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Keystone
Weekly This week's Key Points: *Kit Use: Air and Weather and New Plants,*
*Web Picks of the Week: Special Thanksgiving
Edition,* and *Awesome Science!* Kit Use Through a KSN Teacher's Eyes: Air and Weather and New Plants (FOSS) Rebecca (Becki) Fry, a first grade teacher at Mifflin Elementary School in Big Springs School District (part of the Capital Area Math/Science Alliance), was kind enough to share her impressions of working with two kits: FOSS's Air and Weather and New Plants. In the Air and Weather kit, students study the properties of air. They examine its effects on other materials and use basic tools to gather information about air and weather. New Plants provides students with the opportunity to study some of the diversity of forms in the plant kingdom. They observe and describe the changes that occur as plants grow and develop, and they organize and communicate their observations on a calendar and in a journal. Becki's school district recently adopted a new science curriculum in conjunction with the Capital Area Math/Science Alliance, and their kits are provided through the Alliance. Fortunately, the Air and Weather and New Plants align nicely with what Becki needs to teach in the curriculum. At the moment, Becki and her colleagues are teaching two kits per grade, and next year they'll be increasing to four kits per grade. The Alliance trained Becki to use the kits, and this is her third year teaching them. Regarding both kits, Becki reports, "The preparation is usually very easy. It is so convenient to have everything together in the same place and also have almost everything provided. I really enjoy teaching from the kits and the students love it." Specifically, she says: "I really like the recording that is part of the activities. I feel that is a very important part to the science concepts." Becki says that some of her students' favorite Air and Weather activities are those that use syringes to help them explore air as a gas mixture, finding out that it is matter, that it occupies space, and can be used to move things around. She adds, "They really get into some good conversations about what is happening." When working with the New Plants kits, Becki says that her students love it, and that they get the biggest thrill from planting their seeds and looking after their plants as they grow, commenting, "It's amazing to see that the first place they go every morning is to check their seeds and plant growth." Looking at the kits pragmatically, Becki says that she finds the teachers guides to be very helpful, and she shares, "I do read the information provided before I begin a lesson just so I am not teaching any inconsistencies." The student pages are also good to use as well, she says, and adds that it's nice to have them pre-prepared. Becki says that the main difficulty she encounters is not having enough time to do all of the activities included in the kits. She skips some activities so her students don't feel like they're being rushed through the science, giving them time to reflect on the activities that they do cover. However, she affirms: "I really feel the kits do a great job of helping me get the main science concepts across to the students. Some students get much more than I intend for them to attain and others don't get as much." So, even though the strength of educational impact varies, the overall learning experience is strong.
Web Picks of the
Week See what one science-minded investigator did to his turkey in an attempt to solve the problems of overcooked breast meat and undercooked drumsticks. You may not want to try this at home! http://www.cnn.com/FOOD/news/9811/24/scientific.turkey/ Who says technology has no place during a holiday as traditional as Thanksgiving? If the Pilgrim and Native American children had computers, they may have made hand turkeys as cute as these. Try it with your class! http://www.fcps.k12.va.us/FairviewES/joplin/turkeys/kturkey s.htm
Awesome Science!
Did you know that some researchers have discovered that 50 percent of the student population could not hear past the first two rows of their classrooms? Check out this article, and see what scientists and schools have been doing to address the issue of classroom acoustics. http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scitech/DailyNews/classacoust ics011112.html
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The Franklin Institute is the Demonstration Site for the
Eisenhower
Mid-Atlantic Consortium, providing science and math
resources for teachers.
This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 9819641. © 2003. All rights reserved.
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