*Corrected:Inquiry based methodology of k-6 science teaching
Bonnie Bracey
One of my students reminded me that we had worked on integrating the social
studies, geography , and science , infusing art, and music... and math. The
math lessons are related to the Virginia Geographic Alliance work on
industries in Virginia, and the economy of the Chesapeake Bay.
Inquiry based methodology of k-6 science teaching and Clyde
Roper Stuff
Beastly Science and Electronic Classrooms with Hands On
Yesterday, Clyde Roper( you know the scientist from the Smithsonian who does
the giant squid) gave a lesson in the electronic classroom for members of a
group called Natural Partners. It is an initiative that creates a "virtual
museum, a resource and learning center without walls, for both young and old.
Kids were in classrooms learning from him, and some of us were able to reach
out and touch him right there in the museum.( Director:Cissy Foote Anklum/
National Museum of Natural History /anklum...@simnh.si.edu)
He was able to share using the resources of the museum, his experience , and
the
expertise of others at the museum with kids over electronic communication..
but before that some of us tried.. doing hands on and minds on. Here's my
essay and I welcome Clyde Roper and others to help us create lifelong
learners....using whatever we have...
Here's before Clyde Roper..with a little help from him.
I forgot to watch the Beast... and today we were involved in an electronic
field trip at the Smithsonian. I chuckled to myself as they showed the
octopus , squid, and other creatures of the sea. and I thought about my first
ventures , teaching without a text book. The year I taught the Chesapeake
Bay. I had a lot of help. I had a pathrow picture and views of the Chesapeake
Bay, in poster form, and in photographs. I bought the posters..
Before Technology
I worked with Dr. Valerie Chase of the Baltimore Aquarium, on a project( NSF)
funded and had...a very busy, and interesting time learning oceanography...
but that is a long story.. I was chuckling because when I was going to do
dissection of a big fish, and a squid, the nice man at the waterfront gave me
an octopus. It was huge. I put it in a sack and put it in my car. I guess I
did not set the bag right because when I turned the corner , it fell out of
the bag flopped over and a tentacle swept past my foot and I screamed.. and
then
remembered that it was just a dead octopus,.. I was embarrassed but , it was
dark, so I drove on home and pushed this big old octopus into the
refrigerator.
I think I read a newspaper and then went to get a drink.. and when I opened
the refrigerator.. it fell out, its head rolling around.. and I screamed
again. when I was a little girl.. we did not do octopus or squid.. it looked
kind of
alive and my cat was hissing at it. I watched it.. and then picked it up and
tried to find something to put it in that would hold it so there would be no
more surprises.
It went to school with me. Of course , I had to put it in the teacher's
refrigerator. I got a complaint, I understood why, and so I removed it to the
classroom and we changed the schedule so that we could proceed to do science
immediately. We had a lesson on fish dissection, squid, and octopus
dissection from Valerie, I had attended classes and we had tested them out.
The children were worse than I. I think it was with the fish when they opened
the stomach to see the contents of the fish's stomach. One child had his head
hanging out of the window, and it appeared he was turning green. I asked..
are you ok? He said , " I am , but what ever that fish ate, it smells to high
heaven. " He stood with wide eyes back at the window as we proceeded."Living
in Water " is the curriculum.. and before that we had done things like, test
for ph, examine habitats , test water for oxygen content, and learn
interesting thing about geographical wetland environments. We were NOT
reading out of a book, and some mothers were concerned. The kids were having
fun. We were testing a stream near the school. Was this a worthy cause? Most
were loving it and writing in their diaries.
I was concerned. They were writing that we were not using books. I was very
concerned about that. They were to make entries about what they thought was
significant. They did not miss a day. They were excited. It was different.
They were doing things. They were making me clean up the stream.
