Biography

I am excited to be in my fourth year teaching here at Decatur, and I wanted to take a moment to introduce myself to those of you who are new to Decatur. I am going into my 23rd year of teaching, having served students and families from all across Chicago in grades 3-8, primarily in the subject areas of Science, Social Studies, and Language Arts. I hold a Master of Arts in Teaching Degree from National-Louis University, and in recent years I was awarded a Golden Apple in Teaching Fellowship and MSUrbanSTEM Fellowship. I have also earned National Board Teacher Certification.

I am extremely passionate about teaching and exploring Science with middle school students! My philosophy of teaching science revolves around guiding students into collaboratively exploring phenomena, both inside and outside of our classroom. Based upon their own observations, under the framework of The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), students devise their own evidence-based hypotheses, test their hypotheses with their own designed experiments and/or engineering creations, and after careful data analysis, they apply their language skills in a variety of ways to communicate their findings to a wider audience. Their audiences sometimes include students from other schools and locations, as well as professional scientists and engineers from local universities or corporate foundations, and even around the world via videoconferencing.

When I am not in the pursuit of quenching my own lifelong love of learning new things through Science, I love spending time with family and friends. In the picture you can see my family; my wife, Megan, our children Ruby and Hank, and Hank’s service dog, Dosido. I am honored to be your child’s teacher of Science this year and I look forward to working as a partner with you to help your child grow as a learner!

Posts

Week 19 of JHS Science 2023-24

This week's slideshow highlights: 8th grade class beginning the first stage of the integrated and collaborative unit with 5th grade class that encompasses learning experiences in both Science and Music class with Ms. Schmittle as part of this year's Chicago Symphony Orchestra partnership; 7th grade class began exploring how to measure velocity of moving motor vehicles as part of their SEPUP Physics Unit: Forces & Motion; 6th grade class explored microscopic organisms under our microscopes as part of their SEPUP Inquiry Unit: From Cells to Organisms; and there are a few pics of our Decatur Lego Robotics Team members celebrating this year's successes of a new Decatur Classical school record of 285 points at the robot table by our Pedal to the Plastic team members and a return to IL State Competition by our Brainstorms team members! Thank you for checkin in with us this week:)

Decatur Lego Robotics is Headed Back to IL State Tournament Competition!

Congratulations to both of our Decatur Classical First Robotics Lego League Teams, Pedal to the Plastic & Brainstorms, who competed at the Chicago McKinley Lego Sectional Tournament this past Sunday! Each team, made up of 16 total students from grades 5-8: shined at the tournament; both teams received special awards at our regional and sectional tournaments; and Brainstorms was one of only 5 teams out of 18 at the Sectional Tournament who advanced onto the IL State Tournament on February 17th at Elgin Community College. Ms. Petropoulos and I couldn't be prouder of all of our team members this year, who set Decatur school records that allowed both or our teams to compete in last Sunday's sectional tournament! Thank you to all of our team members' parents, Mr. Bashir, and you for checking out our slideshow:)

Decatur JHS STEM Fair

This slideshow highlights 6th-8th grade students presenting their chosen individual or partner inquiry STEM Fair Projects to volunteer judges at our JHS STEM Fair last Thursday. The judges were so impressed with each presentation and while working in teams using the CPS STEM Fair Rubric they helped narrow down who are our 5 sixth grade finalists and 5 combined 7th-8th grade finalists who will now advance onto CPS Network 2 Regional STEM Fair. Our finalists this year are: Saliha & Sriya, Maja, Zoe, Raaga, Aaron & Johaan, Adrian, Maizie, Clare & Neil, Elliot, and Sienna! Congratulations and best of luck as you represent Decatur at CPS Regional STEM Fair!

Weeks 17 & 18

The weeks before and right after winter break highlights: Grade 8 students exploring sound waves as part of their SEPUP Waves Inquiry Unit; 7th graders making greeting cards for the entire Decatur staff; 6th-8th graders conducting an experiment called "Can you taste the difference" where they collected class data on how much they could actually identify the difference in various types of bottled water vs tap water (the data revealed that overall people can not really taste the difference yet spend billions of $ on plastic bottles that often end up in our oceans, lakes, and rivers; and a sighting of our class pet bearded dragon, Snickers! Thank you for checkin in with us this week:)

Decatur First Lego Robotics Teams Advance to Sectional Competition!

