Effecting Change at School and District Levels

I am a lifelong learner.  I am not happy until I am involved in something to make me a better educator.  I continuously take professional developments, but my biggest step is pursuing my master’s degree here at Walden.  I am always thinking about what is next.  I family thinks that I am crazy because after I graduate, I want to pursue my National Board Certification and then maybe a PhD (who knows).  The more experiences I have the more confident I become.  I feel that I have the knowledge to voice my opinions. 

There are several actions I take to ensure that my voice is heard.  I am the science lead at my school, so I attend county science meeting with the head directors.  That these meetings the attendees are allotted the opportunity to discuss concerns, ask questions, and make recommendations.  I must take the information that I have learned back to my school and inform the rest of the staff.  I am also part of two county wide PLCs.  One is only for elementary science lab teachers and the other is for the Inspire participants.  Inspire is a week long program at Purdue University. This program believes that interest and drive to participate in engineering must be fostered in elementary school (Purdue University, 2011).  This group grows each year when additional participants attend the workshop over the summer.  The purpose of the PLC is to motivate teachers to continue to integrate STEM skills into lessons daily. 

My biggest challenge is at my school level.  In the past teachers were told not to teacher science in grades K-4.  Students in Florida are tested in science for the first time in the fifth grade.  The principal actually told them that Hollie will do her magic.  I did fight for curriculum revision and tried to recruit more teachers.  This year my school got a new principal.  This principal’s background is high school chemistry.  I love working for a principal that understands my passion.  Collaborating with this principal we created a science lab position, developed a science PLC, allotted time in daily schedules to teach science, and purchased programs that will assist teachers in effectively engaging their students.  Now that I have the principal on my side all I need is the classroom teacher to be on my side!

Purdue University. (2011). Why Inspire? Retrieved November 17, 2011, from https://engineering.purdue.edu/INSPIRE

What will it take to rejuvenate science education?

Timothy Friedman brings up many interesting statements in his article, What’s Our Sputnik?  He believes that the United States should focus more money and time on science education then on the “war on terrorists”.  I agree with Friedman’s perspective on this situation.  There is so much the government could do with the money they have invested into this so-called war.  This war has cost the American taxpayer over 1 trillion dollars, so far and is estimated to total 2.4 trillion by 2017 (Politics Daily, 2010).  This is $21,500 per American household (CNN Money, 2007).  If I am just giving away $21,500, I rather it go to science education or finding an alternative source of energy. 

I do believe the U.S is in a crisis and the governments must step in to create positive change in science education.  This happen, on October 4, 1957, when the Soviets’ launched Sputnik.  Sputnik was the first man-made artificial satellite to be launch into space.  This event caught the U.S by surprise.  Americans’ feared that the Soviets’ now had the capabilities to use the satellites to spy on government agencies or carry nuclear weapons.  The U.S government answered this panic by creating the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) (Garber, 2007).

The government also supported new science curriculum by passing a billion dollar budget called the National Defense Education Act in 1958.  Science classroom started to change, programs were created, and technologies were supplied.  The combination of paranoia and reform sparked the much-needed revolution (Abramson, 2007).

To spark the fire in science education today, I believe it must start at the top.  The government must work with scientists, state agencies, and teachers to make significant change.  The government will need to provide money to schools to make science a “cool” subject again with a purpose.  Teachers need to use more hands-on, problem-based inquiry lessons to excited and motivate students to be long term science students.   Science instruction must be a priority in elementary schools.  Teachers need training, time, and materials to effectively teach students to embrace, understand, and see a future in science.  Most of my students do not even know what a career in science entails.  We need to glorify STEM related professions like we idolize actors and athletics. 

References:  

Abramson, L. (2007). Sputnik left legacy for U.S. science education. NPR Author. Retrieved November 7, 2011, from  http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=14829195

CNN Money. (2007). “War on terror” may cost $2.4 trillion. Retrieved November 7, 2011, from http://money.cnn.com/2007/10/24/news/economy/cbo_testimony/index.htm

Garber, S. (2007). Sputnik and the dawn of the space age. NASA Author. Retrieved November 8, 2011, from http://history.nasa.gov/sputnik/

Politics Daily. (2010). “War on terrorism” has cost U.S. over $1 trillion so far.  Retrieved November 7, 2011, from http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/07/21/war-on-terrorism-has-cost-u-s-over-1-trillion-so-far-report/

Earthquakes!

This was the most difficult lesson implementation thus far of my degree journey.  It was extremely challenging for me to find students for my summer class.  I ended up with a class of my two boys, my two nieces, and two of my boy’s friends, and two of their sisters.  The four girls were wonderful, but the boys tried not to be goofy, but for the most part they were.  They all know I am a teacher, but I think it was bizarre for them to see me in a teacher role. 

