Oct28

Supporting children's observation: what will they remember?

Two particularly inquisitive and bright former preK students (siblings) unexpectedly attended a workshop I gave for early childhood teachers about bringing local butterflies into the classroom for observation. Instead of distracting from the planned workshop, they added to it and made me look good! It was gratifying to have them model how to ask questions, and to comment on what they had learned, one and three years ago, respectively. They recalled the words “pupa” and “chrysalis” and remembered how they saw a red liquid (miconium) after the butterflies emerged from their chrysalides and that it wasn’t blood. It was inspiring to see how observing part of the butterfly life cycle made a great impression.

I hope that all students remember as much from that experience. Repeat the life cycle observations with other species of butterflies or Tenebrio beetles (mealworms) and children will observe insect metamorphosis, and relationship between animal and food source, more than once.

To enable all students to make observations, teachers adapt activities to the needs of the students. Have a bright light source in the classroom to help children with low vision see details. Put caterpillars or other small animals in small containers such as medicine bottles so children with fine motor control difficulty can hold them without accidently squishing them. Some teachers set aside a time for drawing or otherwise documenting an observation of nature each day. What do you do in your classroom to make sure that all students get to carefully observe?
Peggy
Published: Oct-28-08 | 1 Comment | 571 Links to this post

Oct26

Mixing colors more than once!

Science activities that children initiate motivate teachers to extend and expand the activity. Children learn more details about their area of interest and make connections with other concepts when they work more than once on activities about the same concept, such as mixing colors. If you see a child noticing colors mixing at the easel, offer to bring out additional materials to explore color mixing.

See the October Early Years column, Color Investigations in Science and Children (NSTA membership required) to read about additional coloring mixing activitities.

When an activity is both easy to prepare and easy to clean up, teachers are more likely to see that it happens, and to encourage the children to repeat the activity. These two circumstances can come together in activities where children are mixing and separating colors with a variety of materials. Colored acetate (sold as clear wrapping paper in party stores) is dry, easy to store, and easy for children to handle over and over again to create new colors when they overlap the squares of color.

 

Mixing paint need not be messy if tiny spoonfuls are served onto a plate, mixed with a single finger, pressed with a paper towel or sheet of paper to record the colors achieved, and then washed off the plate to begin again. The young scientists repeat the process, discuss their procedures with each other, and record their results. Don’t worry that you are stifling their work by using small amounts on occasion. Children enjoy changes in scale, going small and going big!

In collaboration with their students, teachers discover new ways to explore familiar concepts. Tell about your color explorations in a comment so we can all learn.

Peggy

Published: Oct-26-08 | 3 Comments | 567 Links to this post

Oct22

Sink? Float? Try it with pumpkins

For an activity to explore buoyancy—what materials and which objects sink or float in water—I gave each child in a small group an object to hold. Then I explained that we were going to think about the objects and say where we think they will come to rest in a big tub of water—at the bottom or near the top of the water—BEFORE we put the objects in the water. Most of the two-year-olds are in the “thought is action” stage and immediately dropped (threw, in some cases) the objects in the tub. “I think it’s going to…It’s floating!”

The four-year-olds seemed to savor their anticipation of “doing”. They took their time to tell where they thought the object would come to rest before testing their prediction. It’s wonderful to work with children who are not afraid to be “wrong”. My hope is that I do nothing to change that. 

Pumpkins are fun objects to use in this activity. Children often predict that the largest one will sink, even after witnessing the smallest and the medium pumpkins floating. Children can record their results by drawing the pumpkin shape on a teacher-made template of the tub.

Some children may notice and explore the effect of magnification, especially if the tub you use is round.

Read the October Teaching Through Tradebooks column, Pumpkins! By Karen Ansberry and Emily Morgan for more pumpkin exploration (grades K-6) with literature connections to How Many Seeds in a Pumpkin? by Margaret McNamara and Pumpkin Circle by George Levenson. 

Peggy

Published: Oct-22-08 | 0 Comments | 359 Links to this post

Oct14

Yes, a science teachers' conference IS the place for early childhood teachers

I’m looking forward to the NSTA Regional Conference in Portland, Oregon in November,  a cornucopia of a conference so full of interesting presentations that each of my time slots is double (sometimes triple) booked with workshops and fieldtrips. Being over-scheduled assures me that I have an alternative session if one is canceled or looks like it will cover familiar material. Here’s a sample of where I hope to be on Thursday, Friday and Saturday….

 

Thursday November 20, 12:30–1:30 PM, Family Science Day Session: Starting Them Early: Science Learning in PreK and Early Elementary

Discover innovative resources and best practices designed to lay the foundation for lifelong science learning. Appropriate for educators of pre-K to early elementary school.

