Science is my new "thing" this year. I have been teaching it
almost everyday that I am at my internship and I love it!
It is so easy to do extensions on the spot and students are so naturally
curious and this is the subject that they can let it all out and ask a million
questions. More importantly than asking, they can try things to answer their
own questions!
I created a lesson to teach students how to make a closed circuit using a
battery, light bulb, and wire. I wanted them to KNOW how to do it before they
even got it. I wanted it to happen this way because I can remember anything
that I learned from elementary school science! So why is that? I think it is
because we would just get to fiddle with materials until something happened and
we were like oh cool...that worked. But we never understand why and that is why
I don't remember anything!
When I was planning for this lesson I read the curriculum guide and I could
not even figure out the diagrams that showed the different ways that a light
bulb could be lit, I could not see a pattern. So I went into my step-Dads
flashlight collection and I started to take them apart. I totally understood
what was going on after that!
So this time around, I wanted students to figure out how a light bulb is lit
the same way I did. So I gave them all flashlights and they understood the
process just fine, so I would say that it was a success. I even had us, as a class;
design a way to get a light bulb to light using only 3 materials. And they
figured out a way to get a light bulb to light using a battery, bulb, and wire.
So all that was a success.
However, I added to the lesson a video and explanation about how a light
bulb works (also a mini-diagram about how electrons get from the + side of a
battery to the - side and anything touching the wire that connects the sides
will get power from the flowing electrons.). I thought that they should
understand how electrons get to the bulb and what happens afterward. I believe
that students should see the whole process inside and out!
So I showed them the video of the light bulb as one of the first things before
they even got the flashlights. I wanted to give them all the vocabulary they
needed first and I wanted them to see the processes that are occurring. I,
unfortunately, did things a little out of order.
I realized that when you give students information about parts of something
you need to give them that part to examine! They were just sitting around,
listening to jibber jabber about light bulbs and they didn't even know what
they needed to know later about light bulbs. I had them draw diagrams (only 1
person in each group, oops) to show how the power flows through a light bulb
but they still were not getting it throughout the 2/3 day long lesson! What was
going on in their heads I wondered... I showed them an awesome video... So I
had to improvise and show them again but with my own diagrams. I drew out the
parts of the light bulb in an assembly line type thing, some got it, so then I
put it back together like a real light bulb and drew each part as electrons
would flow through them. There was a whole class "ohhhhhhhhhhhhh"
behind me. It was pretty awesome. So they needed to see the parts of the light
bulb as they learned about them. I was able to correct my mistake but when I
teach this lesson again I will give them light bulbs as they watch the video
(well maybe RIGHT after so they aren't distracted).
The lesson went great and they understood the one configuration with the
materials that made the light bulb work. They believed this one because it was in
the flashlight but I wanted to be able to see the other 3 that would work as
well. The next lesson in the guide did just that! But I had kind of overlapped
my lesson into this one. NOTE: read the WHOLE unit in science, all the lessons,
before you start to plan! It did not work out badly or anything but it could
have...
When I had told another teacher about my plan she said that she used to just
give them the parts and let them play around with them and they eventually got
it. I told her I wanted them to know before they just accidentally figured it
out in a way that I was sure they would not remember unless they knew what was
going on inside the configuration. So in my first lesson I taught them how the
power is flowing and then the next lesson they did get to play around with the
materials and try more configurations that were suggested to them on a work
sheet.
So they all figured it out and corrected their wrong guesses and I made them,
as a class, explain why each worked and why the others did not work.
The best part was when one student started to stack the batteries and it made
the light bulb get really bright! It started to smoke of course because a
little light bulb cannot handle 4 D batteries for very long! But I used that
opportunity to explain wattage suggestions on a light bulb! Now they know that
if you give a bulb too much power you will make it smoke. Everyone was crowded
around watching the one student doing this though and it was really exciting.
And they all wanted to play with the materials later! I saw it as a way to get
students interested in the science fair!
If we had a science fair I would want students to use simple things they learn
in science (closed circuits) to create things that are more complex (a chair
that you sit in and it makes a light bulb light up). I can't wait to teach more
science!