I placed the students into four groups of two and each group were given two pieces of tow by four wood, clay, toothpicks, and Monopoly houses to create a fault line and a city.  They placed the tow by fours on a flat surface and covered them with clay to appear as one piece.  Then they added a road and house to create a city.  I was surprised how much these middle school students were engaged in the creation of their fault line city.  Once the groups were finished with their models, they need to make a prediction on how the land would look after the plated moved.  Then they were instructed to place one board in each hand and slide their boards in the directions specified on their lab sheet for each fault, resetting the crust after each demonstration.  One group of students observed that most of the damage occurs along the fault line. Eureka!

Natural Disasters

            I have been working at Lancaster Elementary School for the last five years.  This school is located less than ten miles west of downtown Orlando, Florida.  The school opened in 1964 and much of the original buildings are still in use today.  This once middle-class area is now predominantly lower socio-economic households.  It is not uncommon for my students to reside in rented hotels or apartments with extended families living together in one or two bedrooms.  Eighty-six percent of Lancaster’s population is on free and reduced lunch.  Many of my students feel that they are entitled to community or governmental assists.  It is not unusual for my students’ families to demand free eye glasses, dental work, holiday meals, Christmas trees, and breakfast for their children.  I have had many parents that argue, yell, and even curse at me if they are not selected as one of the families who are provided assists.

Lancaster feels that it is extremely important to education our students on the value of community involvement.  The staff has developed partnerships with many local organizations to instill the power of service learning to our students.  The purpose of this Caring Community is to build character by identifying and serving the needs of others (Lancaster, 2011).  For example, students can write letters to soldiers, decorate bags for pharmacies, host a senior breakfast, or collect dog and cat food for the local animal shelter.  My students and I have participated in these service-learning partnerships for the five years that I have been teaching at Lancaster, but I never thought about adding a science or environmental component.

The students at Lancaster would benefit from a partnership with the American Red Cross.  Living in Florida many of my students understand how devastating a hurricane disaster can be on the community.  I will have a Red Cross volunteer discuss ways that students can help this organization.  I would want the Red Cross to discuss their youth volunteer program with my students. The Red Cross Teen Corps is a youth group that performs a wide variety of community service projects throughout the Orange county area.  Volunteers can be trained as disaster responders, which can assist in the aftermath of a disaster (Mid Florida Red Cross, 2011).  Adding the Red Cross as part of our Caring Community will continue to instill the character education and values that we want our students to possess.

References:

Lancaster Elementary School. (2011). Lancaster’s Caring Community. Retrieved July 15, 2011,  from https://www.ocps.net/lc/southeast/eln/schoolinfo/Pages/Lancaster'sCaringCommunity.aspx

Mid Florida Red Cross. (2011). Teen Corp. Retrieved July 14, 2011 from http://www.midfloridaredcross.org/general_calltoaction.asp?CTA=2&SN=5929&OP=5937&IDCapitulo=9B23PSXU4I

Implementing the Backward Design Process

Categorizing biotic and abiotic objects

Outside investigation

Presentations



Ask a Scientist!

I have not received an ask to my cell question as of today.  When I receive an answer I will update my blog.  Thank you!

Web 2.0 Presentation Tools

When I was in fifth grader, I cannot remember my teacher doing a song and dance show to keep my attention.  Now teachers are encouraged to use a wide variety of multimedia tools.  As a teacher, I incorporate power point in my classroom through review, jeopardy games, and student projects.  I do not like change, but if I am forced to then I want to go “big”.  I reviewed two presentational tools that I could use to complete my course project.  The two tools are 280 Slides and Prezi.

280 Slides essentially is an online version of power point.  Pictures, You Tube videos, and clip art can be easily added to the presentation.  There are tutorials that guide the user to completely a successful presentation.  I believe that 280 Slides is a great next step if someone is uncomfortable with change, but it is too close to power point for me.

The next presentational tool that I explored is Prezi.  I have attended several workshops where Prezi was used.  It is extremely important in my county that all the students understand the standard and direction of each lesson.  My principal will walk into my room and ask students to identify the objective of the lesson.  I think being able to zoom out and show the students the “big picture” will assist students in understanding the objective and the direction the lesson.  Students can also use Prezi as a study guide because they can access it from home. I think that my students will enjoy Prezi as a new multimedia tool for me.

21st-Century Topics and Tools

The content area in which I conducted my research on is the flow of electricity through a circuit. I enjoy teaching this unit because it is one of the few times I have my students conduct an open inquiry activity. The open inquiry activity has the students discover the elements of a working circuit. I would still have my students complete the inquiry activity first because it will set the stage to teach them the science behind their circuits.