Adventures
We walked down the Four Mile Run, and there was a little fuzzy duck, trapped
in garbage bubbles trying to swim. I said nothing. The kids all looked with
big eyes. I knew it was coming .. one child splashed in and took the trash
from around the duck's feet. We looked for the mother but did not see her..
well, not at first. Silently, they set about picking up the trash. Again, not
a word was said. It was.. what they wanted to do. There was not much
conversation. ( We had done Kidsnetwork " What is in Our Water.. and Fish and
Wildlife connected us to the Isaac Walton League to survey the stream near
our school. Ok, we did a stream clean up too. One child asked me..why do they
put fingerling trout in that polluted stream? I looked at him and said.. why
don't you find out? The answer he got was , by letter later was that the
stream was clear in the spring.. and that it was an appropriate habitat and
clean enough for trout. Our research did not agree. He shrugged his shoulders
and wrote a letter to the county manager. Yes, I got in trouble.. with the
principal. No, I was not in trouble with the county manager. He had some
concerns too. His name is Jim Hunter. He came to visit and talk with us.(
teachers poked their heads in to see if I was in deep trouble and laughed ) I
was not.
Art
We had some art lessons where we did printing of the fish. I got in trouble.
The teachers using the refrugerator did not like seeing a fish that had been
used for
printing .. as in making an art project , in the refrigerator. The fish
disappeared during lunchtime.
Not to worry. A mother brought in another one and this one was a flounder, so
we lucked out. The prints were wonderful. The art teacher extended the lesson
for us, using objects of nature to frame... accentuate the prints. She
repeated the experience for them. I forget the Japanese name.
The children who dissected the various fish, we had a huge bluefish, which we
then sent home to be cooked , a flounder, and octopus and a squid, ..
compared notes.
We wrote descriptive paragraphs , and some wrote cinquains and haiku or
diamantes .. one was required. Some circled to each table , and observed. ..
The chunks of bluefish and flounder were served up with chips as in fish and
chips.. and we had posters from NOAA. We discussed the economy of the
Chesapeake Bay.. and there was this funny film... about " It Happened Today
on the Chesapeake Bay" .. featuring crabs, Anoxia Mae... and other
interesting characters.
Geography
At the end of the year, on a grant from the Virginia Science Humanities we
had completed a study of Virginia in the Pioneer times, and a part of low
tech work, was to create toys by hand. We made 8 eight different kinds
and sold them to finance our trip to Staunton, where there are authentic
British, German, and Scotch Irish homestead and a barn. Since my class
is the color of America, we investigated each of the cultures, and then
in the American farm, we could see how the elements of culture were fashioned
into the American culture. My class is culturally diverse.
We had maps of Virginia and the project from the Alliance which shows
Staunton , as the gateway to the West. ( really hands on projects in the
teachers edition. Outstanding work.
We watched in interest a Chesapeake Bay film about Reedville , Virginia.. and
observed a man tell us that the Chesapeake Bay and his garden was all he
needed to sustain himself..in the country. He said he had lived in the city
for a while but things were too expensive.. and people were not kind. This
got us to thinking a lot .
Cooking and Eating.. we ate seafood from the Chesapeake Bay. We wrote to
water men. The fishmongers at the wharf gave us seafood to study and to eat.
We gave them our book and projects. Maryland Crab Vegetable Soup was a
favorite. We also liked the Eat A Crab Lab. Susan, a biology teacher would
bring in the crabs and teach us crab anatomy. It was not from a book.( then
we ate the crabs after we cooked them.)
I had at that time, Odell Lake, several computer copies of it.. and ..
Wetlands the ...
Optical Data, videodisc and we had a remarkable set of filmstrips from the
National Geographic. The more I worked and the harder we worked, using this
new to me way of working, the more the parents responded.
We were learning and teaching Virginia History, Virginia Geography, and
the topics in the 4th grade science book was water, and the 5th grade book
was Oceanography. ( Love teaching those combination classes and looping)I
read some
parts of Chesapeake to them...)We followed the standards in geography, and
the
dictates of the county , and added as enrichment some of the map work and
learning to read topographical maps.
One parent who was a Navy
Landscape something or other , took us to the Patuxent River Station to learn
about how the Navy cares for the Chesapeake Bay. Except for the child who
cried about all of the animals that were mounted on .. trophy boards( they
swore that they were not the ones who captured them... it was a great field
trip...
We learned about the submerged grasses, we saw how they protected the shore.
