On Tuesday, January 31st I travelled to McCurdy Elementary to work with Alicia Holden’s fifth grade class. The students are studying animals and learning how to classify animals into five animal groups. We started the day with introductions and then I asked students to tell me what they already knew about animal classification since they had just started the lesson the day before with Alicia. Next we passed out small animal figurines to each students ranging from a bright organge octopus to a black gorilla in a menacing pose. Each student sketched their animal in their science journal and then chose either a blue, green or brown piece of paper to serve as their animal’s background for a close-up photo. Student’s folded their paper’s in half, “hamburger style” and drew on the top half of their page filling in details of what might be in their animal’s natural habitat. They traced their pencil drawings in black pen and then were ready for their animal photographs. Student’s drew imaginative backgrounds including other deep sea creatures and plants to keep their sea creatures company or a farm house and ponds to provide a suitable site for their farm animals, for example. I went around to each student’s desk and took a close-up photo of their animal and background scene and let them see the photo on the camera’s screen to see if met their approval. Most students smiled, laughed or exclaimed, “cool!” Several students asked me where I had purchased the animals and when I told them, “at Michael’s” one boy immediately said that he would be asking his mom to take him to the store to pick some up after school. I think having the small animal figurines in front of the students at their desks was a great prop for the lesson. They kept student’s really engaged in the process and thinking practically about where their animals live and what they need in their environment to survive. Alicia kept them in the classroom this week and will use them as the students write poetry with her. When I return on Friday we will be creating additional animal collages and drawings.

Over 200 teachers, administrators, artists and community members attended the SLSL Professional Development workshop on January 4th. Participants enjoyed a keynote address from Sallie Wolf (Sallie Wolf’s biography), attended their choice of 3 breakout sessions and engaged in a thought provoking panel discussion with Dr. Diana Wiig (Dr. Diana Wiig’s biography) and SLSL creators Dr. E. Wendy Saul and Carrie Launius.

We will have evaluation feedback information soon. In the meantime, we encourage all of you post to this blog and share your thoughts and experiences.

Thank you for all of your hard work, engaging presentations and willingness to participate in this innovative program!

Planning Session Notes – Science Meets Arts: Experimenting With Book Making
Monday, October 24, 2011

-Experimental Design (October –January)
Testing of pendulums, life boats, airplanes, flippers
-Workshops will happen on November 4, 11, and 18th 11:00-12:15 and 1:30 – 2:30, 24 students, Arrowpoint Elementary
-Professional Development rehearsal is December 9th 8:30-3:50

Books:
Poetrees
In The Swim
Beast Feast
The Frog Scientist
Snowflake Bentley
The Tree of Life: Charles Darwin
The Robin Makes A Laughing Sound

Activities:
Photography
Poetry
Free writing
Collage
Drawing

 
Friday, November 4, 2011
Workshop 1: Photographing student-authors, photographing materials, and experiment, word wall

-Introductions to project and each other; Chinyere will talk about the 3 workshops she and Nate will teach and show the students a sample finished book.
-Experiment will be set up and students will photograph their experiment in action, taking many how-to photographs of each step of the experiment.
-Students will also take up-close photographs of the materials used in the experiment.
-Students will brainstorm a list of words to add to the word wall to be used in poems or free writing in workshops 2 or 3.
-Individual student portraits with Chinyere

Materials:
Digital cameras, AA batteries, large paper/markers, sample book, list of students’ names

Friday, November 11, 2011
Workshop 2: Writing Poetry on pendulums or the themes of science/observation/experiments

-Chinyere will give some example formats – list poem, acrostic, haikus and read some examples
-Students will write rough drafts and then final drafts on index cards
-Students will begin drawing or searching magazines/catalogues for collage

Materials:
Prints of photos, word wall, lined paper, pencils, colored ruled notecards, poems on large paper, magazines/journals/catalogues, scissors, black felt tip pens

Friday, November 18, 2011
Workshop 3: Drawing and collage, writing author bios, begin book assembly

-Students will continue drawing/collaging
-Students will write brief author bios including name, age, place of birth, special interests/hobbies, future dreams
-Students will assemble books from colored cardstock and twine

Materials:
Colored cardstock, scissors, pencils, unlined paper, colored ruled notecards, alphabet letter stamps and ink/letter stickers, twine, hole punch, markers, black felt tip pens

***What is not covered in the 3 sessions: Design cover page, table of contents, assemble book with all drawings/collages, poems, photos and captions…How to squeeze this in???

