Throughout this class, we had to make a demonstration and present it to our cohort. My partners for the demonstration were Carter White and Connor Hall. We did a lot of brainstorming and we decided to do our demonstration on paper airplanes. We connected this topic to the grade 6 science curriculum.
What we did to prepare:
- Created a student worksheet to guide inquiry and reflection
- Created a teacher document that our peers could follow in the future
- Researched how Paper airplanes could connect to FPPL (First People Principles of Learning) in a meaningful way
- Tested our demonstration before our presentation
Here is everything we gave our class:
As you see, in the teacher notes, we have already connected our demonstration to the BC Curriculum by tying in the Big Ideas, Content, and FPPL.
Big Ideas:
- Newtons three laws of motion, describe the relationship between force and motion.
Content:
- Newtons three laws of motion
- Force of gravity
FPPL:
- Intro in Ktunaxa
- Learning is hands on and contextual
- Learning involves recognizing consequences of one’s actions
- Learning involves patience and time
- Learning is reflective
- Sharing Circle at the end – talking about what went well and what we could improve on
- Recommended to do the activity outside if the weather is nice
- Fredrick James Carmichael (first Indigenous commercial pilot)
AHA Moment
My aha moment came when I realized how much work it is for teachers to set up each demonstration and when I realized that engagement alone does not equal understanding. Students get really engaged with paper airplanes therefore, it is easy for a class to be engaged but not create a meaningful connecting to the content that is being covered. When my group was brainstorming, we kept thinking how we could make sure that the students were actually learning and that is how we came up with our worksheet. We had to make sure our worksheet was guided and structured in a way that students would make meaningful scientific observations and guesses. The worksheet and teacher notes are essential to help me understand that strong science teachings are about purposeful structure that supports the students inquiries.
Reflection
This experiment and assignment impacted how I view science instruction at the elementary and middle school level. When I was a student, I loved science experiments because I found them exciting and fun (I mean I still do). Now, as a future educator, I see the importance of intentional design behind all of the experiments.
Moving forward in my practices and creating student worksheets, I want to make sure that I somehow include something for the students to record. This should include their data/ observations (predictions and their explanations). I feel like those three things really helped us with creating a good worksheet that help guide students into meaningful hands on learning.
One thing I need to keep in mind when I am creating scientific demonstrations is how I will keep my class focused on the learning intention while still allowing time for their own exploration. I believe that there has to be both structured learning but also unstructured inquiry/play but there needs to be a clear purpose, place, and time for each of those things.
Having meaningful hands on learning in elementary and middle school classrooms helps students make abstract concepts concrete. Science at the elementary and middle school level should encourage curiosity, critical thinking, and different types of problem solving skills. This demonstration helped me understand how to design learning outcomes that support these goals I have.