The websites that I believe are powerful learning tools are: 

1.      NASA: The students can use this website as a reference page.  This one page website defines parallel and series circuits.  http://scifiles.larc.nasa.gov/text/kids/Problem_Board/problems/electricity/circuits2.html

2.      Woodland Junior School:  This is an incredible website.  I cannot wait to use it with my students.  This website provides about fourteen different games to explore.  My favorite interactive game is called, Silicon Spies.  This is a comic like story of an evil doctor.  Dr Volt has an evil plan of destroying all the power in Silicon City.  The city sends a group of spies to foil his plans.  The student becomes one of the spies. 

http://www.learningcircuits.co.uk/

These two websites will prepare my students to be 21st-century scientifically literate citizens by providing them the knowledge and practice in understanding the basic of circuits. The only challenge that I can see is providing my students an opportunity to practice building circuits independently or in partners because of the lack of computers available.

The Heat Is On!

In my inquiry, I selected a fifteen centimeter piece of square craft felt, a fifteen centimeter piece of a cotton shirt, a fifteen centimeter piece of aluminum foil, and a fifteen centimeter piece cut from a quart-sized plastic bag as my manipulated variables. I poured eight ounces (240 mL) of boiling water into five identical ceramic mugs. The fifth mug remained uncovered as a control. I then covered each mug with one of the selected materials and secured the materials with rubber bands. After thirty minutes, I uncovered each mug and measured its temperature. I recorded my results on a chart and repeated the experiment two additional times to ensure my results were accurate and reliable. As I analyzed my materials to my hypothesis, I was surprised by what my results revealed. On average, all of the water temperatures were reduced by forty-eight to sixty-nine percent. The aluminum foil that I believed would be the best insulator did not provide the best insulation (see appendix). The results of this experiment were extremely unexpected. The plastic bag conserved heat the most efficiently. This surprised me because I would never think to cover a hot dish with a plastic bag or plastic wrap. I never imagined that it would be a practical insulator. The plastic bag’s water temperature was six degrees higher than the aluminum foil. The unanticipated outcome provides insight regarding heat transfer and insulators.

The insight that I have gained from conducting this lesson is that less dense materials are better insulators (Kurtus, 2006). This explains my results; the plastic bag was definitely the least dense material that I chose. Kurtus justifies this reasoning by explaining that the denser the material, the closer its atoms are together. The closer the atoms are together, the faster the transfer of energy takes place (2006).

When I conduct this inquiry with my students, I will ask them to bring in items from their house. I will give them examples such as cotton cloth, potholders, tissue paper, and towels. I will also provide materials from my classroom such as aluminum foil, napkins, paper plates, books, and plastic bags. I will give the students opportunity to choose from a variety of hot and cold liquids to test. I will provide tea, coffee, hot chocolate, cold soda, cold juice, hot and ice water. I will make this inquiry more relevant to the students’by showing them different travel mugs and discussing the propose and what they are made of.

Reference

Kurtus, R. (2006). Thermal insulation Prevents Heat From escaping. Author. Retrieved January

            26, 2011, from http://www.school-for-champions.com/science/thermal_insulation.htm

Appendix

Type of Material	Trial 1	Trial 2	Trial 3	Average
Felt	32°C	35°C	33°C	33°C
Cotton T-Shirt	39°C	40°C	41°C	40°C
Aluminum Foil	47°C	46°C	46°C	46°C
Plastic Sandwich bag	52°C	52°C	53°C	52°C
Uncovered (Control)	31°C	31°C	31°C	31°C

Inquiry-Based Learning

Question: Which pendulum will come to rest more quickly—a lighter pendulum or heavier pendulum?

I tied a string with a washer to the end of a ruler to set-up my pendulum.  I taped the ruler to the edge of a table.  I released the washer and timed the swings until the pendulum came to a stop.  I used three different size washers and repeated my trials three times.  Before starting my investigation, I conducted research on pendulums.  My research indicated that the length of string was more important than how heavy the object.  I still made a prediction that the lighter pendulum would come to rest more quickly.  I sat on the floor with a stopwatch and timed the pendulum until I believed it to be stopped. 

My results surprised me because I thought the times would be fairly similar, but instead there was a vast difference.  My results made question my experiment.  I believe my challenge was in determining the precise moment when the pendulum stopped.  I sat down until I perceived the pendulum motionless, but this observation was very subjective. 

Washer size	Average time to stop
Large	6min 36sec
Medium	5min 31sec
Small	4min 29sec

The set-up of my pendulum worked extremely well.  I students would be able to recreate my pendulum easily.  Timing the pendulum did not work well.  I wonder if any of my students would find a solution to this problem. 

The one modification would be to make this inquiry activity about variables.  I would supply my students with different size washers, different length of string, and various materials to create their pendulum.  This inquiry lesson will help students understand they are only allowed to change one variable at a time.