DAY #2 Revised – December 5, 2011 at Townsend with Tracy Cotton
Materials: A Handful of Seeds by Monica Hughes
five cans of vegetables: green beans, potatoes, corn, asparagus, northern beans
Dichotomous Key worksheet
clear snack bags with 5 pastas – rotini, gemelli, farfalle, penne rigate, tortellini
answer key for pasta
Identifying Pasta with a Dichotomous Key worksheet 20111114.02

This lesson has been streamlined from the previous day 2 lessons with Robb Harkey and Sara Berghoff.

We started with a discussion (review) of Lewis & Clark and the Corps of Discovery and how cool it is to be living and going to school in what had been the Louisiana Purchase. Our discussion included mention of a fifth grade class in Philadelphia learning about the Louisiana Purchase and the mysterious lands west of the Mississippi River. Just as Lewis & Clark had done, we can conduct our own exploration of our own piece of the Louisiana Purchase around the schoolyard as we hunt for and gather seeds.

The book, A Handful of Seeds by Monica Hughes, was introduced and offered as a possible read-aloud for another time. Its relevance is that it focuses on the importance of seeds and takes place in a Latin American country. The use of Spanish will be included in the next lesson, not specifically to teach Spanish, but to more effectively use a dichotomous key to identify common items with words unfamiliar to the students.

To prepare for the gathering and categorizing of the seeds we may find we talked about ways scientists categorize and identify items – specifically through the use of dichotomous keys.

The five cans of vegetables were shown and a volunteer was asked to place the cans into two groups. The class was challenged to determine the criteria used to group the cans. This activity was completed several times. If not done so by a student, I separated the vegetables in to those that grow below ground (the beets and the potatoes) and those that grow above groun (the beans, corn and asparagus). During the discussion, the criteria were stated as yes or no questions. To further link this activity with the introduction of dichotomous keys (yet to come), I closed my eyes and selected a can at random and held it over my head for the class to see but out of my sight. I asked, “does this vegetable grow below ground?” If the students answered yes, I then asked, “is it a dark color?” If the answer was no, I identified the vegetable as potatoes. This was repeated several times, pointing out how simple yes or no questions could be used to identify the vegetables. I introduced these questions as a simple dichotomous key.

The Dichotomous Key worksheet was distributed as an introduction to the use of dichotomous keys. Together with the class, we did shape A. Then the students were challenged to do the rest. This afforded Tracy and me an opportunity to circulate and see who was able to utilize the key effectively. Students who quickly understood and finished the activity were asked to circulate and help any others who were confused.

The bags of pasta were distributed. The students were asked if anyone could identify each of the pasta shapes. No one could. The Identifying Pasta with a Dichotomous Key worksheet 20111114.02 was distributed and used by the students. As each pasta was identified, the students were directed to make a sketch of it next to its name on the key.

For a one hour class, this was as far as we got. By not rushing, there was time for lots of discussion and ample opportunity for those students struggling to understand the process of using the dichotomous keys.

If there had been extra time, reading from A Handful of Seeds could have followed.

Next class – The introduction and use of the dichotomous key to identify the eight items in Spanish and an opportunity to create an original dichotomous key with beans using Make Your Own Dichotomous Key worksheet 20111113.01.
Then, for class #4, either go outside and gather seeds, or examine and catalog any seeds already gathered using the Catalog of Seeds form.

 DAY #3 – November 30, 2011 at Jamestown with Sara Berghoff
Materials: A Handful of Seeds by Monica Hughes
Seeds gathered from schoolyard between DAY #2 and Day #3
Catalog of Seeds – Jamestown form 20111027.01

The class began with a discussion about the seeds that the students recently gathered. I asked about locations, methods, and kinds of seeds. We also talked about seed identification and if it was important to know the names of the seeds gathered. We decided that, for now, it was not.

We also reviewed Lewis & Clark and the Corps of Discovery and that Jamestown Elementary is located in what was the original Louisiana Purchase. The seeds gathered by the students were similar to the mysterious seeds gathered by Lewis & Clark who also were unable to identify all of the seeds they found.

