Integrating Technology and Science Safety

Hell-ooooooooo blog friends!  I wish I were a more consistent blogger, but I guess I'll need a 12-step for that to happen.  :-)  In the meantime, I've been going on vacation, celebrating weddings and babies (none for me right now :-) ), and a little home improvement here and there.

As I prepare to attend my summer curriculum and technology trainings, my mind has naturally gone to the beginning of a new year.  I have a new technology tool that I've been wanting to try, so I applied it to our first science unit (Our math curriculum is changing again, and integrated language arts and social studies is always evolving, isn't it?  Naturally, science seemed like the logical choice.  :-) ).

My attitude with most technology is that if so many other people can do it, so can I.  So, I searched for a YouTube tutorial, watched it, gathered my science safety resources, and dove right in.  Without further ado, I give you my Science Safety Thinglink (to check out the links I've described, hover over the picture and click "Touch."):




Making this was so simple.  First, I found a google image of a science safety rules poster created using Glogster.  I saved it and imported it into Thinglink.  Next, I added several YouTube science safety videos.  Then I added links to several curriculum resources I had saved in GoogleDocs.  Finally, I searched blogs, Pinterest, and TPT to find additional ideas and products that I might purchase to help me.

I'm so excited that I'll have so many of my digital resources for this unit all together in one place.  That's one less thing I'll have to worry about during the always chaotic beginning of the school year.  I'm glad to have discovered another digital tool and to have found a meaningful way to use it in my classroom.  I can continue to use this app/website to organize my digital resources for teaching units.  I can post them on my class website and/or Edmodo site for students to view again at home or during computer lab time/extra time in class.  Students could even create their own Thinglinks to organize information they have found.  This app/site is clearly full of so much potential.

My hope is that you might find some use for the science safety Thinglink I have created.  If not, I hope that you might have learned about a new app today and/or found the courage to try and make your own Thinglink if you knew about the app already but were a bit hesitant to try it on your own as I was in the past.

Thanks so much for reading!  :-)

Plant Research and PBLs

Hey everyone!

I'm returning a bit later than I wanted to my good ol' blog, but I'm here, so I'm happy.  :-)  We have been working hard on researching the parts of the plant in class lately.  When I saw Amy Lemons's Earth Day unit, I knew I could use her parts of the plant foldable to help my students with notetaking.  The results are below. 

One of my student's flower foldable

Student notes on plant roots and leaves



Once we found and recorded information about how the roots, stem, leaves, and flower help the plant, we formed groups in class.  My students are working with partners to develop a product and presentation that can answer how each part of the plant helps it survive.  It's been a fun week! 

Do you do project-based learning at your school?  What's your favorite PBL unit or topic that you teach?

Finally, I'm getting ready to celebrate Earth Day on Monday.  What read alouds are your favorite to share with your students?  I'd love to hear from you in the comments below.   

A Long Time Gone, DonorsChoose, and Great Ideas Soon to be in Action

Hello blog buddies (if you're still here),

It's been a long time.  It's been quite the school year.  I can't believe we are coming to the end of it.  Tonight will be a short post as I simply get back into the art of blogging.

As for the title, it was completely accidental, but it made me think of this Dixie Chicks song (Long Time Gone).  I loved them when I was in high school.

 

1) I have a new Donors Choose project posted, which you can view here. I have had one project funded by DonorsChoose before, and it was such a great experience that I decided to try again. Best of all, if you donate to any projects this week (through the 14th) and use the code "INSPIRE" the DonorsChoose Board of Directors will match the donation.

2) I saw a great guest post on Christina's blog, written by a guest blogger (Sara from Smiling in Second Grade that you can read here.  I LOVE the idea of Friday journals, and I can't wait to start this next year.  Frankly, I was so excited about this idea, especially for my English Language Learners, that if it didn't mean that I would have to find an extra journal for each of my students I would have started this immediately.  

3) I recently took advantage of the TpT Easter sale, and I picked up two great units.  I picked up Hope's poetry unit which you can find here and I picked up Amy's Earth Day unit which can be found here.  We have just begun our study of plants so we are working on Amy's parts of a plant foldable in class right now.  I'm excited to give you an update about this study later.     That's all for now.  It's definitely time to go home.      

