Skype in the Classroom -- Posting #33

Every good teacher knows that is in retelling of the concepts that reinforcement of learning occurs. Retelling allows the learner to rethink and synthesize the concepts they are talking about. It also allows the auditory learner an opportunity to hear the content and thereby reinforce it. In short, retelling is critical to building comprehension in any subject area.

Building retelling into a lesson by having a student talk about what they have done and discovered also provides a wonderful opportunity for formative assessment. It allows the teacher to hear what the student truly understands, pick up any misconceptions that the student may have and recognize any gaps in the students’ learning. Skilful questioning will aid the learner in organizing their facts into the correct order and allow for clarification of concepts. 

This semester I have stepped this “retelling technique” up a notch by having a colleague from across the province, who is also a science teacher, Skype into the classroom.  Prior to each Skype call, my colleague and I discuss what we are currently up to in my science room so he is aware of what to expect of the conversation and can therefore provide appropriate prompts for the learner.

At regular intervals, my colleague from Smarter Science has Skyped into my classroom. Because he is a teacher himself he knows how to speak to the students in a respectful and appropriate manner. He is skilled at using higher order questioning to draw answers out of the students. When he hears a misconception he gently corrects it with an age appropriate example. The students look forward to his calls. On days that I announce that we will be getting a Skype call in class there is great anticipation. The students determine whose turn it is to talk first. They get their projects ready to show our Skype caller. When the now familiar “Blip-blip-blip” of an incoming Skype call comes in they cheer! Eureka! Another way to engage the 21^st century learner!

My experiment with Skype in the classroom has also provided me with another, unexpected, teachable moment in class. The students have questioned me about how I know our Skyper. This provided me with the opportunity to talk about how I met him in person before ever going online with him, how I was sure he was really is who he says he is and how easy it is for people to present themselves as someone other than who they really are online. Online safety can never be stressed too much with our vulnerable youth!

An extension I can see arising from the learning opportunity of Skype in the classroom is to have a pool of retired teachers who would volunteer to engage in these conversations.  As teachers they would be comfortable talking with youth, skilled at questioning techniques, and knowledgeable of specific subject areas. 

How have you used Skype in your classroom? Leave a comment below or send me a tweet @EurekaTeacher to let me know.

Solar Panels -- A Photo Essay

The grade nine applied science students have decided that they like the class because “we never do any work”. Well! Let me tell you about what we did this week and you decide!

 Step One: Initiate and Plan      (ENGAGE)

Our school, St. Pius X High School in Ottawa, had a solar panel array installed over the summer months as part of our board’s commitment to renewable energy the solar array is used to capture the sun’s heat as a means of heating the hot water used throughout our school. Since we are currently studying the ecology unit, I told the students about this initiative and arranged an onsite field trip for them to observe this process from beginning to end. The students were encouraged to use their digital cameras, cell phones and other electronic devices to take photos of the various stages involved in the creation of our hot water.

Step Two: Perform and Record                        (EXPLORE)

On the first day of our “field trip” the head custodian took us up onto the school’s roof. This was fairly time consuming since we had to climb up a ladder and, in the interest of safety, only one person could be on the ladder at a time. Once we were all on the roof we observed the solar panels, what they looked like, which way they were oriented, the angle they were set at and the two large pipes attached to them. These two pipes were clearly labelled “glycol in” and “glycol out”. After much discussion and many photos we descended the ladder and now class was over. So no work? Any learning?

On the second and third days of our investigation to observe how our school uses the sun’s energy to generate all of our hot water, we followed the path of the glycerol pipeline from where it enters the school building to a small room tucked away at the back of our library. Here we checked the temperature gauges that showed the temperature of the glycol prior to entering the tanks. Inside the sealed tanks, we were told that the glycol pipe encircles a central core containing water and the heat is transferred from the glycol to the water. By comparing the temperature of the glycol as it left the tanks, to return to the roof, we realized that there was a temperature differential of 21 degrees C. Again we took lots of pictures before proceeding to the schools’ basement where we observed the boiler where the water that was heated by the glycerol is held until it is needed, at which point it is mixed with cold water, if necessary. These students have only been attending this school for less than three weeks so it was thrilling for them to go behind the scenes in the out-of-bounds areas of the school that are the domain of the custodians! Two more days with no work! Boo hoo! For the first time ever there was homework however! The students were told to email or forward the photos they had taken to me.

Prior to the next class I collected all the electronic photos that I could and posted them in my mailbox, which is available for the students to see on our school computers.

