The Beginning of the End
4th quarter is here, and I'm looking forward to it! Chemistry experiments on the horizon in 8th grade and a new unit of physical science coming up for the 7th graders! Let's go!
This week, the 7th graders have been wrapping up our life science standards with a look at evolution. Upon choosing an organism (I gave them the choice of plant or animal, but all picked animals), they were given the task of learning some basic information about it and identifying key adaptations it had. Then they were given the task of imagining how that animal would evolve 2,000,000 years into the future and come up with new adaptations based on what it would need to survive, as the environment around it had probably gone through changes as well. This being a culmination of a lot of learning on mutations, adaptations, and natural selection, the students had to bring back and apply a lot of what we had talked about. There were definitely a lot of interesting animals that went through some interesting changes (a few of them being a bit far-fetched), but as long as they were able to justify those changes based on their needs, it was acceptable. Unfortunately, many of the students have a rather bleak outlook on what the Earth will be like in 2,000,000 year due to all the damage that humans are doing to the planet. Here's to hoping that will be an encouragement for them to take action...
In 8th grade, the students have been working on a few different tasks. First of all, they have been building their awareness with some of the key elements on the periodic table; we call them the "Big 20." Tomorrow we have a quiz on identifying the elements based off of the symbol and classifying them by their families. This week has also brought about the start of the unit that I have been creating with the help of my colleague, Mark Thompson, who has been helping me to incorporate more UDL into my classroom. We started the unit with a lab investigation that we developed to build the students' curiosity towards the "why" of the science we will be learning about. The investigation we did had the students adding food coloring to three different samples of water at different temperatures. The students needed to make observations of what occurred, investigate why they saw what they did, and then report back on their findings. Here's a snapshot of one group...not exciting explosions or anything, but it was fun to see their reactions once they added the food coloring and either confirmed or refuted their hypotheses.
Mindfulness thought for the week: Whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right.
--Henry Ford
This week, the 7th graders have been wrapping up our life science standards with a look at evolution. Upon choosing an organism (I gave them the choice of plant or animal, but all picked animals), they were given the task of learning some basic information about it and identifying key adaptations it had. Then they were given the task of imagining how that animal would evolve 2,000,000 years into the future and come up with new adaptations based on what it would need to survive, as the environment around it had probably gone through changes as well. This being a culmination of a lot of learning on mutations, adaptations, and natural selection, the students had to bring back and apply a lot of what we had talked about. There were definitely a lot of interesting animals that went through some interesting changes (a few of them being a bit far-fetched), but as long as they were able to justify those changes based on their needs, it was acceptable. Unfortunately, many of the students have a rather bleak outlook on what the Earth will be like in 2,000,000 year due to all the damage that humans are doing to the planet. Here's to hoping that will be an encouragement for them to take action...
In 8th grade, the students have been working on a few different tasks. First of all, they have been building their awareness with some of the key elements on the periodic table; we call them the "Big 20." Tomorrow we have a quiz on identifying the elements based off of the symbol and classifying them by their families. This week has also brought about the start of the unit that I have been creating with the help of my colleague, Mark Thompson, who has been helping me to incorporate more UDL into my classroom. We started the unit with a lab investigation that we developed to build the students' curiosity towards the "why" of the science we will be learning about. The investigation we did had the students adding food coloring to three different samples of water at different temperatures. The students needed to make observations of what occurred, investigate why they saw what they did, and then report back on their findings. Here's a snapshot of one group...not exciting explosions or anything, but it was fun to see their reactions once they added the food coloring and either confirmed or refuted their hypotheses.
Mindfulness thought for the week: Whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right.
--Henry Ford
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