Making Observations, Setting Expectations, and Writing to Learn

September 11, 2013

Today, the third graders in Andrew Weir's class are continuing their study of life cycles by observing and recording scientific observations of butterflies.

Andrew opened the science session by reviewing the ways students have been writing and drawing as a way to record their observations, with the purpose of helping them acquire and make sense of new information. See here for five minutes of this review.

As he gave instructions for the student task, he included his expectations of their observations. This video clip shows an example.

Students made observations and Andrew walked around with the butterflies.  He used questions to deepen students ability to make careful observations, "Did you notice that...?"  He also prodded students to support their ideas with evidence.

About halfway through the student observations, he pulled students together to discuss what they had noticed so far.  Andrew modeled creating a "class observation" that included the ideas students shared. Instead of stopping there, Andrew repeated the process to encourage more detailed careful observations. He then added additional student thoughts to the class observation.  Excitingly, this second round of observations brought some additional energy to the classroom as one butterfly escaped form the net and another butterfly emerged from the chrysalis right as they were observing!

Andrew continued to review student observations, paraphrasing their ideas while highlighting content vocabulary.

Because Andrew wanted to value the enthusiasm of the students at the impromptu arrival of a new butterfly, he brought students together to model a class record of the discovery.

Today in Andrew's classroom, the students were engaged in the exploration of butterfly life cycles but students also were determined and thoughtful about their writing - they seemed to be developing the understanding around the purpose of important task of recording their observations.

Unfortunately, I didn't get to see Teresa Carlson's kiddos during her science time, but I did get to snap this picture of their excitement as their butterflies emerged before their eyes!

Thank you to the 3rd grade teachers at Hutchinson for creating these opportunities for engaging and meaningful science!