Louis Rosche · For Schools
Middle and high school science teacher · St. Louis, MO
I run a science classroom that takes NGSS three-dimensional learning seriously, uses formative assessment as the central weekly routine, and partners with families and IEP teams as a default rather than as an exception. The students I focus on most are the ones who look fine on the dashboard but aren't — and the routines that identify them early in the year.
The sample unit is the complete working set for one five-day HS Biology cycle (HS-LS1-2): lesson plan, Canvas student page, exit ticket, rubric, differentiation, and family-communication template.
Beginning the 2026–27 school year, I'll teach Grade 6 science at Confluence Academies, delivering Washington University's MySci kit-based curriculum.
Each unit opens with something students cannot fully explain on day one. The phenomenon frames the full unit, not just the opening. Models get drawn early, revised against evidence, and rewritten before the summative. Students keep every version; the revisions document what they learned.
Rubrics name the Science and Engineering Practice and the Crosscutting Concept alongside the Disciplinary Core Idea. A student who can explain a model but can't construct an argument from evidence sees specifically what to practice next.
Every class has an exit ticket. Every unit has at least one mid-unit "where are you on this idea" check. Every two weeks I look at a sample of student work in writing, not just in the gradebook. The point of the cycle is the regrouping move on the next day.
When a student is struggling, I read their work before I read the screening report. Screening tells me who; the work tells me what. The intervention follows the gap I can see, not the score the system hands me.
Family communication in my classroom is structured and sourced from actual student work — not just from a grade. For students whose plans call for regular home contact, I send a short weekly note that names what's working, what's struggling, and one specific thing to celebrate. When there's a difficult conversation, I listen first, take notes, name what we agree on, show the work, and offer a next step the student owns. I send the follow-up through the district's official family-communication channel so the assistant principal and I are working from the same record.
The data platform I built carries this into a bilingual (English/Spanish) family progress profile for every student. In any shared example every name, score, and date is synthetic — but the structure is exactly what a family at one of my conferences sees.
I read the IEP and 504 plan before I plan the unit, not after the first failed assessment. I name the accommodations on my unit plan in writing. I attend annual reviews when invited and bring a folder of recent student work rather than a verbal summary. I track progress on goals against work I'm already collecting (exit tickets, lab reports, model drafts) so my data fits the meeting rather than requiring separate collection.
As a Tier 2/3 case earlier this year, I noticed a student whose exit-ticket performance had pulled steadily below the rest of his work even though every standard early-warning signal said he was fine. Looking at the actual work, I advocated for a re-evaluation of his existing eligibility because the supports in his plan weren't matching what I was seeing day-to-day.
I helped stand up a regular communication loop with his holistic care team — parent, counselor, case manager — checked in with him directly twice a week, and sent his mother a short weekly report of progress, struggles, and successes.
In less than three weeks his course score had moved from the low 50s to the mid 60s, his risk score had dropped by half, and he was off our internal failing-grade flag. The deeper work isn't done, but he is now monitored directly and a structured support routine is in place around him.
A five-day HS Biology I unit anchored on a body-systems-failure phenomenon — standards-aligned to NGSS HS-LS1-2. Includes the full Day 1 lesson plan, a paste-ready Canvas student page, a 5-statement RATE-format exit ticket with answer key, a three-dimensional summative rubric, differentiation notes for IEP / 504 / multilingual / above-grade-level students, a Day 2 lab safety brief, and a family-communication template. Designed as a conversation starter for a PLC, not a deploy-Monday plan.
Beyond the single sample unit, here is a complete two-year scope: every week of Grade 7 and Grade 8 science, eight cycles each, anchored to Next Generation Science Standards. Each week opens with a real phenomenon and ships with a student page, interactive simulations, original animations, a worksheet, and an answer key — browsable in the page.
74 weeks of instruction, 82 student pages, 56 interactive simulations, and 17 original Manim animations — phenomenon-driven and NGSS-aligned.
Phenomenon-first weekly structure, a hook + three-station rotation + a spiral exit ticket, accessible HTML simulations, and printable worksheets with keys for every lesson. Original instructional materials authored by Louis Rosche.
Missouri DESE certification spanning elementary through high school science (grades 1-12).
National Commission for Health Education Credentialing.
References available on request. All student data referenced in this portfolio is simulated or fully anonymized in compliance with FERPA.