The form Catalog of Seeds – Jamestown was distributed and briefly discussed. The students were directed to select any one seed from those they had gathered and to complete a catalog page for that seed. Sketches of the seeds were to include measurements. A quick mini-lesson of metric measurements was conducted with emphasis on millimeters and centimeters. Assistance was provided as the students worked individually. In addition, the students were asked to make up names for any seeds they could not identify.

The students were told that the completed pages would be placed into a binder for the class to share. Common names for the same seeds could be decided upon later (even if they might not agree with the names in field guides). The important thing to consider was the formulation of a common language much like that in use by scientists elsewhere.

Using the binder, the students may someday peruse the seed descriptions entered by others and possibly develop dichotomous keys (once common names were agreed upon).

Had there been time, a read-aloud of A Handful of Seeds by Monica Hughes would have been continued from previous lessons.

 Links to documents referred to in lesson:

Dichotomous Keys

A Catalog of Seeds in our Schoolyard

Objectives: The student will
1. Identify the habitat and adaptive features of an aquatic animal
2. Apply knowledge of animal classification through creating, sketching and labeling an imaginary marine animal and its structures
3. Create a mosaic of an imaginary marine animal that demonstrates the student’s understanding of the structures, functions, and habitat of the animal
GLEs
Science: 3.1.D; 3.1.E.a, c, & d; 3.2.C
Visual Art: V.1.A (grade 6); V.1.B
Materials
1. 8” x 8” sketch paper
2. Pencil with eraser
3. Colored pencils
4. 8” X 8” black or dark blue illustration board
5. Tacky glue
6. Tesserae: small pieces of ceramic tile, beads, sequins, glass, shells
Trade books and resources
• Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau
• The Fantastic Undersea Life of Jacques Cousteau
• The Boy Who Drew Birds: A Story of John James Audubon
• Pierre the Penguin
• Several photos of student’s chosen animal
Vocabulary
• Background
• Biodiversity
• Classification
• Cousteau, Jacques
• Foreground
• Habitat
• Invertebrate
• Marine animals
• Mosaic
• Structures (as in features of an organism)
• Tesserae
• Tile
• Vertebrate

Intro
1. Introduce lesson to class by stating that we will use our knowledge of animal classification to create an imaginary marine animal.
2. We will also look at the life of Jacques Cousteau, a famous marine biologist, who created a TV show that showed people ocean life, and gave people a greater appreciation for the amazing diversity of life there.
3. Many artists learned about the natural world through observing and creating art. We will do it through making a mosaic, whereas Cousteau used film, and a painter of birds named Audubon used pencils and paint.
4. Show students trade books that will be integrated into the lessons and used for reference.
Day 1
Discussion:
Start with question: Why is it important to learn about and classify living organisms? What do we hope to gain from this knowledge? How does knowledge of an animal change your relationship to that animal?
1. Read Manfish to students, show illustrations.
2. Show short film clip of Cousteau (no more than 1 minute)–optional
3. Present detail of Lod mosaic, an ancient Roman mosaic found in Israel that depicts a variety of sea life.
4. Go over components of mosaic: define tile, tesserae, and give a brief overview of the process.
Procedure/demonstration
1. Draw animal on a 8” X 8” sheet of paper, make it larger than ½ the length of the paper. It is in the foreground.
2. Draw the animal’s habitat in the background and areas surrounding the animal. The animal will overlap most of the features of the habitat.
3. Include and label the following : 1. Structures of animal (e.g. fins, legs, gills, eye ect), 2. habitat including food source, shelter, and level of the ocean in which the animal lives.
4. The habitat will be in the background—its details will be smaller.
5. Using colored pencils, color animal and its habitat the appropriate colors.
6. Have student write a few sentences about why s/he chose this animal, what is interesting about it, and why it is important that people learn about it.
Day 2
Discussion:
1. Start with asking students to share the animal they chose, and why they chose it.
2. Share parts of second Cousteau book, The Fantastic Undersea Life of Jacques Cousteau
3. Show Roman Lod mosaic, discuss in terms of biodiversity.
4. Compare and contrast different fish depicted.
Procedure
1. Have sketches ready to transfer to the mosaic. If not finished with sketch, have student spend 10 more minutes on it before transferring the image to the board.
2. Draw the sketch on the board on which the tiles, or tesserae, will be glued
3. Take the tesserae and place them over the drawing to see if they fit. Minimize the space between tiles, but make sure a little bit shows. Rearrange the pieces several times to get a consistent fit that also stays within the outlines that were drawn.
4. Work on arranging one section of the mosaic at a time, starting with the animal. This is so the student won’t have to take tiles off if s/he runs out of time.
5. Once you finish a section, begin gluing on the tesserae of that section. Put enough glue on the back of each piece to ensure that it adheres.
6. Continue arranging and gluing section by section.
Days 3 & 4
Discussion:
1. Day 3: share images of John Audubon’s, especially those which depict marine birds.
a. Link Audubon’s drawing of many species of birds to classification.
b. Ask “Do you think an artist can be a scientist, or a scientist an artist?” why or why not?
c. How are artists and scientists similar, and how are they different?

