Physical Sciences are 'energetic' at St Emilie's!
What a busy term we've had in the world of the Science Specialist teacher. Everyday I feel more and more convinced that I have the dream job. All of the classes from years 2 to 6 have been learning from the Primary Connections units this term. I've introduced two new units that I've never covered before - Heating up and Essential Energy. Really loving these units and seeing the children continue to inquiry and learn more and more each lesson. I've once again used the Light Shows unit and found it to be an excellent resource for teaching about light.
Here is a glimpse of some of our wonderful learning activities. This is the Year four and Five students showing how to make light travel around a corner then constructing their own ray diagrams. Another great activity to share with the students is this one from BBC Schools. Students were also encouraged to set up their own mirror challenges using extra mirrors. Speakers had fun sharing their challenge with the class with the students using the Science Starters questions from Primary Connections to further enhance their questioning skills.
Here is a glimpse of some of our wonderful learning activities. This is the Year four and Five students showing how to make light travel around a corner then constructing their own ray diagrams. Another great activity to share with the students is this one from BBC Schools. Students were also encouraged to set up their own mirror challenges using extra mirrors. Speakers had fun sharing their challenge with the class with the students using the Science Starters questions from Primary Connections to further enhance their questioning skills.
Earlier on in the term the year 2 and 3 students investigated how things produce heat. Our classroom was set up looking like a 'Harvey Norman' appliances store with all the variety of heat producers and also things that are heated by something else. Some to the objects investigated in the 'What's hot?' investigation - kettle, hot water bottle, candle, lava lamp, cup of warm tea and a hairdryer. The students had to rate each object according to whether it felt, warm, hot or very hot. Of course many safety issues were covered before we commence investigating. One problem I encountered was finding many interactive sites to show the children about heat energy. Our next investigation was to place a spoon in different places to see how quickly it warmed up. Below are some photos of the 'What's hot?' investigation.
The Year six students investigated how to make water in a coke can heat up faster. They did this by modifying their can with different materials. Once again the students had to think very carefully about setting up a 'fair test'. There was a temptation with several teams to 'over modify' their can. Some of the ideas students used to modify the can were - covering it in black paper or foil and placing hot rocks around the can. The results varied greatly. We will be doing some more work on our data this coming term by constructing line graphs to identify patterns in our results.
At the start of the school year I like to ease the Year one students into the Science program. I start the year off with teaching the students the routines and class expectations. Every week I plan an activity to enhance their sense of wonder about the world around them. This term we did several activities about our sense of sight and how light helps us to see things. The activities included the following hands on experiences - using magnifiers to examine objects in the classroom, using small mirrors to capture sunlight and make sunbeams and going on a light walk around the school to explore the variety of light sources.