We
learned the history of the Chesapeake Bay from a Maryland perspective, and we
were treated to two of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation videos. One we saw there
and one we took back with us. We looked for sharks teeth and I could not find
one single one. One child who was having trouble with things in the classroom
found 20 sharks teeth. We rested on the beach in the sand and dreamed
Chesapeake beach dreams. It was beautiful. We watch jets take off.. and the
officer explained why the Navy had to protect the Chesapeake Bay. We
identified birds, and watched as they soared overhead.. it was beautiful. He
gave us nautical maps.. we collected treasures from the museums to establish
our own classroom museum. We learned to see Virginia from a Maryland
perspective and to understand the Bay is a treasure we all must protect.
The Smithsonian has a research center at the Rhode River inlet. The kids and
I won a grant from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation for our work. So.. we were
at the Rhode River, at the SERC pier with stations( I was trained for this at
the
Baltimore Aquarium) the kids , parents and I had stations to attend. We
tested for salinity, using different concentrations. We peered at the skies
and wrote information about the weather.. and tides, and turbidity.. using a
secchi disc which we lowered until we could not see it. A docent told us that
when
he was a little boy, one could see their feet in the water, it was so clear.(
I don't think they believed it until they saw a film that recounted this and
other tales from people who had lived around the Bay). Groups rotated from
the
crabbing station, to the seining, to the use of the microscopes.. and we were
outside, learning. No books .. well , we used books, and films, and videos,
and EPA charts and NSTA lessons ,and wet labs and mud samples, we had used
computer programs such as Kidsnetwork to learn about water, the Chesapeake
Bay, and we had booklets done by real scientists that helped us to learn the
cycles in
the bay , the stages of living things .. and all manner of things. We even..
they made me eat a grass shrimp.. it was ... better than the brine shrimp
that some of us who trained at the National Geographic .. had eaten in the
field...at Lake Mono.. but not so good but... when we studied water we were
into doing this thing right. If the Indians ate the brine shrimp , I was
going to do it.
We wanted to know about the grass shrimp because of SAV ( submerged aquatic
vegetation). In approval a drake swam around in circles .. and then a lot of
ducks came out.
We did primitive email and talked to kids.. who were a part of the Labnet
teacher virtual faculty. We also read magazines, books,literature in a list
about the Chesapeake Bay and we took one more field trip. This was the best.
It was "Take a Kid Fishing Day" at the Tidal Basin.. we were guests of the
Fish and Wildlife people who had come into the classroom to help us learn the
maps and exercises of the Chesapeake Bay. You do know that John Smith
traveled our way...
We learned the history of canals, and towpaths and canoeing and the rivers of
the watershed. We knew where the migration of animals took place and what a
flyway was.The Fall Line fascinated us. Some people made a topography map of
a section of Four Mile Run.
One of the Fish and Wildlife instructors had carved ducks and he shared them
with us.. and told stories about snapping turtles and rockfish so huge. We
had seen some of
these at the Baltimore Aquarium. We had done lessons in the aquarium in
classrooms on adaptations. The grant that the kids and I wrote funded the
trip. Anyway.. there were stations.. we went to learn about fish habitat..
where do they hide , live.. and so on.. we learned about how to cast.. , we
... practiced casting into rings.. and then we learned to tie knots.. ( not
in a book though we did eventually find a chart that people used to tie every
kind of knot that there was.. and then we cast into the Tidal Basin with rods
that they GAVE us.. we caught a few but tossed them back. It was exciting.
Take that Tom Sawyer.... we worked so hard, in fact on Memorial Day we had a
fishing party on Windy Run, on the Potomac, just for kids and parents. Yes,
we cleaned up the river bank as we worked.
We learned that prominent Black activists, created beaches, for people of
color to go to, and that there was a tobacco road. We had visited the
National Colonial Farm in the fall and learned the history of the Potomac as
a highway.
We had worked from the school, to the outdoor lab in the creek, to the river,
to an inlet.. and we had seen the Chesapeake Bay. We had an eat a crab lab..
and children were beginning to write letters to editors, search for more
information on their own, and to create booklets , stories, ......What was
missing was internet connectivity on a scale where we could actively pursue
studies of independent projects.