Step Three:  Analyze and Interpret    (EXPLAIN)

Day four we went to the computer lab. For all but two of these grade niners this was their first visit to the computer lab since entering high school. First I had to teach them how to log on to our network and then show them how to retrieve the photos from my mailbox and import them into Microsoft Photo Story.  Although none of them had used Photo Story before they actually figured it out before I had time to show them. Any technical questions they had they asked each other and I was just along for the ride. Another day with no work! Yay!

Step Four: Communicate                        (EXTEND)

Day five we continued creating our photo essays of “How Hot Water is Produced at St. Pius”. About half way through the day one of the new comers to my class asked me to review his understanding of the project with him. He explained the whole system to me starting with the glycerol circulating through the solar panels in the roof and ending with the hot water coming out of the taps. “You mean to say that all the hot water for this whole school is made just from the heat of the sun?!” he clarified. “Yes, yes it is”, I replied. “So it doesn’t cost the school anything to make all the hot water for this whole building? The cafeteria? The washrooms? Everywhere?” his eyes were widening! HIGH FIVES ALL ROUND! They got it! Sadly, another day with no work. I wonder when they will realize they are learning?

Here is a sample of one student's finished product. Send me a tweet @EurekaTeacher and let me know what mark she deserves.

Special Education Students Get to Meet Canada’s Astronauts

St. Pius X students pose with Canadian astronaut David Saint-Jacques.

On Friday, May 13, 2011 two students in St. Pius X  High School’s High Needs Program, had the opportunity to accompany their science teacher, #EurekaTeacher, to the newly renovated Canadian Aviation and Space Museum where #EurekaTeacher was participating in a live tweet-up with five of our astronauts.

After some carefully placed phone calls to the Canadian Space Agency and with the blessings of her principal,  #EurekaTeacher was able to make arrangements for the two students to attend the event with her. Canadian astronauts Steve MacLean, Bob Thirsk, Chris Hadfield, Jeremy Hansen and David Saint-Jacques spent an hour on the stage participating in a Q & A session withschool students from Ottawa. Their questions ranged from how you shower in space to what happens if a meteorite hits the space shuttle.

After the Q & A session the two St. Pius X students spoke privately with David Saint-Jacques who graciously answered their questions on a one-to-one basis, signed souvenirs for them and posed for photographs with them. This is one Friday the 13^th that brought Good Luck to our students. Thanks to David Saint-Jacques and the Canadian Space Agency for making two students dreams come true!

People's Choice voting Now Open in Google Science Fair 2011

Recently I had the pleasure of being the only Canadian judge in the Google Science Fair which is open to all 13 - 18 year olds worldwide.

The thousands of entries have been narrowed down to the top 60 and the public can now judge them for themselves.

You do not have to be a science teacher to be impressed with the awesome entries you will see here:

• http://www.google.com/events/sciencefair/vote.html

Be sure to vote in each age category!

Send me a tweet @EurekaTeacher and let me know what you think of the entries.

Of Spiders and Butterflies -- Posting #29

So, not only was the launching of the space shuttle STS-134 delayed yet again but all of our spiders have escaped from their carefully designed and constructed habitats!  See blog post #25. Just another day in the life of a classroom teacher! These circumstances have brought an untold number of teachable moments.

While we have been waiting for the space shuttle to launch to launch so we can compare our spider webs to the ones spun in microgravity we have been learning about butterflies. All this information on arachnids and insects will eventually tie together in our Ecology Unit. Since these students have no prior knowledge I am using these circumstances to teach them some.

By combining the overlapping units on space and ecology we have had the opportunity to study:

• Insects vs arachnids
• Requirements for life in space
• Habitats
• Incomplete and complete metamorphosis
• Food chains and food webs
• Spiral tongues
• Technical glitches at NASA
• Space shuttle disasters
• Use of Twitter to monitor NASA launches

In the meanwhile I have also ordered Painted Lady Butterfly larvae from one of the biological suppliers. Once these arrive we will be able to witness the wonder of Mother Nature up close and personal! Stay tuned for more information!

How have used insects or arachnids in your classroom? Send me a tweet @EurekaTeacher

A Judge's Perspective of the Google Science Fair, Spring 2011

Using Gizmos to Grow Plants in Locally Developed Science Class – Posting #27

I have tried using the interactive Gizmos available from ExploreLearning.com with my locally developed science classes in the past and have given up in frustration. This week I tried again but I was much more systematic in the way I scaffolded the lesson plan with the end result being real, authentic learning due to a rich, engaging task.

