Central Idea: Applying the inquiry cycle helps us understand our world.
Transdisciplinary Theme: How the World Works
In order to demonstrate their understanding of the central idea, students were given the task of designing their own experiment based on a certain set of materials. They were given a large ice balloon, sugar, salt, sand, magnifying glass, and toothpicks.
Day 1: They first spent time planning their question, writing the steps to their experiment, and thinking of some way to collect data. They readily took on their role as scientists and dove right into their experiments!
Day 2: We spent time reflecting individually and as a class on how our experiments went. What could we do better? What conclusions did we make? How can we improve our questions to make better conclusions? Individually they revised their questions in order to make deeper conclusions. Given the same materials, the class went back to work implementing their new plans.
(Sorry the first part of the clip got cut off! She is describing how much her ice cube changed after she put salt on it.)
Because a major focus of this unit is working on different kinds of thinking skills (analyzing, synthesizing, applying, and metacognition), we compared our thinking on Day 1 with Day 2. We made a list of comments they heard around the room while they were working, as well as which experiment they learned more from. They saw that their thinking and conclusions from their experiments were deeper on Day 2 when they revised their question. Learning how to reflect and critically think is just as important, if not more important, than the facts they learn from the experiment.
And that concludes our inquiry unit! We are excited to transition into our new unit next week!