Resources/then Wetlands ,Optical Data, videodisc
Filmstrips on water, National Geographic
Chesapeake Bay Foundation Posters and videos
CBF is in Annapolis, Maryland , and there is a store
Kidsnetwork/Living in Water Project an 8 week
telecommunications
Project...
Virginia History Atlas ( produced by the Geographic
Alliance Va.)
Lesson Plans and Writing activities for the
SERC/Smithsonian
Project Wild, Project Wet, .. and Historic
Photographic
and pathrow photos of the Chesapeake Bay
Diaries from the Living in Water materials (children
wrote
Living in Water Curriculum Baltimore Aquarium
Dissolved oxygen kits, Ph testing kits , extra and
Isaac Walton League stream kits / for testing
Chesapeake Bay workbooks from the Fish and Wildlife
Videos about taking care of birds from Fish and
Wildlife
" A Home for Pearl"
Art Projects? Word webs, Chesapeake Bay the words in the middle,
and webs all around in wonderful ways.
Fish Prints
Paper mobiles of sharks, fish, whales, and so on
Illustrated poems
T Shirts
Cartoons about dissection and lengthy descriptive
writings
about each field trip, photos
Collages
There is now a wonderful videodisc on water from the National Geographic.
There are also posters which can serve as bulletin board, and historic maps
of the Chesapeake Bay.
Geography resources on the net
URL http:/www-nmd.usgs.gov/www/html/nmp_prog.html
We learned to use topographical maps and had them of the Chesapeake Bay as
well as a collection of other maps, water men's maps, historical maps,
pathrow
maps , etc.
URL http:/geosim.cs.vt.edu/index.html
Sense of place.. gives snapshots of counties in the US.. we use the ones
around the Chesapeake Bay .. We also learned about point source pollution and
so on.
Froggy Page.. we had lots of frogs at the outdoor lab , they kept us up all
night..
http://www.cs.yale.edu/HTML/Yale/CS/Hyplans/loosemore-sandra/froggy.html
The one thing I could not add, because we did not have the technology, was
what I saw today. We were in the Smithsonian electronic classroom , after the
movie the beast, we had an expert on Mollusca, and on the groups which
include squid, octopus, and others in the classifications to share specimen,
unusual and interesting and some a little weird with us in a classroom which
was teleconferencing .. to Mississippi .. and the class was from Kentucky.
The scientist had all manner of things that I did not have and taught well.
It was amazing. There were no books. The books is a reference or a thing to
go to, after the teaching.. there were of course interactive museum displays
as well to learn from. Hands on is good.
The children I taught Chesapeake Bay to, took me on a field trip to
Annapolis, and we
went to the Baltimore Aquarium for our end of the year trip. It was a
surprise..I think it was enjoyed all the more because they had really studied
and were empowered with knowledge. It was not a chapter in a book kind of
thing, Gordon.
Teacher Training_ Staunton Frontier Museum, Stanton Va. Grant
Virginia Humanities Grant for Hands on tool making for Staunton Field trip
Teacher training: US Fish and Wildlife Service( A Home for Pearl)
Earthwatch- Talley Forbes- Indigenous Plants and field work notes for
student study( from the Internet)
Audubon Society ( Conneticut)Teacher Training from a scholarship
by the Fairfax Audubon Society
NSTA - Conference -Bottle Biology Handouts - University of Wisconsin
Project Wild all kinds of wonderful lessons- Virginia Fish and Wildlife
Teacher training.
Project Wet( same as above)
Dr. Valerie Chase..who remembers when we didn't understand about
Phytoplankton.. Summer Institute and training NSF Grant.
and the National Geographic too much training to specifically target.
Virginia Geographic Alliance- Geography Atlas of Virginia.
As you see Gordon. .it can be done without the internet. the Internet is a
tool.
They tested extremely well. Extremely. At least you asked.
Average test score was grade 9. I had special education students, ESOL
students, gifted and talented students and students. It was hard to tell who
was what category and that 's the way I like it.
Bonnie Bracey
Teacher Agent of Change
Arlington Career Center and the McGUffey Project
Fax 703-358-5815
bbr...@aol.com
bbr...@mcguffey.org