Saving the City of Ember

      I'm am so excited to finally get to this summative assessment for our unit of inquiry into energy- specifically how innovations of today will affect our lives in the future.
   
     Yesterday we thought back to the story of Ember and came up with a list of problems they had in the city, there were many.  We had to narrow the list down to what we thought we could engineer in the classroom, with limited materials as could be found in the city of Ember.  We arrived to three problems:
* Lack of a mail system- they rely on messengers to run the messages around town
* the yarn in Granny's shop was out of control
* They didn't have a good way to organize or access materials in the storage rooms.
    The children voted on their top choice of what problem they would like to solve. I then looked then broke them into groups based on their choices.

     Today we were able to get into our groups and begin to brainstorm a device we could build to solve the problem.  The students will be scored on a rubric as shown below so they frequently referenced that as they worked through the design process.  Tomorrow I will give them a preview of some of the items that will be available to "purchase" to create their design.  This will allow them/force them to go back and make revisions to their plans over the next few days.

When Science Fails

Wawawa.... You know those great inquiries that you have all planned out and oh what fun it will be, the kids will be so engaged and I can't wait to hear their thinking... Yeah reality sets in and the experiment FLOPS.  It was one of those days yesterday.  We were conducting an investigation into what happens to the energy when two objects collide.  (PS3.C)  So we set out to see what happens when two mables, attached at then of a string (like a double pendulum) collide.  Sounds doable right?!

Yeah, you know what happened....NOTHING! They just flew past each other or the strings got tangled and just wound around each other.  So, we weren't able to measure the effect of the collision, or really observe the energy transfer.  Great- another fabulous (in my head) idea out the window.  

I had to go back to the drawing board and think about how I can get the students to understand this concept, because obviously the marble idea was not a success.  Well, why not bring in another standard that requires them to design and test a model?  So that is just what I did on day two.  We began by talking about what scientists and engineers do and how often times it will take several attempts to successfully find solutions to problems.  That is just what we had to do now.  I gave them the task of designing their own model that would demonstrate what happens to energy when two objects collide.  They had to design their model within the following parameters: 

    - It had to be something that could be easily replicated.

    - The materials used had to be those that I could get access to easily at school or at home. (no crashing of cars into walls etc).  

Their designs were great!! I was so excited to see them applying all aspects of science AND bringing in what we've been investigating in language workshop!! 

 Whew, much more successful and way more meaningful for them!! I had so many of them go home that night and try out their models- it was awesome!! 

Another Science Mystery

     Have I mentioned my love for science....?? NO?!  Well let me know tell you this girl loves science, I love everything about science and how it can get your most reluctant readers and learners engaged.  Science is the area that helps students see the link between the skills they are learning in reading and math and what we do as everyday scientists.
     The new NGSS has added in the the engineering component which I believe is crucial to problem solving, and developing a true appreciation for science.  Through the lens of an engineer/scientist we began our inquiry in to sound waves.  We read another mystery from a great text called Everyday Science Mysteries.
Definitely worth a read through!
     Today the kids were given a problem where two girls are trying to communicate with a TCTS device (tin cans connected by string).  The students are then posed with the problem of how to make their communication more clear.  After reading the story the students got out their content journals and wrote their hypothesis to test to see how they could help the girls engineer a new TCTS device.

     The students then went out, gathered their materials and tested their new designs.  It  was great to see what they came up with!  They may not have seen themselves as engineers, but that is exactly what they were doing- planning, testing, and redesigning their ideas.  AMAZING!

   The conversation that followed their work was awesome.  They had some great ideas of why their design did or did not work.  Many were going to take some action at home and test out some different design theories that they had, with supplies I was unable to provide. The students debated if it was the type of string used that may have inhibited the sound. They speculated that since the fibers were looser on yarn than the string that the waves would have a harder time traveling through.  Really?! Wow that is some great thinking and hypothesizing!!!