Ice Cream?!

What better way to spend a sub-zero Friday afternoon than to make ice cream during a science lesson?! It seems strange, I know, but this experiment is always a favorite way to end our study of solids and liquids. In any case, it was a fun (and VERY messy) experiment. It had to be done in two parts, which only enhanced our problem solving skills as scientists.

Friday was the first attempt. We followed the directions, but after lots of shaking, most of us still didn't have ice cream--just soupy liquid. Our theory was that we needed more ice and more salt. Also, our bags were leaking a lot, which caused for very cold hands and fingers! We decided as a class to try again Monday.

Meanwhile...I had an idea. Instead of having everyone re-do the experiment, why not pop the "failed" bags of ice cream soup in my freezer for the weekend, and start again with fresh ingredients for a class team attempt at making ice cream on Monday? We used more ice, a bit more salt, and double bags to keep that salt and ice away from our hands. Guess what?! It worked! Sadly, it was time for P.E. when we finally got ice cream after our group shaking (see video) and everyone wanted to eat the ice cream from attempt #1. So, the bags from attempt #2 sit outside the classroom...in the snow! Perhaps we'll do another taste test tomorrow.

Tomorrow we will finish our Solids and Liquids notebooks and students will bring them home. Next up--WEATHER! This is a perfect unit to do following a study of solids and liquids, as there are so many connections. We will do many more experiments too. Hooray!

Cloud Parfaits

Cloud parfaits were a big hit last Friday! Have you heard about them yet? This was a combination of science, writing, and...eating! We have been studying weather for the past several weeks, so making a yummy treat with a weather theme seemed appropriate. Next up is Solids and Liquids. Finally, we're writing "how to" books. So, we followed directions to make something that changes state (Jello) and ends up looking like clouds in the sky. I'm hoping some students will use this as a how-to writing topic soon. And there's no question it was FUN! 

It's great to have our document camera to show what the student helpers are doing--it allows us to zoom in on the action!

 

 

 

I'm not a fan of Jello OR Cool Whip, but it seemed most students enjoyed this weather-themed treat. 

 

 

 

 

 

Four Winds: Nests

I hope everyone has enjoyed this amazingly warm and sunny week! What a nice start to spring...

We had another great Four Winds session on Monday. I am so thankful that Mrs. Gamelin, the mother of a child in Mrs. Hughes' class, is willing to be our Four Winds volunteer. Thank you, Katy! The children enjoy Four Winds and are such keen scientific observers. It's fun to learn right along with them. Monday's topic was bird nests. Students watched a puppet show, studied real birds nests and drew them/took notes about them, and then went outside to work in teams to try to build a birds nest using nest-like building materials. We all realized that birds are pretty amazing creatures and are fantastic nest builders. It's not easy! Enjoy the Animoto video slideshow with some pictures from our lesson.

The Water Cycle Song

Our study of weather has been great so far! Have you heard the "Water Cycle Song" yet? If not (or even if you have), check out our video below. Students are learning some pretty sophisticated scientific words! Evaporation, condensation, precipitation...impressive! This video was taken on the iPad--our favorite classroom tool!

The Water Cycle

We are learning about the water cycle as part of our weather unit in science. Students have learned a water cycle song (video to come!), completed a water cycle labeled diagram, studied the cycle on a poster, and watched a cool stop-motion video about it. One student requested I post the video, since she likes it so much! So, here it is! I will add a "Cool weather sites" sidebar on this blog very soon. Stay tuned:

The Water Cycle stop motion from StopMoGo on Vimeo.

Lino It!

We have been using a cool tool during our science time recently--Lino It. It's a web-based program that allows us to make virtual sticky notes and to change them in many ways--content, color, font, etc. Last week, we made two Lino It virtual bulletin boards with sticky notes to answer the questions, "What do you THINK you know about weather" and "What do you want to learn about weather?" It's important to find out what students already know about a subject and also to learn about any misconceptions students might have going into the study. If you look at our first board, you'll see there are some misconceptions we'll have to address during our unit. And it's extremely valuable to find out what students want to learn to make sure everyone's engaged and motivated!

It was great to hear students' thinking and to hear them discuss how we should move the sticky notes around according to commonalities, subject matter, and more. Very impressive first grade thinking!

Click on the links below to see our "Lino It" bulletin boards!

Weather

Weather Part II