Mark
Forum Replies Created
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I have not used any citizen-science projects in the past but I would very much like to start. Reading about all of the many citizen science opportunities available kind of makes me want to do more than I probably should! I definitely would like to investigate weather through CoCoRaHS or one of the other weather projects. I can see how this could be done easily from the classroom, and how it could possibly be compared to another classroom in another part of the country. I can see using tools and data with visual observations, and learning patterns and how to predict weather using the data we collect. I like the FeederWatch project to spot and identify birds, but I wonder if we would be able to dedicate the time necessary without it becoming a distraction for the other parts of our learning. As a (former, hopefully future) beekeeper, I am also interested in MLMP through a school pollinator/milkweed garden. This would also give us the opportunity to observe the lifecycle of a monarch. Finally, Budburst holds the same fascination for me to plants as some of the other projects do to animal life. Particularly, for me, how plants change through the year in central Florida compared to the more defined and extreme differences of plants through the seasons in Ohio.
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I love that this activity takes place in the students' own environment. I wonder if they notice nests, bird preferences to trees or other habits when they go on their hunt?
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@Amy I did an activity similar to this when I was in elementary school, but I put a couple partial wall inside the box to make a sort of a maze. I remember how cool that experiment was even today, so many years later! I might have to steal your shoebox idea :)
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Sundial I have an activity that I like to do that is tied to Science and Math. Outside of my old classroom in Ohio was a basketball hoop pole, and I would pick a sunny day where we would draw a chalk line on the shadow of the pole. Throughout the day we would notice the change of position and length of the shadow. I would explain how the first clocks were similar to this, and I even found a sundial craft that students could create using cardstock and a pencil. I wanted them to see the connection of our clocks being based on the movement of our planet. From this, we would discuss the movement of the earth's rotation and revolution throughout our universe. I think this would fall somewhere between Confirmation Inquiry and Structured Inquiry, since the activity starts with the principals of a sundial and I encourage explanations and responses from students throughout the day about why the shadow moves and changes shape. Students think about the shadows and have discussions about how sunrise and sunsets aren't really the sun moving through the sky, but the Earth turning. To make this activity more inquiry-based or open-ended, I could have students observe the shadow of the pole throughout the day, after they discuss the best way to track the progress and how often to track. Perhaps they could come up with a better process than chalk :) Then the students could work together to discuss, document, and explain their deductions. We could also track our "sundial" through the seasons to further investigate where the sun is in relationship to us as it travels. Hopefully students could conclude that although it appears that the sun moves through the sky, the Earth is actually rotating, and the sun does not appear at the same location or time throughout the year because of the tilt of the planet.
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Inquiry is taking a curiosity about something - an object, event, animal, etc., and creatively using your schema to discover and explain, and eventually build your knowledge and expand your schema. I like hearing the words "creativity" and "passion" used with Inquiry, because it's about taking the world that one knows, and using that knowledge to play and observe and gain knowledge through the passionate exploration and discovery, trying to make sense of a "thing". It's easy to see how inquiry is differentiated since it is using the knowledge and skill that a person has to scaffold their own learning through their experiences. Providing the right guidance can help keep these scientists continuing their inquiry, whether the guidance is from a teacher or peer or a family member. Exploring and trying to make sense out of something, and being able to describe your conclusions with writing, numbers, and pictures is a pretty awesome journey of inquiry.
Inquiry is taking a curiosity about something - an object, event, animal, etc., and creatively using your schema to discover and explain, and eventually build your knowledge and expand your schema. I like hearing the words "creativity" and "passion" used with Inquiry, because it's about taking the world that one knows, and using that knowledge to play and observe and gain knowledge through the passionate exploration and discovery, trying to make sense of a "thing". It's easy to see how inquiry is differentiated since it is using the knowledge and skill that a person has to scaffold their own learning through their experiences. Providing the right guidance can help keep these scientists continuing their inquiry, whether the guidance is from a teacher or peer or a family member. Exploring and trying to make sense out of something, and being able to describe your conclusions with writing, numbers, and pictures is a pretty awesome journey of inquiry.