The vignette portraying the difficulties encountered by the first year teacher in Louisiana really stuck with me while reading this chapter. She was highly educated on successful ways of teaching science and really believed that she was going to be a highly effective science teacher, as all of us hope to be as well. Once she began teaching, she realized that her students were not receptive to the inquiry style of teaching that she believed in. She debated teaching out of old textbooks and lecturing to her students, but decided that figuring out why her method wasn't working would be more beneficial. I think that this a very important quality for beginning teachers to have. This teacher spoke to her students about their learning histories and observed other classrooms to get acquainted with the typical teaching strategies used in this area and was able to adjust her teaching to fit both her needs and the needs of her students. This shows the importance of novice teachers learning about the backgrounds of their students and taking these into consideration while teaching.
One example of this that I encountered was in East Hartford while they were implementing reading and writing workshop. This is a different style of teaching that many students were not accustomed to. Students are offered choices in the books they select and have plenty of time to read freely around the classroom. In order to make this work, teachers had to spend weeks at the beginning of the school year getting children acquainted with this literacy set-up through rules, modeling, reminders and reasons for this way of learning. Similar strategies can be used in science. If students are not used to the inquiry method, it may be helpful to model how it looks, give reasons as to why this type of learning is being used in the classroom and ease students into it.
Reading this teacher's experience really made me see the value in learning about my students' learning backgrounds and thinking of strategies to combine my beliefs and teaching strategies with the strategies they're comfortable with.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Saturday, November 8, 2008
Conversations with Kids about Science
I really enjoyed talking with kids about science and seeing their reactions to all of the different concepts and experiments we presented them with. Both of the students that had the opportunity to talk to were very excited to do a science experiment and had many interesting ideas as to what science was.
The first student I spoke with was very talkative and excited. She said that she really enjoyed science and that they did a lot of science in school. She also said that she talks to her brother about science at home and does experiments with him, but not her parents because her mother doesn't speak English. The second student was much quieter and said that he liked science, but didn't talk to anyone about science at home. He also said that in science class, they read, answer questions and take notes. This upset me because these students were so excited and interested in the experiments that we brought with us and I was hoping these students would be able to experience more hands-on science experiments using the process skills during their typical school day.
I conducted an experiment about gases with the students. We heated water, put it in a milk jug and shook it to see what happened and repeated this with cold water. Before doing this, I asked the students what they knew about gases and both talked about pollution. The first child said she only sees gases when they come out of a car pipe and go into the air and the second said he sees gases in school sometimes in the pipes. The first student thought the hot water would be bubbly and change the water to a different color because when water boils, it turns grey. They second student had a more accurate idea of what would happen, saying steam would blast the lid off and also might make everything hot so you couldn't see inside the bottle (foggy). They were more unsure about the cold water, saying the bottle would get cold and ice would grow and make all the water freeze.
Seeing their reactions to the experiment was the most entertaining part of the experience. The first student made comments like "OH MY GOD IT GOT FATTER!" and "When you take the top off, it sounds like Pepsi because it fizzes." She also said that this might be because the water was magic. The second student seemed scared to touch the bottle because he thought the steam would be strong and blow the top off. He also did not notice that the bottle was getting sucked in and pushed out depending on the water temperature, which is the first thing that the first student noticed. Neither student was able to think of anything that this reminded them of, so I mentioned that another student told me it reminded them of blowing up balloons. The first student said still couldn't think of anything but the second student said "OHH thats true. Well, I guess the steam reminds me of after I take a shower and the mirror is hard to see in." I thought this was a great idea and interesting that he made this connection.
These students were interested in finding out how clouds are made, how the ocean is made and how water is formed. They were also curious about how God created us and dying. These were very profound things for fourth graders to be thinking about and I was really surprised by these answers. It shows that they are curious about a lot of things and think about things we might not expect.
Overall, I had a great time talking with these students. The second student seemed to have a clearer idea about what was going to happen and why, but the first student seemed to have a love for science and an excitement about it. She also had a great imagination. I think this experiment would be a great one to introduce atoms and molecules to students and how different temperatures affect the speeds at which they move. I learned that students have a lot of ideas coming into the classroom and it is important to acknowledge and build upon these predictions and connections.
The first student I spoke with was very talkative and excited. She said that she really enjoyed science and that they did a lot of science in school. She also said that she talks to her brother about science at home and does experiments with him, but not her parents because her mother doesn't speak English. The second student was much quieter and said that he liked science, but didn't talk to anyone about science at home. He also said that in science class, they read, answer questions and take notes. This upset me because these students were so excited and interested in the experiments that we brought with us and I was hoping these students would be able to experience more hands-on science experiments using the process skills during their typical school day.
I conducted an experiment about gases with the students. We heated water, put it in a milk jug and shook it to see what happened and repeated this with cold water. Before doing this, I asked the students what they knew about gases and both talked about pollution. The first child said she only sees gases when they come out of a car pipe and go into the air and the second said he sees gases in school sometimes in the pipes. The first student thought the hot water would be bubbly and change the water to a different color because when water boils, it turns grey. They second student had a more accurate idea of what would happen, saying steam would blast the lid off and also might make everything hot so you couldn't see inside the bottle (foggy). They were more unsure about the cold water, saying the bottle would get cold and ice would grow and make all the water freeze.
Seeing their reactions to the experiment was the most entertaining part of the experience. The first student made comments like "OH MY GOD IT GOT FATTER!" and "When you take the top off, it sounds like Pepsi because it fizzes." She also said that this might be because the water was magic. The second student seemed scared to touch the bottle because he thought the steam would be strong and blow the top off. He also did not notice that the bottle was getting sucked in and pushed out depending on the water temperature, which is the first thing that the first student noticed. Neither student was able to think of anything that this reminded them of, so I mentioned that another student told me it reminded them of blowing up balloons. The first student said still couldn't think of anything but the second student said "OHH thats true. Well, I guess the steam reminds me of after I take a shower and the mirror is hard to see in." I thought this was a great idea and interesting that he made this connection.
These students were interested in finding out how clouds are made, how the ocean is made and how water is formed. They were also curious about how God created us and dying. These were very profound things for fourth graders to be thinking about and I was really surprised by these answers. It shows that they are curious about a lot of things and think about things we might not expect.
Overall, I had a great time talking with these students. The second student seemed to have a clearer idea about what was going to happen and why, but the first student seemed to have a love for science and an excitement about it. She also had a great imagination. I think this experiment would be a great one to introduce atoms and molecules to students and how different temperatures affect the speeds at which they move. I learned that students have a lot of ideas coming into the classroom and it is important to acknowledge and build upon these predictions and connections.
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