Today group three taught their direct and
inquiry based lessons on precipitation. Group three started off strong using a
word cloud in the shape of a tornado to introduce precipitation. It is always
important when you introduce your topic to relate it back to something children
are familiar with. This procedure ensure students will be making connections as
they learn new material. Students who make connections while learning are
better able to understand the content they are learning. Group three did a
great job connecting their material to the real world such as why you can see
your breath when it is cold out and what the white lines are behind planes.
This was a great way for students to think back to something they have observed
before. Students gain a deeper understanding of a concept when they make
authentic connections. The only suggestion I have for group three during their
direct instruction lesson is to "teach the stuff and cut the fluff."
By this I mean that group three gave the students a lot of information that was
unnecessary and doing so they ran out of time. It is better to just present the
students with the information they will need rather than anything extra that
may distract them.
When it was time for the inquiry lesson, group
three was already so behind they left out a lot of key steps when presenting. I
wish he group had more time to explain to the class what the inquiry process is
and what they would be doing at each station. It seemed that group three had
very thought out and exciting experiments for the students, but it was hard to
see what was going on. Next time I hope group three remembers time is of the
essence!
Well, today was the day! After weeks of planning, hours spent practicing and many late nights editing my group finally taught our two lessons. As you read in my previous blog our topic is clean & green energy! I personally was very excited about this topic because I wanted to learn more ways I can help our planet through the use of alternative forms of clean energy.
For our direct instruction lesson we used a google slideshow that you can find HERE to teach the necessary vocabulary and concepts that the students will need to know in order to do the inquiry lesson. As we taught our direct instruction lesson, the students followed along writing the necessary words in their "green energy" booklets that we provided. I think this was useful because after the students learned a new word they wrote it in their booklets and then read the definition again. This repetition is key to learning vocabulary and we thought this would benefit our students when it was time to apply the knowledge they learned. In addition to the booklets we used an acronym to teach the five forms of clean energy. Silly (Solar) Boys (Biomass) Go (Geothermal) Hunting on (Hydro) Weekends (Wind). Together as a class we repeated this over and over until it was second nature for the students. The direct instruction lesson went smoothly with a few check for understanding activities and a couple of guided practice worksheets to ensure the necessary material was learned. The students were very respectful for the direct instruction lesson and seemed to be very interested in learning more about green energy.
Now, let's talk about our inquiry lesson... We chose to create a webquest for our inquiry lesson in which the different groups of students would each become experts in one form of green energy. Similarly to group 1 we chose to use a voki o introduce our problem. This choice was also our biggest problem as teachers. We thought it would be a good idea to use a voki of President Trump in which he would ask our class of students for help as he wants to save our planet. Yeah, we THOUGHT this was going to be a good idea, but instead of having the class actively listening, they all bursted out in laughs and had their own comments to say about Mr. President. I wish we would have used a letter/ email "written" by the president and maybe things would have gone smoother. My colleagues and I did not let this ruin our lesson though. We tried to keep it as serious as possible and explain to the class what we would be doing in our groups. We went over the inquiry process in our google slides presentation which you can access HERE.
After we taught the lesson it was time for the groups of student activists to get working! Each group was assigned a form of green energy and using the webquest I created they would fill in a sheet to become an expert on their energy. The groups then explained why their type of energy would be best for the United States with details from what they learned. The students seemed to enjoy researching their energy topic using the ipads. I think the inquiry lesson was very effective and engaging for the class because they felt as if their voice was going to be heard by the government which made the experience authentic for the class. I'm glad they learned something because the future of clean and energy lies in that generations hands.
Week four approached quickly and with that came time for group 1 to teach their lesson. The topic group 1 chose to teach is the solar system. Group 1 started off strong, my colleagues started off with an acronym to help the class remember the planets and their order. To teach their direct instruction lesson, my colleagues used a Prezi with many pictures and minimal words. I though this approach to teaching was very effective because it wasn't too much for the students to remember. I am unfamiliar with Prezi and often take the safer route which is creating a google slides presentation. After watching group 1 present, I hope to use Prezi in the future for a lesson or at least play around with the website for now.
The inquiry lesson was an exciting experiment in which each group was assigned a different material to see which could keep the ice from melting! The problem was introduced through the use of a Voki about how climate change is effecting glaciers and the students must become geologists to find how to keep ice from melting! I think this was a very engaging start and the students seemed to be very interested in becoming geologists.
I think because it was the student's first time being taught a lesson in the after school program they did not know what to expect. Most of them figured they would be doing crazy science experiments that included explosions and fizzing wonders, but that was not possible in the little amount of time we were given to teach direct and inquiry lessons. This was hard for group 1 to up hold such high expectations, but they did a great job teaching the material. The behavior management could have been approached differently because the students were very disrespectful throughout the lessons.
After a delayed start we were finally able to meet our students that will be apart of our after school program! The program consists of about 20 students from 3rd to 5th grade. Our first afternoon meeting with them we were asked to bring a getting to know you activity, a way to introduce our topic and a book that has to do with science.
The topic my group chose was clean energy. We asked the students what energy was, what types of energy they know of and how energy works. We did this so we could see what we would have to teach them and what we could review based on what they already knew. When we met with the groups of students we noticed a couple of different things. First we noticed there were a couple of major behavior problems with the students. Right away my group agreed we would have to strategically place the students seats when we teach our lessons and stand scattered amongst the students. We decided this because we noticed "cliques" amongst the students, we knew that if we wanted the lesson to go smoothly we would have to separate them. Secondly we noticed that the skill levels varied greatly amongst the students. Some students seemed to love science and knew a lot of different information where as others had a hard time answering our simple questions. To make sure the lesson would be beneficial for everyone we knew we had to make it engaging with different types of assessments so the students didn't struggle or get bored while we were teaching. After the "meet & greet" session I knew we had our work cutout for us and we should start planning sooner rather than later. I am excited to see how the program goes and the different lessons my colleagues and I will teach!
After we taught the lesson it was time for the groups of student activists to get working! Each group was assigned a form of green energy and using the webquest I created they would fill in a sheet to become an expert on their energy. The groups then explained why their type of energy would be best for the United States with details from what they learned. The students seemed to enjoy researching their energy topic using the ipads. I think the inquiry lesson was very effective and engaging for the class because they felt as if their voice was going to be heard by the government which made the experience authentic for the class. I'm glad they learned something because the future of clean and energy lies in that generations hands.
Week four approached quickly and with that came time for group 1 to teach their lesson. The topic group 1 chose to teach is the solar system. Group 1 started off strong, my colleagues started off with an acronym to help the class remember the planets and their order. To teach their direct instruction lesson, my colleagues used a Prezi with many pictures and minimal words. I though this approach to teaching was very effective because it wasn't too much for the students to remember. I am unfamiliar with Prezi and often take the safer route which is creating a google slides presentation. After watching group 1 present, I hope to use Prezi in the future for a lesson or at least play around with the website for now.
The inquiry lesson was an exciting experiment in which each group was assigned a different material to see which could keep the ice from melting! The problem was introduced through the use of a Voki about how climate change is effecting glaciers and the students must become geologists to find how to keep ice from melting! I think this was a very engaging start and the students seemed to be very interested in becoming geologists.