2. Day 4: Share Pierre the Penguin—a story of a penguin who lost his feathers and was faced with hypothermia. Ask students:
a. What structure of Pierre’s was not working, and have them describe how he was affected.
b. Why did Pierre need his feathers to survive?
c. Name a structure that helps your animal? Is it depicted in your mosaic?
d. Show photo of mosaic (TBD) which clearly depicts an animal and its structures that help it survive. Perhaps compare/contrast two animals.
Work time for days 3 and 4:
• Continue to place tesserae and glue on to the mosaic in sections.
• Monitor work of students to ensure care in placement of pieces.
• For students who finish early, have them create a label showing the name of the animal, and what they found interesting about their chosen animal. Have them use nicer drawing paper and design (Demonstrate this activity before students start to work).
Set-up and clean up
1. Have students pass out sketch paper (day 1) and colored pencils (if students don’t bring their own supplies with them to class).
2. Have two students pass out board on which mosaics will be placed and sketches (day 2-4)
3. Have the tesserae and tacky glue on an unused table. Students will take each only when they are ready to start arranging or gluing (with teacher’s permission).
4. 5 minutes before class ends, students will place unused tesserae in a ziplock bag with their name on it.
5. Students will bring pieces to storage area, and use hand wipes to clean any dust or glue from desk.
6. I would like sketches and students’ bags of tesserae to be kept separately from the mosaics.

Literacy, science combine in lesson at McCurdy Elementary School

Student use of dichotomous keys requires the breaking of a rule many of us find troublesome. When asking questions of our students (and encouraging students to ask questions of one another) we teachers urge our students to avoid ‘yes’ or ‘no’ questions. These kinds of questions yield shallow answers – no surprise there. Plus, ‘yes’ or ‘no’ questions often require little thought to create or to answer, and a mere guess will be correct half the time.

 However, with dichotomous keys, the long avoided ‘yes’ or ‘no’ questions become the central means to an end. A dichotomy is either one way or another. Scientists categorize – when we encourage our students to do the same it can be a relatively easy task to first divide a group of items into two subgroups (based upon a particular attribute), and then continue to divide the resulting groups into smaller and smaller sets. With dichotomous keys, the way to do this is to ask those ‘yes’ or ‘no’ questions – an item goes either into this group or that one.

 The important thing for children to remember when developing their own dichotomous keys is to avoid asking questions such as, “is the item a pencil?” Rather, the questions must be about attributes such as, “is the item long with a point at one end?” This kind of question will separate pencils, crayons, and markers from notepads, erasers, and rulers.

 With the dichotomous key, the ‘yes’ or ‘no’ questions concerning the attributes of an item require of the user a careful examination and observation of all of the items in question. These seemingly simple kinds of questions take on a whole new level of significance. When students develop their own dichotomous keys for others to use, a level of thinking is required that demands an understanding of the attributes and how they differ within the group of items.

The effectiveness of originally developed dichotomous keys can be easily assessed as these keys can be tried on other students, maybe in other classes or in earlier grades. If the key is found to be faulty either in its logic or accuracy, troubleshooting by the key’s originator can add to the overall learning experience.

 As in so many areas of teaching and learning, transforming our students from consumers to producers is a key element in achieving understanding.

