Science Content

Science content is the first component of the three legs of science. Obviously, a crucial
component of science is memory of scientific information and understanding of the world
around us. I was the first to present a lesson in our science CLC and I focused on the
subject area of physics. The concept I wanted the k-2 students to learn was about
electrical safety in addition to what an insulator and conductor was. Since the theme of
our club was electricity, I thought those two concepts were most important to teach to the
students first. I began by showing them a video on how to play it safe around electricity.
Although having the students watch the video could be seen as a superficial way of
teaching the content, the video was fun, kid friendly, and informative. After assessing the
students formatively, by asking them questions regarding the video, I was so surprised at
the wealth of information they had received. In regard to that objective I believe I
delivered the content in a complete and accurate way.
Secondly, I had to address the component of insulators and conductors. I first modeled
and used think-aloud strategies to explicitly teach what conductors and insulators were. I
had created a simple circuit with a battery, one wire, and light bulb. From there I placed
pre-planned objects such as a piece of cardboard, a paper clip, and soda cap top between
the battery and lightbulb. If the light bulb turned on, the object was a conductor. If the
light did not turn on it was an insulator. I made sure that during this instruction I was
holding the simple circuit, but I did allow students to come up and place the object
between the light bulb and battery. At first, I did not explicitly tell them to make sure both

the light bulb and battery were fulling touching it. But, after some careful questioning by
me they caught onto the idea themselves!
I was extremely impressed with the way the students were able to grasp these difficult
concepts. Out of all thirteen students in our group, only one had been introduced to
electricity in their schooling! One of the reasons I believe I was so successful in teaching
this content, was because of the way I had students record and organize their data.
Because they were in kindergarten to second grade, I knew their fine motor skills were
not developed enough to keep this lesson at the pace that it needed to be in order to cover
all the content in the time frame. I set up a simple comparison sheet and pre-printed and
cut out photos of the objects we would be testing. I also printed out giant versions of what
they had for myself to model proper recording on their worksheets. The visuals really
allowed them to focus on making connections to what was being taught. The reason I
thought about this was from the book Science Notebooks: Writing About Inquiry by Lori
Fulton and Brian Campbell. In chapter two they asked, what expectations will you have
for your students as they record? (page 38). This really caused me to take a step back
and think about how data recording and organization plays a part in the way students will
retain content knowledge.
Science Process Skills
There are several process skills that were focused on throughout my science lesson.
For instance, they were engaged in observing. Throughout the activity they had to use
their observation skills to make sense of what was around them. Especially in my activity,
since the students did not all have their own circuit and materials to work with, they had

to pay special attention to what we were doing at the front of the classroom. Since they
werent able to fiddle around with the materials themselves, I had to use effective
questioning techniques in order to check for understanding but even more so to ensure
they were paying attention to the parts of the experiment that were important.
I made sure to avoid the wrong questions such as questions [that lie] in their
'wordiness'. [Such as] purely verbal questions, which require wordy answers, often neatly
dressed in bookish phrases (Elstgeest). Especially since I was working with k-2 students
I knew that in order for the students to draw conclusions about the experiment I couldnt
bore or confuse them with wordi questions that simply sound smart. This careful
questioning enabled these young students to classifying and predicting throughout our
activity. For example, I used a series of simple productive questions such as saying
What do you notice about and having the students come up with their own answers.
A straightforward question such as that actually brings up a plethora of answers from the
kids. Their answers proved to me that they were classifying (conductors and insulators)
and predicting (what they think the object will be) without me even having to prompt
them directly to use those skills! It also allowed me to address misconceptions quickly
and demonstrated they were going beyond following the directions that I had given to
them.
The Nature of Science
One thing that really stood out to me that Hanuscin talks about is allowing children to

create their own knowledge. That is such a powerful idea. But, how do we do it? How do
we create such conditions that not only has children doing science but actively

constructing their own knowledge? Well, I think my project did okay with this. Some
people may think the scientific method is the only way to portray science. In my opinion
the version of the scientific method that we all learned in elementary school is so
simplified and rigid that it fails to accurately portray how real science works.
In my lesson the students were guided by inquiry. They made predictions, asked
questions, and experimented. The only thing I wish I could have done was have it be even
more hands on for the students. I know that when you think of science you think of
working with your hands. I was originally thinking that since they were only 5 and 6 that
they wouldnt be able to be as hands on with the science. But, my experiment still
portrayed science. It focused more with the recording aspect. Recording is still an
important part of science and I had the students recording the results of our experiment as
we went along.