Saving Science

Hello blog readers (if you are still out there-I've been gone for a long, long time),

I need your help today.  Science has become terribly, horribly boring.  Our 2nd grade students are so desperate for engaging science that they are literally digging up the playground at recess (No, I'm not kidding)!!! 

Not my students, but I think this captures how they feel.  :-(



We are about to embark upon our energy unit, and we need your help!  We are looking for engaging experiences to provide our students that will still yield a grade.  What do you do for science in your 2nd grade classroom?  What do the kids really love?  How do you grade it?  What are your sources for lessons/experiments? 

I've looked around the internet a bit, especially at the websites of two of my favorite scientists, Bill Nye and Steve Spangler.  I'm about to check out Pinterest next, but I'd love to hear your science success stories.  Please help us...BEFORE my students dig to China!

I hope to make my way back to blog land.  Maybe next week I can write a post to update you on how Investigations is going and what it looks like in my classroom.  Thanks for reading (and hopefully helping!). 

First Week Science: Ice Balloons

I'm so excited to have Angi from First-Graders from Outer Space as my first guest blogger.  She is clearly some kind of science rock star!!!  :-)  I just know that these will be great experiments, and my students and I will definitely be playing some cold potato (see below)!!!  Thanks again, Angi.  Without further ado:

Hellooooo Psyched to be in 2nd readers! This is Angi from First-Graders from Outer Space. I was very excited when Molly asked me to be a guest blogger and share some science experiments with all of you! Our first day back to school was on July 31st, so we have already done our first experiment. The kids loved it and I hope you do too!

Before I start, I have to admit that I completely stole this activity from the Exploratorium After School Activities webpage. I fell in love with the activity and modified it for our short, 25-minute, daily science block. You might want to go check it out on the Exploratorium site first, so you get an idea of what I’m writing about. (Psst...there’s videos there, so you can watch the whole process!) After reading here, go back and check out more activities on their website!

I’m very jealous of his balloons...ours never turned out that clear. :( Anyway, now that you’ve learned about the ice balloons, I’ll tell you what I did to modify the activity. 

The activity has been split into three days. Each day I’ve split the class into six groups (because that’s how many flashlights we had on hand). The goal is to get the students to start asking questions, stating observations, and making predictions. I actually take paper with me during this activity so I can write down the great things I hear them say as they work. This allows me to tell a lot about my kiddos right at the start of the year. I can see who works well in groups, who is shy, who the natural leaders are, those who make good observations and who is comfortable taking risks.

Prior to doing the experiment, be sure to freeze your water balloons in the same fashion as in the Exploratorium video. I would say to give yourself more than two days of freeze time. We tried this last year, and one of the balloons that was in over the weekend fell and cracked open. One of the kiddos got splashed with ice cold water. He thought it was hilarious, but others might not! ;)

I stretched each activity to fill a 25-minute block of time. This was done by asking a lot of questions and stopping for good observations that were made. If you point out the great observations, chances are they will start dig deeper when they think about what is happening to their ice.

Day One

You will need:

a large tub for each group

frozen water balloons for each group

a flashlight for each group

toothpicks for each person

paperclips for each person

magnifying glasses

blank paper

pencils

• First, give each group a tub with a flashlight. Have them turn on the flashlight and point it up to the ceiling. Place an ice balloon on each flashlight.
• Students will take turns using the magnifying glasses to look closer at each ice balloon. After getting a close look, ask them to draw what they’ve seen. You may want to point out spikes, bubbles, frosty areas, or cracks they could draw. (Be sure to be listening for the great observations the kids make!)
• Discuss the toothpicks and paperclips before passing them out. What are they made of? Which one do the kids think is stronger? What would each of them be useful for?
• Pass out a toothpick to each student. Give them time to see what they can do to the ice with the toothpick. Ask for observations. Many will notice that they cannot break through the ice (unless they find a crack or close bubble) and that their toothpick starts to bend or break.
• Pass out paperclips to each student. Give them more time to see what can be done differently with a paperclip. Ask for more observations. Students might notice that they can chip away at the ice better with the paperclip.
• Discuss the observations and questions the students have after this part of the experiment. Discuss what other items they could use to alter the ice balloon. (Usually they get very excited when someone mentions using a hammer to break it!)
• If you have science notebooks, you can glue the picture the students drew into their notebooks and have them write about what they did to their balloon. Depending on the grade level, students may write more or less.

