Seeds
in Fall...Collect Them All!
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Seeds
in Fall...Collect Them All! |
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I took my class to Lindner Park in Norwood. Pam Bowers oversees the Norwood Planetarium and Lindner Park. She and I worked together to impliment the Seeds in Fall... lessons. We will return to the park on October 15, to finish the material. I was given special permission to visit this location for an extended period of time, as well as recieve free bus service if we addressed this trip as a pilot program that could be implimented in all of the Norwood Elementary Schools. Today's activities went beautifully. However, in the future we need to bring photocopied and laminated picture files of trees to help the students with their onsite investigations. I truly believe you would love this location, it is 5-7 acres of wooded area, with some wildlife, and it has a very interesting history. I could hear the students discussing what they learned in prior lessons. It was rewarding! Michelle VanHook I used this unit with a
class of 10 fourth grade gifted students. The students were enthusiastic
about this unit. Alex's father works in landscaping, so the leaves he
brought in from his yard were somewhat exotic and very diverse. Michael
told his grandparents in Florida about our study and they mailed him
palm, banana, sea grape, and a few other tropical leaves. Andrew's father
came to our class as a guest speaker to share his knowledge from classes
he had taken in forestry. I would definitely use this study again. It
was easy to use and a good way to tie in my students learning to use
Hyperstudio technology to produce a usable product. I like this activity because it encourages cooperation among the students... The people sort was an excellent way to teach attributes...When I attempted to figure how the students sorted themselves, they were very happy when they managed to "stump" me. They tried even more during the second round! The students were very surprised when I taught a math concept. They were even more surprised when I required that they figure the percentages on Data Sheet #2. Denise Prichard I completed three of the lessons from this inquiry with my kindergartners in the spring. We were lucky enough to have saved our fall collections as well as being given John Farmer's fall seed collection that his students completed in the fall. We did the people sort and the seed sort altogether as a group on two different days. Together, we were able to focus on attributes and break groups into two until everyone or seed was placed in itŐs own group. We also utilized the On-Line Seed Tour to identify our tree seeds we had sorted. In addition, my students used the On-Line Seed Tour to identify seeds we had not sorted. I had placed a basket at the computers and they were clicking through the pictures to find matches. They really loved being independent on that particular page and felt proud when they could make a match. I also took it a step further since we were in the spring planting season. We planted a class tree garden and individual sunflower seeds that we had harvested in the fall. This allowed us to observe sprouting and measure growth over a week as well as learn about plant parts and their jobs. I was able to integrate science, math and language arts to create a wonderful, engaged learning atmosphere. Carolyn Helmers This unit is very well done, but I struggled with it because I have almost no life science background. I spent a great deal of time surveying the school property and learning what kinds of trees that we have. One of our biology teachers was kind enough to walk around with me and then I repeated the walk several times to make sure that I knew what I was doing. However, I really learned a lesson the hard way: being able to use a key and identify A tree is not the same thing as being able to use the key to identify EVERY tree. I went down the wrong path a couple of times as we tried to key it out in class. I really liked the Dichotomous People Sort. I will continue to use this forever, maybe even in my physics classes as an opening day icebreaker. I did not do the home leaf collection project because these students had severe home problems. First and foremost, several of them didn't have homes--they were living in hotels. Second, they struggled to bring back papers from home-- planning a class activity that depended on students bringing materials would have been a setup for failure. Sandee Coats-Haan I completed the What Is Dichotomous
Sorting portion of this inquiry while the fourth graders at our school
were completing the October Reading Proficiency Test. My students were
as quiet as church mice! A nice connection
to the kinds of sorting expected of students on the fourth and sixth
grade proficiency tests. Make sure you remind your students NOT to use plastic bags when collecting seeds. Juicy seeds kept in plastic bags for several days will decay before you can identify and sort them. Ken Vincent |