Implementation made easy! *note: This site is designed for classrooms with a smartboard/interactive/projector board, (to show videos to provide the students with background knowledge, teach using media, and to seamlessly integrate technology), access to computers for research, and to learn through online academic games that will increase understanding and enhance the concepts taught throughout the lesson. Easy to use. Just click and the videos will pop up. Click and the online games will pop up.
This site is to make teaching and learning the CCSS & Next Generation Science easier for 4th grade teachers and students. Have fun teaching!
There are 18 weeks of science lessons to cover the whole science curriculum. The site includes:
1. lessons 2. supply lists- 3 types-one page at a glance, weekly by week, checklist form 3. easy to do science experiments with low cost supplies (suggestion: get a tub and restock supplies each year) 4. science experiments & activities 5. science handouts 6. formative and summative assessments each week 7. list of web links (or just click on them following the weekly lessons on this site)
*Most weeks the anticipatory set includes short videos. Many of them are on youtube, so if you have youtube blocked at your school, you might need to find a substitute anticipatory set. * Students need access to computers for research, online practice, and a project. * If you teach with other 4th grade teachers, use the week by week supply list to put together your science tubs. Determine who is doing which week, they gather supplies for your weeks. * I have the essential questions all over the lessons and on the students' webpage. When you are teaching, keep drawing them back to the inquiry questions. It's "Blooms" and it is the NGSS standard that you want them to demonstrate by the end of the unit. The lessons, activities, games, readings, videos, and discussions should keep being swept towards those questions for that week. If the students can answer, demonstrate, or model that question, then you know you were successful in teaching that standard. If you use journals have them stop and write down something interesting that a student says. If you don't use journals you can use chart paper for this. If you don't use chart paper, you can have them turn and discuss with a partner. ie "Wow, that really is interesting what little Patty said. I want to see if some of the rest of you have great ideas churning like Patty. Turn to a partner and discuss that and see if you have anything to 'piggy-back' or add." There's millions of ways to drive the standards (through the essential question) home. Use your favorite classroom tricks. *The first three weeks you'll note some edibles. They don't eat again until popcorn. (heat convection, etc.) I teach in a poverty district where we really have to do a lot to grab the student's attention. I wanted to get the "buy in" of my class. By the end of the second week, my class is asking "When is science?" I wean them away from my primary reinforcers with fun and interesting projects and activities. But by then, they are hooked. They have a "taste" for science that isn't broken.