Presenters: Anne Gurnee (Southwest Charter School: Portland, OR); Mia Jackson (David Heil & Associates, Inc: Portland, OR)

 

And then from 2:00-3:00 PM I’ll be presenting a workshop session with Marie Faust Evitt (writer and teacher at Mountain View Parent Nursery School in Mountain View, CA) on

Winter Observations—Birds, Wind, and Melting

Discover hands-on, standards-based preK–2 activities that incorporate observing animal behavior, counting, exploring the nature of materials, and using children's literature. Work through (and take home) three lessons that include making bird-shape rubbings, playing games with air, and trying to melt chocolate, beeswax, ice, and rock.

 

Please introduce yourself if you stop by. Mention this blog and I’ll give you extra chocolate!

 

Friday November 21, 8-9 AM, The Science of Children’s Literature

Browse the many learning centers that WSU preservice teachers have developed using science-themed children's literature, and try out the hands-on activities.

Presenter: James R. Williamson of Washington State University

 

Saturday November 22, 11:00 AM-12:00 PM, Fight Bac! Integrating Food Safety into Your Elementary Classroom

Explore the free FDA hands-on curriculum that integrates science and health standards while teaching students about the importance of hand washing and food safety.

Presenters: Laurie A. Hayes (Center for Advanced Research and Technology: Clovis, CA); Susan E. Hartley (Navarro High School: Geronimo, TX)

 

As an East Coast gal I find it stimulating to visit a different geographic region, much as children’s knowledge about how the land looks expands while on a local fieldtrip. On a 15-minute bus ride across the Potomac River from Virginia to Washington, D. C. I was given an education in how important fieldtrips are, both the travel and the destination. As we crossed the bridge I said to my 5-year-old seatmate, “Look out the window Joseph”, and he said, “Cool! It’s a big swimming pool!” Thinking he would understand that it was a continuous river of water if he saw the water on the other side of the bridge I said, “Look out the other window,” and Joseph said, “There’s two of them!”

Visiting Portland will develop my thinking about how children relate to new landscape and how they incorporate new knowledge into their existing framework—about waterfalls for example. Here in Virginia at the boundary between two physiographic provinces, the Piedmont and the Coastal Plain, a waterfall is significant because it marks the Fall Zone, that boundary where the harder rocks of the Piedmont end and the sediments of the Coastal Plain begin. Few of my students have seen waterfalls. I’ve heard that the Columbia River has many waterfalls where tributaries join it, as a result of the hardness of the volcanic basalt flows, the manner in which the basalt fractures, and erosion by the Columbia River over much time. I wonder if the waterfalls are the fieldtrip destination of students from the City of Portland and what children think when they see them?
Hope to see you in Portland,
Peggy
Published: Oct-14-08 | 0 Comments | 475 Links to this post

Oct05

Observing, Learning about, Appreciating, and (Maybe) Holding Small Animals Such As Insects

In the fall we may begin to see more spiders in our houses and schools. Why is that? Are they moving indoors as the weather cools? The Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture dispels this myth with some spider facts. Interesting how children are drawn to the models of spiders on the light table but scream when they encounter a live spider.

As a way to begin a classroom study of, or lesson on, spiders—and other small animals such as beetles—I read a book aloud. Each Living Thing, written by Joanne Ryder and illustrated by Ashley Wolff, (Harcourt, 2000) has page after page of encouragement to look for animals in our landscape, to “be aware of them”, and to “take care of them”. This just sends chills down my back as I think about our interconnected lives, and it is an opening for discussing how to handle the small animals that visit our classroom.

(The book also introduces children to our place as members of the animal kingdom as I point to drawings of the child and ask, “What animal is this?” Many children say “That’s not an animal,” but by the end of the book they can tell me, “It’s a human animal, a person!”)

I don’t apologize for quickly killing roaches or crickets if they try to take over my house. But if we capture animals it is our responsibility to make sure we meet their needs. This month the children looked in a resource book for information on what the beetles eat, talked about letting the spiders go in a few days so they can hunt their own food, and practiced holding the beetles, slugs and roly-polies in open palms (not pinching fingers) so they don’t get broken and die. After each “visit” we all wash our hands as a precaution.

Even casual observation over time will lead to a body of knowledge about the animals. Here’s what the children had to say:

Roly-polies make a ball.

Roly-polies have legs but slugs don’t.

Slugs are sticky.

It closed up!

Beetles have more legs than I do. (Counting may not be accurate until around four years old and even then it’s not easy to count legs on a wiggling beetle!)

Beetle babies do not look like the adults.

Beetle babies look like worms but they have legs.

Children are invited to hold all of them, but I never insist. They are more likely to record their observations by drawing or dictating some words if an interested adult offers the materials. Their drawings reveal the range of development in children who are close in age reminding us that we need to observe our students closely to meet their needs.

Peggy

  

Published: Oct-05-08 | 0 Comments | 95 Links to this post