthusiastically share with others. These are important first steps in developing science lovers and students who seek novel experiences for the joy of learning.
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Fully interactive, SOAR's programs focus on children’s natural interests and abilities through carefully planned open-ended, inquiry-based explorations and discussions. Aspects of childhood development including social-emotional learning, manual dexterity, and cognition are considered and reflected in all activities.
Teen Programs
Programs afford teens the opportunity to strengthen critical thinking skills and explore pathways to college and career. With an increase in autonomy, teens welcome opportunities for decision-making, especially with regard to education. Competitive science literacy skills are intertwined with 21st-century skills that often present a challenge to address fully in a traditional classroom setting. Twenty-first century skills include analyzing, evaluating, and synthesizing information, not only from print, but across multimodal sources (Goldman, 2012; Lesaux, 2012)
SOAR addresses key criteria that lend to young adults who are informed of the nature of science (NOS). This leads to success for these students as scholars in the "classroom sciences" by having the nature of science in school science linked to critical thinking. An adolescent's new conceptual thinking and abstract reasoning allow them to approach new problems with out-of-the-box strategies and the emergence of innovation (Siegel, 2015). Our programs take advantage of the increased creative exploration that comes with the expanded sense of consciousness being experienced and explored by teens.
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Taking true advantage of the teen perspective, SOAR's teen programming eliminates "four walls" thinking and inspires global reasoning. Humanizing the sciences for students places them in a position to view themselves as agents of positive change as they apply science and technology concepts in personal, ethical, and cultural contexts in college and career.
Adult Programs
Hobbyists and naturalists alike join together for blended programs. For adults, informal science education is often an independent pursuit rebranded as a simple curiosity or a hobby. Rewarding and fulfilling, enjoying nature as an adult provides benefits both emotional and physical. Informal social gatherings in parks and organized club gatherings provide mental health benefits as well. With SOAR adult programs, there is an added benefit that is not received but given - the benefit of promoting the integrity of natural resources.
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Adult learners hold influences in diverse arenas; these arenas allow for an expanded communication to people and organizations able to contribute to policies promoting positive environmental changes in the community and beyond. These citizen scientists and non-citizen scientist hobbyists have the advantage of established roles in their families, their workplace, and their community. Participation in blended programs expands one's role in and connection to these areas, strengthening positive influences in each.
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SOAR programs support the social well-being of participants and enhance the benefits and enjoyment of varied hobbies while increasing the motivation of adults to learn science in a community space. Adults are perpetual learners, able to enjoy engaging in our blended programs for the enhancement of their hobbies. This lends these key citizens a voice in local environmental decision-making so that the natural spaces where these activities occur can be available for generations.
Educator Programs
Inquiry-based and research-active practices combined with fieldwork engage and enhance experiences for novice and master teachers. Whether inside the classroom or outside of it, science teachers are actively seeking practices to utilize that are proactive, creative, and innovative. Tasked with teaching students critical thinking skills and providing them opportunities to apply them, science teachers must also inspire students to practice these skills at an interdisciplinary level and in their everyday lives.
Teachers of all disciplines of science understand that they are not teaching a static subject. This requires a need to update knowledge of science concepts and the seamless incorporation of these concepts into the classroom, and the formal aspect of a district's curriculum. Mediums for learning science that extend beyond the four walls of the classroom are often met with common challenges. These include limits or barriers to accessible informal science education opportunities - especially in inner-city districts.
SOAR's collaborative workshops engage all levels of teachers from all science disciplines. Understanding that science is vital to the progress of individuals and society, which holds true more than ever, SOAR sessions embrace and acknowledge the diversity of students from suburban and inner-city districts alike. Individual teacher registrants and same-school science departments benefit from the team-teaching and co-teaching community borne of each session.
Signature Programs
The past 16 months have pushed districts and staff to employ every aspect of creativity and productivity for meeting educational objectives. Further, the need for science literacy was never made clearer as the average citizen navigated a wave of scientific jargon delivered from the highest science officials on a daily basis. The emphasis on how science education in the 21st century must focus on developing strategies and solutions to our common problems, and in doing so, must consider the importance of approaches built around collaboration and participatory pedagogy has been reinforced. More than ever, the science educator must approach science so that learners are action-oriented for the application of science on a global and practical scale.
Science teachers must understand the rationale and elements of science literacy to apply and promote new paradigms in a borderless classroom called the global environment (McFarlane, 2013). School districts in support of these paradigm shifts facilitate success that extends beyond the classroom as both science teachers and students become active contributors to banks of authentic scientific knowledge.
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SOAR's signature programs reflect pedagogies addressing the major elements of science education while considering the unique characteristics of the student demographic. The design of supportive instructional context that incorporates fluid and up-to-date changes in authentic science data is relayed in a manner that enhances district curriculum for student development of long-term science skills. All SOAR consultants hold advanced degrees, are well-versed in all aspects of education, and effectively address SPED, ELL, and general education populations. Programs are adjusted accordingly per district need or request.
Districts
Students
Students of all ages communicate ideas and interests to each other not just locally, but internationally thanks to social media. The seamless integration of technology into students' lives has been the bane of many parents and educators. The increase in screen time for distance learning over the majority of the 2020-2021 academic year due to the pandemic has presented educators, parents, and students with many challenges.
Remaining indoors for safety has further decreased opportunities for active learning and collaboration via informal education institutions (e.g., museums, nature centers) and their programs. It has also severely reduced or prevented young people's much-needed exposure to the natural environment - exposure that reduces stress and is cognitively restorative.
SOAR continues to take advantage of our children's enthusiasm for the constant sharing of ideas and of the physical boundaries that have been eliminated by technology by incorporating both into heterogeneous enrichment opportunities. Additionally, we provide and support action-oriented and issues-based curricula in tandem with the educational objectives of school districts. These curricula are the key to renewing and activating scientific literacy that increases students’ performance and national competitiveness in the global economy.
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Classrooms are a microcosm of the globally diverse society in which we live. SOAR celebrates this diversity via student-centered programs provided in non-traditional settings where the learner employs autonomy with guided exploration and discovery.
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SOAR’s signature programs serve as a pathway spanning six years of pointed educational and career objectives beginning with general exploratory programs at grades 7 and 8 and culminating in internship and career focuses at grades 11 and 12. Post-secondary opportunities via partnered internships serve to increase minority and female representation in conservation and environmental sciences.