This differentiated, self-directed stuff is hard for us all

Today's class saw a bunch of students going "but what do we doooooooo?" and flapping their hands over their freedom. I was so tempted to flap my hands back and reply, "I don't knoooow!"

Part of the problem is that they have never done anything like this. When I rewrite the Y 7 & 8 units, I will be sure to include the babysteps version of this unit. Part of it is that they don't really believe that they are allowed to be self-directed, and another part is that they are unsure of exactly what the parameters of their self-direction are. So, right now, we are compromising. All students have lists of the materials they need and should have them by Wednesday, ready to start experimenting and refining their methods.

I still need to finish off my exemplar. Finding time for this sort of thing is like pulling teeth in this place.

One of the things I like about being a teacher...

Is trying things first.

Next term, the Y10 class is doing a unit based around investigations and different inquiry processes. It features self-direction, individual learning outcomes and all sorts of happytiems so-hot-right-now educational features.

But the bit I am happiest about is that there is an exemplar for the first round - for very low ability students, they can use the exemplar as a template and basically plod along in the exemplar's footsteps.

Naturally, I get to make the exemplar.

Even that wouldn't ordinarily be enough to excite me, but I am making my exemplar about using plastic bags as t-shirt transfers. Yeah, I know, exciting right?

Look at this example of what someone made with plastic bag transfers:



I was inspired by three posts on Filth Wizardry - post one, post two, and post three.

And there is lots of science behind this - like why the particle structure of plastics makes them prone to melting, not catching alight. Why some plastics are softer and more melty than others. Like where plastics come from in the first place. Even though the tutorial gives basic instructions, there is still plenty of scope for investigation and coming up with a solid hypothesis. My exemplar deals with the effects of plastic type, holding the temperature and time of fuse constant. At the moment, though, I am freeform experimenting, to get the basic range of my constants settled. I will have pictures later.

So, I'm hoping that a few other students will choose other plastic recycling topics to use for their first investigation. I have some awesome tutorials on fusing plastic bags - here, with patterns if you want to make a rain hat or bag and here, with some more crafty ideas, and even a video tutorial:



But I need more! I'm going to exercise my google-fu later and come up with as many awesome plastic recycling ideas as I can. If any readers have ideas, I'd be delighted to hear them too!

But getting back to this unit of learning. Not many students are going to grasp quite what I'm on about quickly and be able to run with it. Some will, and I am really looking forward to seeing what they and their awesome imaginations come up with. But many will need a lot of support to get through it. That's where the exemplar and some supported options come in - at least for the first round of investigations. And if I get to play round with making t-shirt transfers out of the fifty million plastic bags littering my house, that's even better.

Investigative investigations and the relationship between the physical and living worlds

There are five strands to Science in the New Zealand Curriculum, four content strands and a Nature of Science strand that integrates and permeates the others. It's not always easy to integrate the strands, though I am always looking for opportunities to do so. Today, I had an awesome opportunity to integrate the Physical World and Living World strands.

We're studying forces and motion in Y11 science at the moment. I wanted a paper helicopter investigation activity, because helicopters are pretty damn awesome. But I discovered something better (using the amazing power of google, too) - an activity that uses four different helicopter designs based on seed pods (the twirly ones).

I immediately abandoned the idea of straightforward helicopters and embraced the idea of using four different designs. The learning I wanted my students to get today was partly to do with forces. It was also to do with fair tests and how to design them. But, above all, I wanted them to get the idea that we use models in science to test things. It's hard to get to the forest to study dispersal patterns of seeds? Can we simulate it in the laboratory using other things, with similar behaviour, to get a better idea of what we should be looking for when we do actually get to the forest?

Of my five groups, three were engaged and did a good job. One was fantastic and finished the whole thing, even the extension activity about baby spiders. One wasn't engaged at all, even with my fervent encouragement. I'm not too worried.

I took some photos, and I'm going to make a collage on the wall showing their work. I'm going through a real phase of documenting student work in photo form and displaying it.

I love school *displays unseemly enthusiasm*

This morning has kicked off brilliantly - although I could do with more coffee. My Y10s did an interesting reading exercise about fossils, my Y13s estimated the rotational inertia of each other and used it to explain why we put our arms out when we balance, and my Y12s demonstrated Newton's First Law with an egg. Have some video evidence:

I'll stick this video on the school site too, so the students can access it. They had a lot of fun making it, even though there was a lot of "no, YOU do the voiceover" going on. We didn't have time to add a proper audio track, sadly. Nevermind, it's pretty good for their first ever attempt at using Movie Maker and Audacity on the same day.