If you are unfamiliar with Gizmos they are online simulations that power scientific inquiry and understanding. In Ontario they are part of the Ministry of Education’s free software package (OSAPAC) which means they are licensed for use in all of our publically funded schools.  There are many other computer simulation programs available but I shall restrict my comments in this blog to the experience our class had with Gizmos.

If you teach science you are probably well aware that many of the students in our classrooms today have spent very little time outside playing – they have never made mud pies, they have never eaten worms, they have never squashed a bug and they have never grown a plant from a seed. In short, they have never experienced the wonder and awe of nature: one of the fundamental concepts essential not just to life but actually identified in our curriculum documents as  “The overall intention is that all graduates of Ontario secondary schools will achieve excellence and a high degree of scientific literacy while maintaining a sense of wonder about the world around them.”

Bearing the sad reality that our students don’t go outside I purchased two packages of different varieties of marigolds at my local hardware store. I photocopied and enlarged both the front and the back of the seed packages and distributed them to my students. We compared the claims made  while learning new vocabulary, ie. marigolds, germination, varieties. Hence, literacy was embedded into the day’s plan. I then showed them how to plant the seeds and each student planted five seeds of each variety into labeled flower pots.  We are not recording any information on these marigold seeds. We check them every day, we discuss our observations, we feel the soil to determine how damp or dry it is, we water and we even turn the plants since we have become aware of phototropism.  (Eventually these pots of marigolds will be sent home for Mother’s Day presents.)

Now that my students had some prior knowledge of how seeds grow I introduced them to the Tomatosphere Project. We used the Smarter Science framework to set up the tomato seeds as a controlled scientific investigation. (See blog posting # 26) This investigation is ongoing.

Every day we check both our marigold and tomato seeds. The students have a good hands-n understanding or the necessity of light, soil and water for seed germination and plant growth. I have not yet introduced them to the concept of fertilizers or compost – although while we are in the greenhouse we check on the vermi worms. It won’t be long now until they will delve into this project a little deeper!

Last week I introduced the class to Gizmos. In preparation for this lesson I pre-registered each student into a class on the ExploreLearning website.  Using a very large font size and bright yellow paper I then made each of them a checklist of:

1.      The name of the website (ExploreLearning.com)

2.      The class code

3.       Username

4.      Password

5.      Name of gizmo

6.      “Launch gizmo” instructions

Using checklists has been identified as an essential employability skill in the Passport to Learning produced by the Conference Board of Canada. I was surprised when I first read this but then I started using checklists with my students and I was amazed that they did not know what to do with them. After embedding checklists into all of my courses as much as possible I am pleased to report that they have become invaluable to both the students and the course delivery.

The Gizmo we used was Growing Plants in which the learner investigates the growth of three common garden plants: tomatoes, beans, and turnips. They can change the amount of light each plant gets, the amount of water added each day, and the type of soil the seed is planted in then observe the effect of each variable on plant height, plant mass, leaf color and leaf size. They determine what conditions produce the tallest and healthiest plants. Height and mass data are displayed on tables and graphs.

I provided them with the lesson material, Student Exploration Sheet, which is published on the website. As the computers were firing up the students answered the two questions that are to be done prior to using the Gizmo. Since these were both opinion questions the students were easily able to answer.  (What do you think plants need to grow? And How do you think soil helps plants? )  Thus, the students were feeling confident about trying the Gizmo. Although the handout provides clearly worded step-by-step instructions some of the students required individual instruction on how to drag the variables to the pots and let the plants grow virtually. The learning curve was extremely short especially when the students realized that there was no wrong answer! They especially liked watching the time fly by on the clock as the plants grew.

Spontaneously there became a class completion of who could grow the tallest plant. This led to lots of cheering and excitement! Everyone was truly engaged! As the students were able to grow their plants taller and taller they exchanged their strategies with each other.( It will come as no surprise to anyone who is familiar with teenage boys to hear that the boys were the ones most motivated by the competition – gotta love that testosterone!)

After declaring a “new world champion of plant growing”, who happened to be the newest student to arrive in my class, we carried on with the student exploration sheet handout which takes the students through a number of controlled tests.

The students were delighted with the entire process declaring that it was so much quicker than waiting for real days to pass so their plants could grow. Besides completing the Gizmo in a very satisfactory manner a lot of excellent thinking, questioning and discussion resulted from this activity. The talk was allowed to flow throughout the process proving, once again, that “Literacy floats on a sea of talk”.

How have you used computer simulations in science inquires?  Send me a tweet at: 

https://twitter.com/#!/EurekaTeacher