Materials: Farmer George Plants a Nation by Peggy Thomas
Plants on the Trail with Lewis and Clark by Dorothy Hinshaw Patent
A Handful of Seeds by Monica Hughes
five cans of vegetables: green beans, potatoes, corn, asparagus, northern beans
clear snack bag with 12 fuzz balls (pom poms)
clear snack bag with 12 craft sticks
clear snack bag with 12 crayons
clear snack bag with 12 foam cubes
Dichotomous Key worksheet
clear snack bags with 5 pastas – rotini, gemelli, farfalle, penne rigate, tortellini
answer key for pasta
Identifying Pasta with a Dichotomous Key worksheet 20111114.02
clear bags with the following items: (2 each of) fuzz balls, craft sticks, crayons, foam cubes, birthday candles, pennies, index cards, pencil erasers
Dichotomous Key – Items in Spanish worksheet 20111112.01
Make Your Own Dichotomous Key worksheet 20111113.01
clear snack bags of beans: (2 each of) lima, split pea, pinto, kidney, northern, garbonzo, navy
answer key for beans

The activities planned for this lesson could easily fill two days. We attempted to complete it all in one day.

The book, A Handful of Seeds by Monica Hughes, was introduced and offered as a possible read-aloud for another time. Its relevance is that it focuses on the importance of seeds and takes place in a Latin American country. The use of Spanish is included in this lesson, not specifically to teach Spanish, but to more effectively use a dichotomous key to identify common items with words unfamiliar to the students.

The five cans of vegetables were shown and a volunteer was asked to place the cans into two groups. The class was challenged to determine the criteria used to group the cans. This activity was completed several times. During the discussion, the criteria were stated as yes or no questions.

Next, the four clear bags of materials were displayed on the whiteboard (fuzz balls, craft sticks, crayons, foam cubes). These were also placed into two groups by a student volunteer for the class to determine the attributes which separated the groups. (Another activity with these materials was to select an item at random for the students to determine by asking yes or no questions.) The point of these activities was for the students to become familiar with asking yes or no questions about the attributes of items in order to separate them into groups.

The Dichotomous Key worksheet was distributed as an introduction to the use of dichotomous keys. This afforded Sara and me an opportunity to circulate and see who was able to utilize the key effectively.

The bags of pasta were distributed. The students were asked if anyone could identify each of the pasta shapes. No one could. The Identifying Pasta with a Dichotomous Key worksheet 20111114.02 was distributed and used by the students. As each pasta was identified, the students were directed to make a sketch of it next to its name on the key.

The students were then given the bags of 8 items and asked if they could identify the familiar items in Spanish. They could not and were told that with the use of another dichotomous key they would be able to identify each item in Spanish. Also distributed was the Dichotomous Key – Items in Spanish worksheet 20111112.01. Once the students successfully identified the items in Spanish, they were challenged to use the Make Your Own Dichotomous Key worksheet 20111113.01 to create a new dichotomous key for the items. During these activities the students were repeatedly reminded about the reasons for doing this – to eventually gather and categorize seeds from around the school.

The bags of beans and the bean answer key were left with Sara to use as an impendent activity later. The students would be challenged to create original dichotomous keys for use by others (3rd or 4th grade students) to identify the beans. The success of the younger students would determine the effectiveness of the dichotomous keys.

Next class – going outside to gather seeds to be used for the school seed catalogs.

Scheduled visits:
Robb Harkey, Arrowpoint – Reschedule. Dates/Times TBD

Sara Berghoff, Jamestown – Wednesday November 30, 1:20-3:25 DAY #3

Tracie Cotton, Townsend – TBD

Paris and I have worked together two days so far with 3 different classes. In the meantime he had the students do additional research and write additional questions. Between the three classes, there were more than 100 questions per scientist.

Today, Tuesday, November 22 we had the first class remove duplicate questions and remove bad questions. Criteria: interesting, one answer, no duplicates, grammatically correct. The second class sorted the questions into piles: Yes, No, Maybe. The third class looked through the Yes pile and the Maybe pile to find roughly 20 final questions. The classes were rewarded for good work with a theatre game (A to Z)

A lot going on: research and learning about their scientist; learning to work in a group and developing their own strategies to complete the given task; reading, writing, and grammar.

Next week, Tues 11/29 we will present the final project at 11:30, 1:10, and 2:35. We will play the game show. We have taken video throughout and will video tape next week too.