Students finding information about how to conduct a science fair using a scientific method through videos in brainpop.com
Brainpop.com is a very helpful educational website that I have used for my teaching. It provides a lot of learning activities as well as guidance for teachers and students to understand knowledge.
Lesson Plan PYP 5 2011-2012
Week 6: Scientific Method and Report
Time Allotment: 90 minutes X 2
WALT: Students are able to apply scientific method in their scientific inquiry
WILF:
1. Students are able to explain why science is important
2. Students are able to explain each step in scientific method
- Ask questions
- do background research
- construct a hypothesis
- test with an experiment
- analyze the data
- communicate the result
3. Students are able to conduct their own experiment
4. Students are able to create a scientific report (Display Board)
Vocabulary:
Science, scientific method, stages of scientific method, scientific report, science fair
Stages of the lesson:
1. Tuning in (10 minutes)
Contextualization:
Aims:
- finding out the students’ prior knowledge
Guided Question: Why is science important?
Facilitate the class discussion to get the understanding that:
- Science is a system that we use to acquire knowledge about the world around us.
- Science is important because it allows us to understand ourselves, our planet, the living things around us, and the nature of our universe.
- Without science, people wouldn’t be able to cure diseases. There would be no computers, cars, or televisions. Science is responsible for the creation of hundreds of thousands of innovations that have helped make our lives the way that they are today. We all benefit from science every day.
2. Finding Info
Watching brain pop.com: scientific method: Moby’s Fig tree (20 minutes)http://www.brainpop.com/science/scientificinquiry/scientificmethod/
Aims:
- Leading them to the scientific method
- Finding out information about stages in scientific method
Before watching
Contextualization:
– Guided Question: How would you describe science? (Brainpop.com: Activity tool: jumbled words)
Guide the students to the understanding that:
- Science is the observation, identification, description, experimental investigation, and theoretical explanation of the world around us.
- The scientific method includes observation, forming a hypothesis, making predictions, testing the predictions in experiments, and then repeating the process to continue discovering more.
– Matching cards: scientific methods
While watching
Task:
Fill in the Scientific method blank chart (attached)
Teachers can check the correct answer (look at the teacher’s guidance sheet)
Guided Questions:
What is scientific method?
What should you do at first to solve problem?
What are you doing during “observation”?
What is inference?
What is hypothesis?
What do you need to do before doing experiment?
What is controlled variable?
What is independent variable?
What is dependant variable?
3. Sorting Out (20 minutes)
Aims: to gather information and assess the students’ understanding of the stages of scientific method found in Moby’s fig tree plants experiment
- Check the answer of the stages of scientific method with their science buddies (clock buddies or science buddies) (5 minutes)
- Class discussion to check together and discuss the answer (15 minutes)
Teachers elicit some terminology in scientific method and reasons of doing them.
Also, tell the students that they need to make a scientific report following the stages of the scientific method.
4. Going Further (Preparation of the students’ summative assessment) (10 minute)
- Inform the students about science fair (summative task)
- Share the success criteria of the summative task
- Tell them how to organize their scientific report on the display board (see the sample of the display board)
Ask the students to start doing their scientific report and planning for their science fair.
5. Taking Action (20 minutes)
Ask the students to prepare to find their own experiment on the internet: go to sciencebuddies.org for the project idea
all about learning... 