I decided to look into how we, as teachers, can make science more fun for every student and to find methods to help those who dread science class learn to get hooked. I was excited to find a few ideas that really piqued my interest.
A few articles I found talked about having a current events portion of class once a week. Most of us have seen current events done in a social studies classroom and it is not much different when done with science ideas in mind. Students can cut newspaper articles out and find things online that explain a recent event in the science field. Students then have to bring the article to class and explain it to their peers. This could also be done on a daily basis, especially if your students have blocked science time.
Something I am very curious to use in my clinical classroom is the idea of a weekly or daily scientist. Each day/week a student researches a science fact that has to do with what content is being taught. He or she shares it with the class and the class begins to ask questions. If the weekly/daily scientist knows the answer, they can share it with the class but if it is a deeper question than the scientist came prepared for, it is written on the science question board and can be used as an experiment-starter, to give ideas to students who are "stuck" and can also be a point for other weekly/daily scientists to research and find a fun fact about.
Bottom line is that as science teachers, we need to get creative with our thinking! We have vast resources at our fingertips (the internet) and it is full of great ideas: games, ways to encourage and motivate, ways to involve science vocabulary in everything you do, and ways to engage our students.
Until next week...
***edit - here's the link to the website I used to find this information: http://www.science.org/category/teaching ***
I love the idea about the weekly scientist! I can see that being a lot of fun for the students but also sparking up a lot of great discussions. I think giving the students the freedom to choose what they want to study would help motivate them to learn. Your bottom line point is true, we have to be creative to keep kids interested.
ReplyDeleteI like this idea. I also like the way you want to include other content areas in your class, ie, social studies. In my science methods class, we had a great discussion on what is science. I was surprised that ny own opinion was wrong! I was mixing up technology with science! Wrong! The technology stuff is great but the science part is even greater! Have fun with your research and I will check in with you next week. I want science to be fun for me and my students!
ReplyDeleteI too love this idea. I think it is important to keep students engaged in science every day and you bring up some great ideas! I especially like that you talk about using a weekly scientist. This keeps the information relevant and exciting!
ReplyDeleteSara-
ReplyDeleteYou have some great ideas in this blog post. As you find additional resources for future posts, it would be good to include links so that we can read those too!
Finding a way to engage students in learning is a great way to become an excellent teacher. I love the idea of weekly scientist, having students engage in exploring science ideas. Thanks for the great ideas!
ReplyDelete