November 25

Today, we went to Elk Point. I went there for a my junior high years when I did the science fair myself and got third place. It was nice to see that it is still around. A lot of the projects were very interesting. One boy, that won in seventh grade, actually built some robots to test what would work best on a vehicle moving over a variety of terrian. I thought this experience was really fun and informative for our learning. The teachers seemed to have set it up really well.

November 20

Today we had a much needed work day for our final assignment. We got a lot done and found a good website that has a game for volume, mass, and density. My group worked well together, and we will accomplished enough to finish up our project on time. This project is going to be so cool.

November 13

We are now starting our second lesson plan for our science class. Today we just had a workday to plan our lesson plans. Aaron, Brandon, and myself are using a magic in science book and a book about King Arthur to teach about inertia. We are not teaching this lesson to the class, we are going to act as a room of teachers and present our ideas to our other colleagues.

November 7

Today in class we did a potato activity. We were given different materials (chunks of potatoes, salt, water, and different science things). The class and I were asked to invent our own experiment and test how much salt we should put with the potato and water, and then we were to make observations on what happened within the potato activity.

November 4

Amanda, Sara, and Katie presented on seasons and the different types of season there are. This presentation was excellent and very well organized. Then we went outside and set off bottle rockets and that was a blast. It was really great to see the reaction with the vinegar and the baking soda and how far each bottle rocket shot up in the air. Mine didn't go very far like some people's.

After the presentations we came back inside and talked about seamless assessment and how we need to open our minds as teachers and assess in different ways to allow students to learn on their terms and teaching and assessing one way hurts the students in the long run.

October 30

Today's class we finished the midterm lesson plans. Their was another experiment on Oublic, which involved making a suspension out of cornstarch and water to see the outcome. Carrie and Ashley did an activity on taste buds, which was fun when we got to eat jelly beans. Aaron, Brandon, and myself did an activity with balloon rockets, which I thought went well outside of it taking too much time to set up in the beginning. I thought Jessica and Ryan's presentation on magic mud was fun, and also taught students about suspensions. I thought it was fun to see a lot of lesson plans that are cheap to do, since sometimes the teacher might have to pick up the tab for the equipment.

October 28

Today's class was not very productive due to technical difficulties. We started with Maddy and McKenzie. The did a presentation called elephant toothpaste. It involved adding certain materials to dry yeast and predicting and observing what happened when we mixed the materials together. Nate and Ashley were next with a lesson plan on what happens to bird feathers when put in water and then in oil. This would be a good experience to show junior high students what happens during oil spills. Elly and Lourie had us make Oublic. Brittany, Brianna, and Andrea discussed bottle rockets and the many saftey precautions needed for the making and experiment with the rockets.