Finally Done!

Well, this past Friday was the last day of my big project. The kids and I had spent about 3-4 weeks on California State Science Standard 9: Students will plan and conduct a scientific investigation. *whew* I get all tired just remembering it! First we review the steps of the scientific method, reminding them that it was a guide and not set in stone. Then I introduced the idea of variable and controlled parameters, which I thought they got until I read their answers to the experiment analysis questions. *sigh*

Then I did the diet coke and mentos demo which got them excited enough to ask a ton of questions, afterwhich I had to teach them how to ask a good science question. That alone took 2 days. Next was getting them to write up a hypothesis and design an experiment to test it-again, easier said than done. Remember, students today are taught to write in paragraph form with long, complex sentences full of adjectives and whatnots. They had a hard time believing me when I said to keep the procedures short and detailed.

The-e-en they made posters and presented their experiment to the class. The class voted on the one experiment they wanted to do and we did it on Friday.

Gee, no wonder I'm so tired! The experiment write-ups were due on Monday. So, in grading their work I saw that a bunch of them were still confused on the controls and variables in their experiments. Gues I'm re-teaching tomorrow!