Kids Doing Science

For our first, second, third and fourth grade, the third week of the year sees them being introduced to the design process (start with a Goal...then Question, Imagine, Plan, Make, Evaluate). After they understand the process, they are given a design challenge to put accomplish. First grade, being the first time any of our students will see this process, we tell them their goal is to build a tower; we talk about what a tower is, what are some towers they have seen, and what are some towers they have built. Then they close their eyes and imagine building a tower out of Legos. They are then put in groups of 2 and asked to share their ideas with their partner. Next they decide on one idea to try and on the signal, they given 15 Legos (each group has the same types of Legos) and can build for 5minutes. At the end of the time, they stop and we look at all the towers and talk about what just happened. The students are then challenged to build a tower that is taller then the one they just bu...

My job last year was to create a science curriculum for the Lower School (1st-4th) that would excite and engage our students. Having been a elementary classroom teacher for over 16yrs, a science teacher for 2yrs, an engineering/design teacher-science coordinator for 2yrs and a STEM/MakerSpace Teacher for 4yrs, I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to do. With the start of the 2019-2020 school year, all the work I put in get's to be put into practice. Here is how we started each grade this year: The first day for all the grades was the same...the "Welcome to our new lab" speech, going over the rules (in all the years I have taught, I have only had two rules...Be safe. Be kind. I tell my students, before you do anything, ask yourself "Is it safe? Is it kind?" if the answer is yes to both, then you can do it. If the answer is no to either or both, don't do it. No need to have a lengthy list of dos or don'ts on the wall...keep it simple), explore the...

It was a great summer! I was only able to do one Profession Development session and it was "Science in the Rockies-Steve Spangler's STEM Experience". What an amazing time. Steve Spangler is a science teacher, author and TV personality (you may have seen him on the Ellen Show). This program is targeted to educators, administrators and curriculum specialist in pre-K through 8th grade who are "Looking to provide best practices, instruction strategies and high-level engagement pedagogy, hoping to inspire students in STEM." For three days, Steve shared his insight on teaching science and demonstrated cool experiment, to help teachers get their kids excited and engaged in science education. Here are some of my take-away thought: "Choose to engage." Some teachers fall back on dittos or worksheets to teach science. Steve encouraged the attendees to teacher their students with hands-on science education: looking for ways to excite the students helping...

The school year is now complete, and the kids are going their separate ways for the summer. So now it's time for teachers to relax, recharge and renew before August. For me, that includes taking part in summer professional development opportunities. I will be involved in two this summer. One is "Science in the Rockies: Steve Spangler's STEM Experience", July 9-11 in Denver, Colorado. Science In The Rockies "A amazingly fun, three-day professional development experience that is guaranteed to make STEM more exciting and meaningful for your students.  Science in the Rockies  is perfect for educators, administrators and curriculum specialists (Pre-K to 8) who want to explore best practices, instructional strategies and high-level engagement pedagogy for inspiring students through STEM. Oh, and you’ll participate in more than 75 of Steve’s favorite demonstrations and experiments." The other starts this summer but will run the whole year. It's called...

The last challenge also came from a teacher at 'Iolani School...Kathy Warner, Lower School Science Teacher has been doing this project as part of her space unit in 3rd grade. Over the 4 years I worked at 'Iolani, she graciously asked me to assister her in helping to add more Maker Ed aspects to this project. The last year I worked with her, we had the students using rapid prototyping (3D printers, & laser cutters), Scratch programing, MakeyMakeys, simple circuits and green screen video. When the curriculum was bring developed here, I knew I had to use this project. The first part of this unit was to have each student research something in space (planet, asteroid, galaxy, black hole, etc.) and create a poster using Google Slides. These posters would be presented to the class to show what each person had learned (I'll write up the poster project at a later time). It was also a spring board for Project SEV (Space Exploration Vehicle) #3 Design challenge:  Imagine...