Ali Craig science methods

Week 6     At the beginning of lab this week we checked our fast plants again to see their progress. Every fast plant had grown yellow flowers over the past week. Ours had grown so tall that it was falling over. These fast plants have been very cool to see over the past few weeks, they always grow past my expectations.                                                  After, we finished our activity from last week on Jamboard. Our group focused on the tundra, and revised our Jamboard to the natural disaster of climate change. I think this is another great activity that can be used in elementary classrooms all the way from low elementary to eighth grade as it can be modified easily. Working hands-on with a group to become experts about an ecosystem and then getting to share expertise with the rest of the class is collaborative, fun, and efficient.   ...

Week 5 We began lab by looking at our fast plants from two weeks ago. They have grown significantly and may bud flowers in the next week! We also were able to observe the new butterflies, our home only had one to observe while others had 3 or 4. We then discussed our read, write, and watch responses with both our tables and the whole class. This allowed us to remind ourselves of the NGSS study we reviewed. Then we were able to continue our activity from last week. We reviewed the lab activity created and graded it on a rubric. This was nice to further my understanding of the 5E lesson plan.  Then we started on our new focus of ecology. Ecology is the study of the relationships between living organisms including humans, and their physical environment. We also investigated biomes, habitats, and ecosystems. A biome is a large-scale category of ecosystems that have similar climate conditions and similar dominant types of plants and animals. Habitats are specific places where a part...

Week 4 At the beginning of lab this week we were able to look at our fast plant from last week. This was very cool to see the difference between the seed we tried to grow in the cotton. After we d iscussed what a good question is with small groups, and shared our reading and reflection responses. Then we were able to share out loud with the rest of the class what our ideas area as we do every class. This was nice to hear everyone's varying responses and add onto my own ideas that I had while originally responding. Then Dr. You showed us the importance or lack thereof of the order of lesson segments in a lesson plan. She was able to do this by giving us the segments in random orders and then asking if we could use that order in certain lessons. Next, we explored the 5E teaching method through...

  WEEK THREE     At the beginning of lab Wednesday, we began by reviewing materials from last week. We started discussions about life cycles last week and continued them this week, starting with the seeds we germinated last week.                             In lab, we focused on life cycles. We then started with mealworms and then learned a little more about them including that they have three distinct sections, the head, thorax, and abdomen. They also have 13 segments. We then switched to the life cycle of a butterfly which we saw through graphs, images of a butterfly kit, and a video. Looking at the life cycle of a butterfly through different sources allows for a deeper understanding and this is a method I will definitely use in my classroom, so my students have many different resources to reference.      After becoming more familiar with the life cycles we created model...