L and I really fought hard to balance all the information we felt like we needed to convey during this week's lesson. Combining lessons 4 and 5 seemed like no small task to us and we spoke at length debating about what the best aspects of each lesson to cut would be. It was a challenge since lesson 4 was the transition from studying rocks to minerals while lesson 5 was making physical observations of 12 (!) new mineral specimens! Condensing these activities into a 45min lesson was no small task...especially since one of our review criteria this week was on our conclusion!(Last week we weren't even able to get around to a proper conclusion, so we really felt the pressure to manage our time in an efficient manner!)
Time management has been a challenge for us since the beginning and we should've allowed the students mor
e time to observe the new mineral specimens. However, we also decided to begin a KWL chart (already Know, Want to learn and Learn) as well as starting one half of a Venn diagram on the observable properties of rocks (which we will later use to compare rocks with minerals). Amazingly, there was time for them to examine their minerals!As we surveyed the students on what properties we observed it became apparent that some students had mistaken subjective observations for observable physical properites. For example, one student volunteered that her specimen #6 smelled like 'magma'. Another noted theirs smelled like popcorn! Leah and I weren't prepared for this and I tried to explain the difference between an objective observation and a subjective one. As I did I think I also dropped a few other $5 and $10 vocab words...and didnt even realize it was a problem until later that day...shux!
It was around this same time that I got a bit flustered and was thinking minerals as I spoke, but ended up saying 'rocks'. Whew! Fortunately L caught what I said and thanks to her we were able to get back on track.
I think Ms. B's students were ready to start doing some hands on science by observing the 12 exciting mineral specimens after listening to a few minutes of this lecture. Note to self: for future lesson plans, allow students the maximum time to do hands on work!
Like previous weeks we had no problems with classroom management and the students were an absolute joy to work with, as they were incredibly enthusiastic and were engaged 100% (even while I was talking about inherent objective properties represented in the atomic weight of mineralogical molecules!)
And, like I have in the past, I am making a new determination to simplify our lesson...stay tuned for an update next week!
Hi Ben!
ReplyDeleteThis lesson was a challenge but we definitely pulled it off and learned some things from it. I can't wait to read this week's post because I think that this was our best lesson yet! We had so much fun and it seemed like we did just about everything right! :) I can't wait for our next lesson. As long as we give the students a good amount of time for the poem and streak tests we should be golden! Can't wait!! :)
OMG too funny!! It's great that the kids are engaged, even if some of the discussion is going a bit over their heads!!
ReplyDeleteA great way to think about it is "What is the most important thing the students should remember from the lesson?" and "atomic weight of mineralogical molecules" might not be it. It might just be remembering that rocks are made up of minerals, but minerals are made up of only one substance. I think it's awesome that you have a great vocabulary-- and I think you should definitely incorporate new vocab into the lesson, but I think you're seeing that to make it accessible for students you have to bring it down to their level (at least at first).
Great post!