I am so excited to announce that both of our Decatur First Lego Robotics Teams competed at our Regional Tournament this Saturday and each of our 2 teams, The Brainstorms & Pedal to the Plastic, have advanced onto Sectional Competition! Students in grades 5-8 make up both teams and they displayed Decatur Classical's 3 pillars of "Being Present, Enduring Challenges, & Taking Care of Each Other" in such a way that each team also received special awards and trophies for their professionalism and teamwork! Please check out this slideshow for some highlights and a special thank you to Mrs. Negron and Mr. Bashir for your support of Ms. Petropoulos and I getting our teams ready for their competition, and to all the parents who were able to make it Saturday to cheer our teams on!

Week 15 of JHS Science 2023-24| STEM Fair Class Presentations

This week's slideshow highlights: Students in 6th, 7th, & 8th grade classes presenting their STEM Fair Projects to their classmates. Each student chose to work alone or with a partner, where they practiced each of the 8 NGSS Science & Engineering Practices starting with "Asking Questions or Defining a Problem", to then "designing and carrying out an experiment or engineering design process", all the way to eventually "obtaining, evaluating, and communicating information". As scientists and engineers, going through the process of presenting to their classmates simulates the "peer review" process that all scientists experience in the real world. Presentations this week encompassed inquiry projects that explored all the disciplines of science and engineering: biology; earth science; environmental science; chemistry; and physics. I am so proud of our students as they showed enthusiasm for their chosen inquiry topics and displayed a high level of scientific inquiry, which they also combined with college-level research skills along the way. In a sense, students who presented were the teachers of our class for that 10-15 minute period of our class time. We still have a few more presentations this coming week! Thank you for checking in with us this week:)

Week 13-14 JHS Science 2023-24| Transitioning to New Units of Study

This slideshow highlights: 6th grade wrapping up their earth science SEPUP unit by investigating the theory of continental drift and then diving right into a new biology SEPUP unit where they ran a fun real-world simulation where they worked as epidemiologists to determine the most likely cause of a bacterial diseases outbreak; 7th grade applied what they have been learning about the role of genetics in heredity through creating models of "critters" based on crossing of the known genotypes of the two critter parents; 8th grade conducted an owl pellet dissection to culminate their ecology SEPUP unit, and then dove right into a physics SEPUP unit where they began exploring sound energy and how it can impact human hearing. A special thank you to Decatur parent/Decatur Together rep Lisbeth Goble for helping the JHS Science lab secure the materials for the owl pellet dissection, as well as for the purchase of other materials for our science lab such as a new incubator for microbiology investigations!

Weeks 13-14 JHS Science 2023-24| Gearing up for STEM Fair Project Class Presentations and Decatur Lego Robotics Team Competition

This slideshow highlights: students across grades 6-8 choosing to come in during their lunch periods to prep for next week's STEM Fair Project class presentations--students have been busy applying their understanding of the NGSS Science & Engineering Practices investigating problems of their choice; Decatur First Lego Robotics Team gearing up for regional tournament, which will be held Saturday, December 9th, at Taft High School. They will compete with 20 teams for a chance to move onto Citywide competition!

Week 12 of JHS Science 2023-24| Seeing Living Science Up Close

This week's slideshow highlights: 6th grade took a field trip to Indiana Dunes Learning Center and worked on strengthening their class community and learning about wildlife conservation in our National Parks; both 7th grade and 8th grade classes studied the behaviors of some aquatic macro and microorganisms such as Daphnia, Planaria, and Paramecium, as well as organisms that they discovered living in our classroom freshwater aquatic ecosystem; 8th grade also went on a field trip to The Wild Mile, where they worked with ecologists from Urban Rivers to learn about sustainability efforts in the Chicago River, of which our students will design floating gardens to install later this year at River Park (see Mr. Brennan's webpage for some pics of that trip!); thank you for checking in with us this week:)

Week 11 of JHS Science 2023-24| Geologic Process, Genetics, Ecology, a bit of STEM Fair Projects & Oktoberfest!

This week's slideshow highlights: 8th grade working on data analysis and interpretation of abiotic and biotic interactions within food webs; 7th graders exploring genetics; 6th grade investigating a lab on the role of underground gasses in volcanic eruptions; some scenes of JHS students at the experimental design and data collection stages of their STEM Fair Projects; and several pics and a short video of our JHS students having a BLAST at Oktoberfest this past Tuesday! Thank you for checking in with us this week:)

