9-30-08 - Ready, Set, Science Chapter 3 & 4

Today, class was online only. Our assignment was to complete the Module 2 Reading Guide that covered chapters 3 and 4 in the Ready, Set, Sciences textbook. Chapter 3 covered information about the knowledge that children have as they enter school and how that knowledge changes and develops as they continue through school. Chapter 4 discusses how we should use the core concepts as the basis of our instruction. Both chapters contain a lot of useful information as well as how science instruction should differ from practices currently in use. The biggest ideas that I took from my reading as well as competing the reading guide are that students’ misconceptions are important steps in their development and they do not necessarily need to be addressed right away and that your science curriculum should be based on just a few core concepts that will be developed over time.

9-26-08 - The Amazing Food Detective

I spent some time checking out “The Amazing Food Detective” web site linked in D2L. Wow, what a neat site for kids to explore nutrition and exercise! This website is simple to use so it could be used with young children. I did feel though that the site kind of lead you to the correct choices, making it difficult to explore which choices are right or wrong. Thus, there is not much intelligence needed. This might be okay if we use this web site simply to supplement instruction, because the information provided in the narrative is very good. I would also like to note that I really liked the multi-cultural presence on the web site.

9-25-08 - Web Seminar

Instead of meeting at our regular class time, we participated in a Web Seminar. The seminar was titled “Celebrating Astronomy: A Star’s Story” and our teacher was one of the presenters. Going into the seminar, I was a little concerned, because I had never done something like this before and I did not know what to expect. But, the concept of a web seminar is great. I really thought it was cool to have this live time discussion with people around the country (and Australia too). I thought it was neat to have so much interaction in the form of chats, white board markings, and the use of other tools such as the pooling feature and emotion icons.

As far as the content of the seminar, the seminar covered topics such as how stars are formed, information about the star life cycle or stages, how to classify stars, what happens when a star dies, and resources that we can use to help us use this information in a classroom. As far as providing more details about the content, I am afraid that I can not do that. I have had very little instruction in astronomy, meaning I really did not have much background on this topic going into the seminar. As a result, I felt that most of the information was going right over my head. When they asked for questions, I did not even know where to start asking questions. I am hoping that the resources given can help me get a better understanding of the topic so I can successfully teach my future students about astronomy.

9-23-08 - The Acid Test

Today we did another lab dealing with Food and Nutrition. This lab investigated the acidity of foods. There were many steps to this lab. First, we tested what would happen when we mixed vinegar and baking soda in a cup. Then, we tested this same reaction in a bottle. When doing the experiment in a bottle we could witness the gas (carbon dioxide) the reaction was producing. Other variations to this test were mixing water and baking soda as well as testing a 50-50 water and vinegar mixture’s reaction with baking soda. Then the experiment took a different turn. We started to test what fruit juice and fruit pieces would do when mixed with baking soda. The fruit used included oranges, limes, pink grapefruit, and white grape fruit. Our group found the lime juice to be the most acidic. We ran out of time to test the fruit pieces.

From doing this lab, I learned some things about doing labs in a classroom. First of all, I learned that prepared lab directions are not always very clear. Our group was especially confused with the directions on testing the fruit pieces. Thus is might be necessary as the teacher to prepare clear directions for labs yourself. Another lesson learned in class that I would like to remember is to always double the time you think it will take to prepare for a lab, because it can take longer than you expect it to.

9-18-08 – Interaction, Collaboration, and Technology

Today we got to do an activity that included interaction, collaboration, and technology. To complete this activity, we got into groups of three with one computer per group. We then went on the Foss web site that runs in conjunction with the Foss Kits we have in the classroom. We were asked to collaborate with the members of our group to plan a meal that met required calorie and fat intake amounts. This was a fun activity to, but it also proved to be harder than we thought. It took my group quite a few attempts to successfully plan an adequate meal. We also completed a few nutrition worksheets from the Foss Kits. All this time, we were also taking time to discuss our findings as a class.

This was a wonderful example of how to integrate interaction, collaboration, and technology into a lesson. I believe that it is important to include these characteristics in some of your lessons because these characteristics are part children’s learning styles today. Many kids are so use to using the computer and being in social situations due to society's practices, so we really need to build on these strengths and allow the students to use them.

9-16-08 - Safety

After a short PowerPoint on Chapter 2 focusing on the 4 Learning Strands and their importance, we did an activity on a very important part of science – safety. This activity involved creating a game to use to help students learn about safety. The game had already been created for us, but we were able to add our own creative touches to the game board. I got really into this part, so I did not have time to play the game in class. But after reading through the directions, the game sounds really fun. Along with the game we received a few other aids to use in the classroom when talking about safety.

I think that the idea of using a game to help students learn about safety in the science lab is such a great idea. I can only imagine how much more effective this interactive method is compared to just having the students read the safety rules and sign an agreement or to have them watch a video and take a multiple choice or true/false quiz over the content. Safety is so important! I believe that it is critical for the students to really learn this information. If playing a game is the best way to do that, I am all for it.

9-11-08 – Introduction to Ready, Set Science

Today was a very informational day. We started out with an introduction PowerPoint presentation to the textbook that we are going to be using this semester. This presentation really helped me see a few things that I will need to work on during this class. Some of these things include making sure that I know some of the big and sometimes misleading terms, making sure that I am using all of the terminology in the correct form, and making sure that I am persistent in everything that I do. We also had a much needed tutorial on Desire to Learn and on Blogging.

But, the best part of the day was an activity involving chocolate. We did an activity investigating volume/surface area ratio. From this investigation I learned that a sphere vase can hold more chocolate kisses than a cylinder vase. This is definitely one lesson that this chocolate lover will remember.

9-9-o8 – Temperature Probe Response Time

This was a very interesting lab today. The lab itself was quite simple, but figuring out how to use the LabQuest was a task in itself. Although, after we figured out how to run the specific task that we needed, it was actually quite simple. The biggest problem my group had was figuring out that the directions on the lab sheet were for the TI-84 calculator and not for the LabQuest.

In this lab, we found that it took the temperature probe 49 seconds to respond to the change in temperature from the cup of ice water to the cup of hot water. When discussing the lab at the end of class, we found that ours differed from some of the others’ results by quite a few seconds. But, there were also a few who had very similar results. There were obviously different variables being used between the groups. Also, I wonder if the response time would have been different if we had gone from the hot water to the cold water.