Module 1: Week 4: Science as Process. Using the Skills of Scientific Study - February 7, 2011 - February 13, 2011

Week 4: Science as Process. Using the Skills of Scientific Study: February 7, 2011 - February 13, 2011 includes: went over powerpoint called Teaching Science as a Process PPT, balloon activity, went through discussion of observation report for Float, Sink, or????, Assignments: A4, Share URL for blog, and share the analysis table for magazine 

It is important for students to know science as a process and process skills. It is also important for students to do activities and I think that it is a good idea to do the balloon activity with your students. 

 Week 4: Science as Process. Using the Skills of Scientific Study. 

During this week you will: 
1. Brainstorm, discuss, and suggest ideas how to engage students in using science process skills in meaningful and purposeful ways; how to use constructivist approach to teaching science and engage students inbasic forms of inquiry. (Monday - Use: Book, Ch.1-3,+ Ch. 4 Moodle readings, glossary for weeks 1-3)


   To engage students in using science, process skills in meaningful and purposeful ways. Learning as interpreting and understanding reality in a different way. Learning involves comprehending the world by reinterrupting knowledge.Some meaningful ways to engage students through doing experiments and through scientific methods. Some ideas and purposeful ways to learn science is through observing, investigating, discussing, and reflecting. Experiments help to gain inquiry. Science is a set of ideas which include definitions and explanations of natural events. Students can be engaged through doing experiments and by looking at a video. It is important to use constructivist approach which is to construct their ideas on the basis of their experiences of the world. Science as a process uses the skills of scientific study. To understand how students learn science provokes us to find teaching strategies that honor students' ideas and create safe and open spaces in which they can create their own meanings. Hands-on experiments are a great way to engage students in using science process skills in a meaningful, learning, and purposeful ways.  This is what I would do to engage the students in my classroom when I am a teacher. 

Process skills

:

   Abilities that help people gain information about nature and natural phenomena; these include skills such as observing, inferring,classifying, recording data, predicting, and planning investigations. Process skills are employed on a planned and regular basis by those engaged in scientific activity. Also called inquiry skills.


2. Brainstorm and Design a multi-stations "circus" activity and analyze how it works. (Read for Wed. Ch. 4, p.96-107. In class Monday, Wednesday to implement it the following week.) 


   Science Circus is contained within a single room, the science circus consists of several stations at which the visitors are asked to perform certain tasks and record their results or reactions.It is circus-like because many different activities are going on simultaneously, but it is far from chaotic. Each group of the class did a science stations. Hip Habitats was done by group 1. The Human Body Corporation was done by group 2. Buoyancy Boat was done by my group (group 3). Falling for Gravity was done by group 4. Magic Growing Balloon was done by group 5. Shapes of the Moon was done by group 6. These were fun science stations. Each group worked together through Google Docs to put all the information together. The station included a worksheet, a problem, a task, a process skills, materials, and standards. 


    I enjoyed all the different science stations.  I think that science circus is a great way to get students involved in classroom activities and a way to get students to love science at a young age. Students can work in pairs and work together to come up with the solution to each station. I would incorporate that students complete a worksheet at each station and then write about the stations in their science notebook. I would probably do science stations twice in a semester but four times a year as a way to show the students that there is more to science then facts and watching me do demonstrates on guide them through demonstrates or experiments. When students are doing the science circus I will be there to help them as their teacher but I also want them to try to figure out the station and find a solution on their own. 


Family Science Night: 


  The concepts of a science circus --- several stations offering a wide variety of activities --- can form the basis for an event that involves students' family members. Engaging adults in science experiences together with students is a way to not only bring families together, but also to encourage a deeper interest in science and science-related activities. By emphasizing the relevance of  science outside school in our students' everyday lives --- we can help change those negative images of science.


  I would definitely have a family science night. This way that the parents get involved in the students schooling and also the students can show the parents their science skills. It is a great way for students to work with their parents and have fun at the same time. I enjoyed all my family science nights when I was in elementary school with my parents so why not bring the experience I had with those family science nights with me when I teach and let my students experience the same experience that I experience when I was little.

3. Summarize your learning outcomes in Module 1 "A Scientist Within"(during the first four weeks) in a blog entry. (Due: Weekend)
Learned many things from this week. I learned about alternative conceptions. I learned about science as a process, process skills, how to teach science, and some other stuff that is important to Science. 




   Science Notebook: integrates writing and science, but it is more carefully structured as a thinking tool for students. A student science notebook is more than a collection of data or facts. It is a record of the student's reflections, questions, predictions, and conclusions. Writing is one way that students express the science ideas they are learning in their own words. Science notebooks are very important to have in a classroom. Those notebooks are where student keep their observations.