NSTA Recap: Ceilings that Leak and Friends so Unique!

Fellow National Science Foundation SBIR grantees!
Fellow National Science Foundation SBIR grantees!

This year’s NSTA National Conference in Atlanta brought together over ten thousand science educators from across the country and Team Killer Snails was lucky enough to spend time with friends both old and new! Our first day included a wonderful reunion with friends from The PocketLab and NeuroTinker, two fellow NSF SBIR grantees whose games are bringing learning out of the lab and into the hands of students worldwide.

Throughout the conference we met with science educators from across the country and learned a few new tricks too. We learned from industry titans like NOAA whose educator Stephen Zepecki gave a talk about three tools for making weather data approachable and engaging in the classroom and folks from Vernier who demoed their tools for making force visible.

Delighted to see so many awesome attendees!
Delighted to see so many awesome attendees!

 

Imagine our surprise when we discovered that our neighbor was Chris Kessler of Kessler Science fame, and our delight when Diana Allen, of Maine NSTA President & infographic fame and Tom Robertson of Explore Learning descended upon our booth for a visit!

Learning from the ceiling leak!
Learning from the ceiling leak!

Science expertise was on parade at the expo with the folks behind @NGSSphenomena not missing a beat to question the structure, function, scale, and system of the tarp that would later render the exhibitor hall uninhabitable due to an indoor rain storm. The ceiling leak became even more epic thanks to the PocketLab sensors (that also did a stellar job of graphing data from NASA’s Human Gyroscope). And OCEARCH’s own Lindsay Laughner came by to see our latest tabletop game, Biome Builder. We were all enamored by her gorgeous necklace by artist Brooke Kahnani whose art directly benefits OCEARCH.

 

Another great conference is in the books for Team Killer Snails, we can’t wait to see our friends again soon. Until then, you can come play our latest VR adventure with us at the New York Hall of Science this Wednesday from noon until 7 p.m.