Life Cycle of Stars: Student Gallery Edition

A fascinating area of study is the life cycle of stars. At this point my students know the different types and classifications of stars.  I usually only have a few students that know of black holes and supernovae.  I decided to divide my 4 HS Earth Science classes into groups.  Each group was responsible for one poster and section of the life cycle.  Overall, it ended up being 19 groups. I had them research the type of star they were assigned and make a poster. When they were finished, I put them up and we used our wall collaboration to go over the different masses of stars and how it has an impact on their deaths.  It also made my wall look a lot more festive! I also had them do another assignment at the same time with QR codes and past astronomers and their contributions to astronomy.  I had about 3 students a group.  For example, when one or two students were coloring the other could work on their ancient astronomers, then they would switch.

Enjoy!

Rockin' the Rock Cycle

I do not know how the idea for this game popped into my head, but I am glad it did! The rock cycle is not a very complicated cycle on Earth however, some of the processes in it are difficult for students. With a cardboard box, a laminating machine and some Velcro dawned a new game!

I drew the arrows onto both sides of the cardboard.  I thought it was important that the two teams could not see each others answers.  I gave each team a list of words, the laminated paper boxes and then watched the thinking and problem solving commence! The teams had to decide where every word fit into the cycle. It was a lot of trial and error.  They had to talk through the entire process of how each rock type can change from one to the other.  If they noticed that the arrows didn't make any sense with their arrangement, they knew they had something wrong. What made this even more challenging for the students, is that each half is not exactly the same and not all of the arrows go in both directions.  I timed how long it took them to put it together, then put the times on the board to encourage competitions between the classes.  The team with the fastest time got some treats (ended up being around 10 minutes.)  I decided to put treats on the line so my earlier classes would not tell the later classes and give them an unfair advantage.  Here are some pictures of the students competing. 

Most classes I had were small enough that everyone had to participate with just the 2 sides.  This could easily be done with  4 teams and mutliple boxes if class sizes are too big.  When the students were finished they had a set of questions that they had to answer on Socrative.com.  This allowed for the losing team to finish and, give me some time to collect the data over how well they understood the objectives of the lesson. Overall took about 30 minutes to run the lesson. 

HR-Diagram on the floor

When my students begin to study the life cycle of stars I have them make an HR diagram on the floor, before they have been introduced to the HR diagram is.  Some teachers have them graph it with data on a piece of graph paper or perhaps using excel for practice .  I do this because I like that the students get to move around the classroom and get out of their seats. This is the website that I originally got the idea from.  I have since changed it to fit my classroom and student's needs. I also made the stars in Kelvin instead of Celsius to better match common HR diagrams.

This is the star papers to cut out.  I try to print them on color paper so that they correlate with the actual colors of the stars. They use meter sticks as the axes and I give them scratch pieces of paper so they can label their axes. I try and discourage them from using the numbers on the meter sticks so the stars do not bunch together. It also allows them to change the scale of the graph and allows them to experience more trial and error.  I will say it is a lot of fun to watch them think this through.  Most of them get really close but never usually think to put the hottest star towards the inside of the graph as a lot of common HR diagrams have. I like this however, because it gives us a chance to talk about different ways to set up a graph with the same set of data. The students who finish a lot earlier than other groups get instructed  to change the  X-axis to  make the real HR diagram they will later color and glue into their journals. You can have them take a picture or have them draw it in their science journal if there is time.  Super fun and easy activity for any level of student! Have fun!

Steno's Laws Racing Game

Steno's Laws Racing Game is a game I play with my Earth Science students so they can practice their understanding of Steno's laws. I do this game after they have already had an introduction to the the laws in our relative age section.  I made this game up, but I did not make the cross sections myself.  The laws they practice are: The law of Superposition, The law of Cross Cutting, The law of Original Horizontality and The law of Lateral Continuity.

The GAME 

Students are put into groups of between 2-4 students depending on how many you have in the class.  2-3 is perfect, but it can work with 4.  They decide who will be their "walker" and who will be the person who records.  I then have 7 different cross sections starting from the simplest to the most difficult.  On GO they take their first envelope labeled with a "1" and walk briskly back to their seats.  If you have chairs to separate their lanes they are less likely to run into each other or try and obstruct the path of one another. They will also have a a few pieces of paper that they will use to show me their answers.  The students will then have to run back to their group and put the layers in order from oldest to youngest.  When they think that they have figured it out they will then walk briskly back to me to get their answers checked.  If they have it they will now grab the next envelope up.  The team that finishes all of the envelopes will win.  For lower level/younger classes you can adjust how difficult the cross sections are.  For higher ability students I would have them draw their own cross sections that show at least 3-4 of all of the laws at once to win the game or it can even be given as an extension, homework assignment or make that their quiz. The kids usually have a lot of fun with the game and it really does help cement the laws in them.

Here is the paper that I use.  Please let me know if you have any questions!

Carbon Cycle Board Game

In Indiana Earth Science students are required to know all of the different cycles of nature. After we do the water cycle we move on to the carbon, nitrogen and phosphorous cycles.  The day after their test I had my students play this board game that I found on the Internet snooping around.

Go to this link from Arizona State University to get all of the materials. I do not have color printing so I had my assistants color them all in. Other things to look out for is on the game board the atmosphere is represented by two different clouds that are not attached.  This confused my students, so I just drew in an extra cloud.  Also, I would color code the playing cards to help keep track of them.  Have them play it at least 2 times before they start writing and recording their travels on the student sheet.  If you try to have them do it all at once, they will focus more on how to play the game than the information they are supposed to be keeping track of.  Overall a fun way to introduce the carbon cycle!

Let me know if you have any questions!

