Science is one of my favorite subjects to teach, because it most lends itself to get kids thinking about, and interacting with, the world around them.
I have a wonderful student teacher this year, and when we were thinking about our plant categorization lesson, she instantly thought... let's take them outside! The goal was to take them around our campus, and have them observe and examine the plants we have to place them in to categories (flowers, no flowers, deciduous, etc.).
She typed up informational pages ahead of time that gave kids enough clues about each plant that they were looking at. She hung those up near the plants she wanted them to categorize. They read the description, looked at the plant, and then chose what category the plant went in.
Because we live in the desert, any category that we didn't have a plant for in real life, she simply printed an extra page with a picture of a plant on it with its description. Super fun! The kids got to move around, debate with each other (sometimes very heatedly!), and learn a lot of plant names!
Here is what a plant station might look like:
A plant we don't have in the desert:
I have a wonderful student teacher this year, and when we were thinking about our plant categorization lesson, she instantly thought... let's take them outside! The goal was to take them around our campus, and have them observe and examine the plants we have to place them in to categories (flowers, no flowers, deciduous, etc.).
She typed up informational pages ahead of time that gave kids enough clues about each plant that they were looking at. She hung those up near the plants she wanted them to categorize. They read the description, looked at the plant, and then chose what category the plant went in.
Because we live in the desert, any category that we didn't have a plant for in real life, she simply printed an extra page with a picture of a plant on it with its description. Super fun! The kids got to move around, debate with each other (sometimes very heatedly!), and learn a lot of plant names!
Here is what a plant station might look like:
Kids with their clipboards and papers, categorizing the plant on a graphic organizer:
A plant we don't have in the desert:
No comments:
Post a Comment