Science and Investigation in the Classroom

For this week I have only been able to be in the classroom for one day because of family circumstances. I was in my classroom on August 31st. My CE has allowed me to work with a group of students, and Monday I was able to work with the ruby red's. This group is considered to be the students that are above grade level or academically gifted. I was able to obtain UV beads from Dr.McKinney, and with the approval of my CE I was able to conduct an experiment with this group.

I had the students to create a chart in which they would predict what would happen, tell what really happened, and tell why it happened.  I explained to the students that the sun puts off UV rays that allows for our skin to either tan or burn. I allowed the students tell to tell which happened to them. I proceeded in letting them know that we were going to be scientist, and predict what would happen to the beads if we were to go outside. Some students said melt, others said that they would change colors, etc. I taught them that by predicting we were hypothesizing, and I explained to them what an hypothesis is.

Once, we filled out the first part of our chart, I had the students to take a handful of beads and we walked out side. The group was amazed that the beads began to change colors because of the rays of the sun. I explained to the students that just because their hypothesis was not correct does not mean that we stop trying to predict things that would happen because that makes the best scientist. Once the students found out the beads changed colors they were able to explain to me that the UV rays from the sun caused the beads to change colors, and then the students started creating other hypothesis based on different scenarios that the beads could be used in.

It amazed me that after participating in the investigation that the students were able to connect better with the science experiment and also make their own inquiries about other possible scenarios.