Putting a Creative Spin on Science HASTI Presentation

If you are in my session at the Hoosier Association of Science Teacher Inc (HASTI) presentation February 12th, 2015  here is the link for the presentation to follow along.

HASTI 2015

Pyramid Diorama

Pyramid Diorama's

  

  I got this idea off of Pinterest. The pyramid was actually on the rock cycle, but I figured that this could be used for climate change.  The student's I teach are from a small town in Indiana.  It is important that they have a chance to explore different areas of the world in a classroom other then World History. I do this because I am passionate about my students becoming global citizens.  For this assignment I had them use this interactive map from National Geographic about scenarios that could happen around the world if the climate continues to change. They only had to pick ONE of the scenarios but another option would be having them do 4 different scenarios. Each student made their own, but to shorten the project, they could to it in groups of 2 or 3.  Here is the introduction page that I used to help guide my students on what to put on each triangle.  I also gave a little wiggle room as far as what was on each triangle.  For Example, you can see on the first picture that there is just a picture on the triangle.  I was fine with this as long as the information was put on another triangle. 

  The students have to plan and write everything out before they start gluing/ taping the triangles together.  I have them pre-write everything in their science journals before they transferred them to the triangle pieces.

  It was fun and an easy way to get my students to broaden their horizons about areas of the world and climate change.  I will definitely do this lesson again next year. 

The Space Mag

     For the past few years I have had my Earth Science students make an informational magazine covering the planets, moon and various objects in our solar system.  They digitally design these magazines on their laptops.  I love doing this assignment with them for many reasons.  The number one reason is the experience and the journey they go through to achieve the final product.

     For the last part of our Astronomy unit I wanted my students to be able to experience the wonders of our own solar system. I needed a lesson to do this while still making it meaningful and relevant to my students after they leave my class.  This is why I chose a magazine.  By making this magazine my students practice their research skills, graphic designing, problem solving, APA citations and experience perseverance; all while learning detailed information about our solar system.

**A disclaimer is that my students all have Mac computers, a lot of the programs that I mention are built in, but if you have Photo Shop or Picasa this is possible on a PC.**

   The first thing I would do is make a rubric for a large project like this. It is important you know what you want the students to have.  Before giving them the rubric, give them an organizer. Here is my organizer I give my students to help them get started. Again, for my class this is a HUGE project so there are a lot of different areas of research on my organizer.  The great thing about this, is that it can be shortened and it is extremely easy to differentiate for high ability or low ability students if needed.

The introduction paper is here to give you an idea of all that I require them to do.

  In the introduction it explains that each student must pick a theme and, that the theme must be present throughout the entire magazine.  This really helps bring the magazine together and make it unique.  Here are some examples of different themes and magazines that a few of my students have turned in.

Pixar Theme 
The Big Bang Theory 
The Hunger Games 
Video Games 
Thor


Areas that I emphasize on (and have learned to emphasize on) are the following:

1. APA citation- It is critical that they make the citation as they go and not wait until the end. If they do wait they will have a days worth of citation generating and they will most likely forget which citation goes where. 
2. Color Scheme- They are not allowed to have more then 5 different colors per page.  Anymore looks like the rainbow threw up on the magazine. 
3. Images- Must have at least 3 images per page.  One must be of the actual object, the other two can be relevant to the object. An example of this might be having a picture of the Mars rover, Curiosity on their page.
4. Theme Overload- The personal theme is one of the best things about the magazine, but if you are not careful the students can get so wrapped up in it they lose sight of what they are doing.
5. Table of Contents- I have learned to have them do this FIRST.  It gives them guidance on where to start.  It may seem trivial, but it really does help them get the ball rolling on the project. 
6. Peer Editing- Occasionally I will have someone else just look at their pages and see how the flow is going.  Most of the students end up using a lot of the same sources from NASA.gov, so I have them just look at the overall appearance of the pages. This helps give guidance in the aesthetic area of the magazine. 

This project is long, but there is a huge sense of accomplishment when they are done with it.  They are also very proud of the magazine that they create and it becomes something they like to keep. I usually get the top magazine printed and bound with nice glossy paper.  If I could afford it, or if your school has the money I would definitely print them out for every student! 

If you have any questions please let me know!

The Ole Water Cycle Story Book

            Making the water cycle or rock cycle (or any cycle) into a story is an age old lesson. I have seen and heard of this type of lesson since I was in college.  It is also all over the Internet if you type in any search that resembles “Water Cycle Lessons.”  This year is the first time that I actually did it, and I am here to say that it was AWESOME.  I did this with my Earth Science class this year as a refresher. They study the water cycle as apart of their weather unit in the 8th grade in Indiana. After we spend some time doing precursor lessons over the water cycle I decided to have them create a story of a water molecule going through the cycle.  

Things the story had to include:

• All of our vocabulary words from the unit (which can vary for different levels) 
• 5 different stops along the way
• End in the same place that they started 
• The process and explanation how their molecule moved from one place to the other
• (Including words like evaporation, condensation etc.)
• A relevant picture on each page of their story

What I loved about this lesson again were the conversations I heard while they were doing it.  They were asking each other and myself a ton of questions that were at a deeper level of thinking they have had to use before. They were actually helping peer edit each other’s stories (I did not even have to make them.)  As a teacher it truly was awesome to hear and see this from my students.  It also turned out to be a great assessment on how much they actually understood about the processes of the water cycle.  

Recommended Procedure:

1. Have students write out the path that they are going to take through the water cycle in their journals in a column.  In the column right next to that have them right the process for how they are going to get their molecule from place to place (evaporation, precipitation etc)
2. Then have students figure out what part of the cycle is going on each page of their story.
3. Have them make a rough draft underlining and checking everything off as they go.
4. Final Draft (I had them write it out not type it)
5. Drawings and cover page.

Have fun!