Environmental Science
Instructor: Ben Smith

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Ben is a graduate of Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The 2011-2012 academic year marks his twenty-fifth year of teaching environmental and biological science. He has taught in public schools for twenty-one years, a private school for three years and for one year his classroom was Yosemite National Park, where he taught environmental science and natural history with Yosemite Institute. Ben has been involved in the Advanced Placement Environmental Science program since 1996. In July of that year, he participated in the Environmental Science AP “Train-the-Trainers” workshop held at Dartmouth College, where approximately twenty-five high school instructors from across the country gathered with a number of college faculty members to discuss and explore potential laboratory and field investigations, as well as other course content.

In September of 1996, Ben piloted the Environmental Science AP course at Palos Verdes Peninsula High School in Rolling Hills, California, with 128 students in four sections. Since that time, Ben has taught over 2200 students in 75 sections of Environmental Science AP. He has been a College Board Environmental Science workshop presenter since 1998, leading approximately 40 single-day workshops and 34 week-long summer institutes across the United States. In September 2005, he traveled to China to lead a two-day environmental science workshop for teachers preparing to teach the course in Shanghai, New Zealand, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Indonesia. He has made numerous presentations at conferences organized by the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA), the National Biology Teachers Association (NABT), and the California Science Teachers Association (CSTA). Ben served as an Environmental Science Resource Reviewer for the College Board’s AP Central website and is the author of the AP Central article entitled, “Teaching AP Environmental Science to Large Classes”. He also authored a portion of the AP Instructor's Guide to accompany G. Tyler Miller’s environmental science text Living in the Environment, published by Thomson/Brooks-Cole in May of 2006. Ben co-chaired the Environmental Science AP Redesign Commission and served as a member of the Curriculum Design and Assessment Committee for this course.

Ben served as a Table Leader for the 1998, 1999, 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2011 Environmental Science Exam Readings and as a Question Leader for the 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2003 Readings. He served as one of the four readers of the Alternate exam for the 2004-2006 Readings. Ben served as a member of the AP Environmental Science Development Committee from 1998-2002. In November of 2001, Ben received the Siemens Foundation Award for Advanced Placement Teaching. In November 2005, he received the Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District Educator of the Year Award. Ben has participated in two Earthwatch Institute field research projects, gathering data in 1997 for the “Moose and Wolves of Isle Royale” study and in 2001 while on the “Snow Leopards of Nepal” project in the Annapurna region of the Himalayas. In the summer of 2003, he worked as a backcountry ranger with the National Park Service in Lassen Volcanic National Park and in 2009, worked as an interpretive ranger in Yellowstone National Park. During the 2004 summer, he lived on the Homathko Glacier for 28 days while participating in the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) Waddington Range Mountaineering course in British Columbia. He is a finisher of the Western States 100 Mile Endurance Run and the Everest Challenge Cycling stage race in the Sierra Nevada and White Mountain Ranges in California.

Our Overall Plan for our four+ days together:
A. Materials

1. The College Board AP* Environmental Science Participant’s Manual: Teacher’s Guide, Released Exam, 2012 FRQs/Rubrics/Samples
2. Handouts: Course content/information, labs, activities, resources
3. Some of Ben’s Exams and FRQs

1. Prerequisites; The most important prerequisite
2. Students taking AP* Environmental Science:
3. Equity and Access
4. The Importance/Significance of Class Discussions
5. Lecturing: How I have modified lecture-time since 1996
6. Course timeline, Syllabi, Time Management, Lecture/Discussion
7. The Course and The May AP* Exam
8. The Course Redesign
9. Comments on some of the Free Response Questions from 1998-2011
10. Sample Lessons
11. The Textbook Choice
12. Resources & Support Materials: Books, Lab/field manuals, Periodicals, Equipment, Videos
13. Identification and discussion of "Problem Areas"
14. The importance of “experimental design” labs; inquiry
15. "Positive Messages"
16. Field Trips and guest speakers
17. Summer assignment(s)? -Pros and Potential Cons
18. Websites
19. Research projects, long-term lab and field investigations
20. Possible "Post-May AP* Exam" assignments, labs, literature, videos, etc.

1. Course Redesign: “Best Practices”, Problem Solving, Experimental Design/Inquiry, Synthesis and Evaluation

1. Stay current
2. Run with your strengths and passions
3. Network with other APES Teachers; discussion groups, AP Central.
4. The "Reading": attend the AP* Environmental Science Exam Reading in June. The AP* Reading may not occur at an ideal time for some, but you will find this experience to be a very valuable one.

2012 Session Outline

Tuesday, June 26

1. Overview of the AP* Environmental Science Course.
2. Brief discussion of the AP*ES Participant’s Manual.
3. Course Outline and objectives.
4. The "AP*ES Course" and the "May AP* Exam".
5. Prerequisites and the students taking the course; "The most important prerequisite."
6. Textbook options/text selection.
7. Planning the AP*ES course: mapping out the 170 (or 80) days or so you have with your students:
   1. Scheduling and Pacing: how long to devote to each of the topic areas:
   2. Techniques, strategies, and suggestions for teaching this course.
   3. Overview of laboratory work, field investigations, and demonstrations.
   4. Grading: exams, quizzes, homework, labs, reports, presentations, projects, and other assignments.
   5. A "typical two-week period" in Ben’s AP*ES classes; sample lessons
8. Resources and Support Materials
9. Preparing for the AP* Exam.
10. A look at the major "Problem areas": mistakes and misconceptions that students often make or have regarding environmental science concepts; how to prevent/overcome these errors.
11. Set-up/conduct Laboratory and Field investigations.

1. Specific information on the Seven Major Topic Areas in the course outline:
   1. Earth Systems and Resources…………....10-15%
   2. The Living World…………………………........10-15%
   3. Population…………………………………..........10-15%
   4. Land and Water Use……………………........10-15%
   5. Energy Resources and Consumption…..10-15%
   6. Pollution: …………………………………...........25-30%
   7. Global Change…………………………….........10-15%
(-discussion regarding each of these areas, I. – VII., will continue throughout the week-)
2. Laboratory and Field Work continued: Set up/conduct several experiments.
3. Lab and Field equipment: what do you "need"? What would be helpful to have?
4. Lab and Field manuals.
5. Videos, software, websites, periodicals.
6. Continue APES discussion on "Planning, Strategies and Suggestions…"

1. Water Quality Testing
2. Course Content Specifics continued.
3. Perform Lab/Field Experiments.
4. Non-text reading assignments/ periodicals, field outings/trips, agencies.
5. Additional resources.
6. Video samples/titles.
7. Exam Handouts: Samples of Ben’s Multiple-Choice Exams, Free Response Questions, and Rubrics.
8. Thoughts on how we might reduce the number of April and/or early May nights that we wake up at 2:30 a.m. thinking about AP Environmental Science topics that we could have spent more time exploring with our students.