Weeks 8 & 9 of JHS Science 2023-24| Lots of Ecology and Students Being Teachers

This slideshow highlights: 8th graders continuing their exploration of their SEPUP Unit--Ecology; 8th graders are exploring food webs of wildlife within our region as well as seeing them in action in our classroom through feeding live minnows to our Lake Michigan fish (large-mouth bass, bluegill, rock bass, and invasive gobis), and 8th graders also fed live crickets to our pet bearded dragon, Snickers, along with our new live Venus Flytrap plant that was donated to our Science lab by a Decatur parent (Special Thank you to Mr. Greenwald!); there is a pic of an 8th grade student showing Snickers to a fellow Decatur primary grade student who visited our classroom; 7th grade continued exploring genetics by learning how geneticists use Punnett Squares as a way of predicting the genotypes and phenotypes of offspring given the cross of the parents' genotypes; and 6th grade dug deeper (no pun intended:)) into their SEPUP Unit--Geologic Processes by working in small cooperative research groups and teaching the rest of the class about recent significant natural disasters as they continue to gather evidence to support their claims as to where would be the best underground location to store hazardous nuclear waste; and lastly 5th-8th graders who make up Decatur's 2 Lego Robotics Teams are getting closer to regional competition as they began coding and testing their robot designs to complete various game board missions. Thank you for checking in with us this week!

Week 7 of JHS Science 2023-2024| Decatur Now Has Raised Garden Beds Installed!

This week's slideshow highlights: JHS students working together to decide on the best location to install our new raised garden beds; students also worked collaboratively to fill them with nutritious soil that was delivered; a 7th grade student working on their STEM Fair Project, where they are investigating the benefits of mushrooms growing alongside plants; a couple of pics of Decatur's Lego League Robotics teams gearing up for competition; a 7th grade student who was excited to bring some snail eggs from home to share with our science lab; and students taking the extra soil we had leftover and spreading it around our plants out in front of the school. Thank you for checking in with us this week:)

Week 6 of JHS Science 2023-24| Gearing Up for Decatur Green Learning Spaces

This week's slideshow highlights: 6th grade exploring how underground aquifers form as part of their Geologic Processes SEPUP inquiry unit; 6th graders are also leading the way with individually brining in pictures to share with our class and add to our "Decatur JHS All About Us" board in the classroom (First class to have more than 1/2 the class on the board gets to be the class that can first handle our class pet bearded dragon, Snickers; a couple pics of some 6th graders who volunteered to help Mr. Brennan install new mobile garden planters that will be used by our kindergarten class; 7th grade investigated how simple inherited genetic traits are passed from parents to offspring as part of their Reproduction biology SEPUP inquiry unit; 8th grade went outside and conducted data transect biodiversity investigations as part of their Ecology SEPUP inquiry unit; some pics of Decatur Lego League assembling the various missions for their game board that will be used at tournament competition; and last but not least, several pics of our JHS students having fun at our Waveland Bowl community-builder trip! Thank you for checking in with us this week:)

Week 5 of JHS Science 2023-24| Research: Inquiring Minds Want to Know

This week's slideshow highlights: Ms. Koreman came to our 7th Grade Science class to present to on what a landscape architect does as a career--7th grade will be spearheading the design and implementation of a Decatur outdoor learning garden and other indoor and outdoor green spaces in collaboration with Nilay Mistry, Decatur alum and landscape architect instructor at IIT; JHS students in grades 6-8 were busy digging into their chosen STEM Fair Project Topics through researching their developed inquiry questions in order to start the path to becoming experts on their topic of inquiry; 5th-8th graders began our Lego League after-school robotics club this week; our 7th grade herpetologist busy caring for Snickers, our class pet bearded dragon lizard; and our class Lake Michigan aquatic ecosystem now has 4 different species of fish caught from Diversey Harbor, including the invasive and strange-looking Gobi. Thank you for checking in with us this week:)

Week 4 of JHS Science 2023| A Mix of Cooperative Group, Partner, and Independent Work in Science

This week's slideshow highlights: 8th graders working in cooperative groups to explore the impact of the introduced species of Nile Perch into Lake Victoria in Africa, and how it affected the lives of those living in the region from both economic and environmental perspectives; 7th graders continued to investigate the impact of a genetic disorder on a patient's daily living; and 6th grade learned more about the issue of "where to store nuclear wastes"; there are some pics of students presenting to their classmates; a few video clips of students beginning their independent research on their chosen STEM Fair Project essential guiding question; 7th grade working in teams to complete the "Pitfall Harry" community-builder challenge; a few shots of our class pet bearded dragon, "Snickers"; and my 8th grade SEL/Advisory class, Room 1013, doing a fun partner activity that challenges their speaking and listening skills. Thank you for checking in with us this week:)

Name: Mr. Gerard Kovach
Position: 6th-8th | Science
Email: gjkovach@cps.edu