 

Day Two

You will need:

a large tub for each group

frozen water balloons for each group

a flashlight for each group

student watercolor paints

paint shirts

cups of water

magnifying glasses

• Start just like you did yesterday. Give each group an ice balloon and allow them time to observe it. You will notice that many will point out what is different about this new one. Maybe this one has a huge crack in and their previous one had no cracks.
• Ask the kids to take out their paint brushes, but set their paint aside. They will use their brushes to “paint” with just water on the balloons. This will take some of the frost off and might make other characteristics pop.
• If nobody notices it, ask the students to stop moving their brushes on the ice for a while. If they stay still enough, the brush might freeze to the balloon. (Now might be a good time to discuss the dangers of licking frozen poles on the playground in winter! Ha ha...) Talk about why they think this happens and what they can do to get the brush off safely.
• Last, allow for time to paint on the balloons with paints. Can the students find any holes or spikes to fill with paint.

Day Three

You will need:

a large tub for each group

frozen water balloons for each group

a flashlight for each group

student watercolor paints

paint shirts

cups of water

magnifying glasses

small containers of salt

a large tub filled with water for each group

• Start just like the previous days - allow time to observe the new ice balloon.
• Discuss what students know about ice and salt. Some who live in areas where the roads get icy might know what salt can be used for. (Our kids know that the salt looks like tiny diamonds...they bring it in all winter!)
• Ask the students to take a pinch of salt each and sprinkle it on the ice. Give them some time to make and discuss their observations.
• Next, ask the students to paint lots of color on top of the salty ice. They should notice that the melting, salty water has made spots for rivers of color to run down the side of the ice. Allow them to experiment with their paints.
• Gently drop the ice into the water. Look for any bubbles coming to the top of the water. When the kids pull the ice out, discuss why the mushroom top occurred.
• Last, let them paint some more on the ice.
• Make your final observations as a class. Have students write their observations in their science notebooks if they can.

What do you do with all the ice after the experiment is done? Play cold potato! We took our ice out on a warm day and played the game just like you’d play hot potato. The kids had a blast! Then I let them keep them for their recess time...they all got smashed on the blacktop. ;) It’s always fun to play with ice in the summer!

Thanks for letting me be a guest blogger! I hope you enjoyed this experiment!

Angi

First-Graders from Outer Space

Calling all Elementary Science Enthusiasts/Experts!!!

Tonight, I have a story for all of you:

While I was in school, I loved reading.  I loved social studies.  I even loved math.  Science and I did not get along until 9th grade biology, when I was finally able to survive based on my knowledge of vocabulary.  We were at odds again after that brief year.  The only thing I really liked about science, was this guy:

Picture from Google Images

  I loved how funny Bill Nye The Science Guy was, and I loved his demonstrations as well as the experiments you could do at home.  When I became a teacher, I became determined to work hardest at science (since it was my least favorite-interesting logic, I know).  I really wanted to make it fun for my students, so that they wouldn't feel the way I did about science when I was a kid.  This was especially important last year.  I taught a classroom of truly wonderful bilingual students.  A campus requirement was that we teach science in English.  This made them even less excited about science, so we worked even harder to make them less afraid of it.  First, I bought one of these for myself:

Again, from Google Images (and not the exact one I bought)

Next, I also bought 2 student labcoats, worn by the Scientists of the Week.  The kids loved this, and it really motivated them to participate in science class. 

My district's curriculum has some really good elements.  We frequently use the video clips and virtual labs (these are really fun for the class!) from Discovery Education, and they really boost student comprehension.  Some of the experiments in our curriculum are very engaging, also. 

http://www.discoveryeducation.com/



Irony of ironies, guess which subject I'll be planning this year?!  I'm excited about the opportunity.  :-)  I have recently been introduced to Steve Spangler (I'd love for my class to be as fun as I'm sure his science classes are!).  For those of you that aren't familiar with him, here is a YouTube clip of one of his appearances on The Ellen Degeneres Show:

Don't you think his science classes would be a BLAST?!?!  I know I do!!! 

Do any of you have any really fun things you do in science?  Tell me about it in the comments.  If you are really passionate about science, please consider writing a guest post for my blog (again, leave a comment expressing your interest, or e-mail me here)-I'd love to learn from you, and I bet everyone else would, too!!!