Week one down

 The students returned to school on Wednesday. So we had classes Wednesday and Thursday for the first week. 

I dislike starting the year with boring stuff like the syllabus and safety and all that nonsense. Also, the first week or so there is a lot of shuffling of students and so I hate to dive in, only to have them shift classes and then I have to move information... yeah, no. So I generally start the year with some activities that help promote what they will be doing throughout the year. This year it was Save Fred and Inquiry Cubes. 

Can you save Fred? In this activity, the students were given a tray that had a gummy Life Saver under an upside down plastic cup and a gummy worm on top. They also had 4 paperclips. Their job was to save Fred, the gummy worm. Fred was out in his boat when a rogue wave came along and capsized it. Fred can't swim and he didn't have his life jacket on. They needed to turn the boat over, get Fred in the boat and then get Fred's life jacket on him. Oh, and they had only 5 minutes to do it. It was a good activity. They were super involved, working to get Fred saved first. It was awesome to watch. So that helped promote teamwork and communication and cooperation, all the things they will need to work successfully in a lab. This went well because they love a good competition. Some groups worked really well together while other groups could not even figure out how to start. This helps me see what level of instructions they will need for the labs. Do they need a step by step list, or can I leave it a little more flexible? This are all things that I will need to know moving forward. 

Next came the inquiry cubes. I have found that more than anything, students hate to be wrong. They are many times, afraid to try to answer a question because they fear they will give the wrong answer. So the inquiry cubes were a series of 4 cubes that had 5 sides filled out and 1 side blank. They had to figure out the patterns for the 5 sides that were filled in and using those patterns determine what would be on the 6th side. It was good for them and me. They got to see that what they think could be wrong and yet nothing dire happens. They are wrong so they move on and try again. I think that was really good for some of them to see. It also doesn't mean that they are dumb or stupid, it just means they need to work a little harder. It was also good for me to see who actually really tries to figure things out and who gives up quickly. Also, who participates and who doesn't. This information is definitely going to help shape my seating charts and seat placements during the year. Oh yeah, I don't assign seats on the first day. I let them sit where they want. This gives me a view into who are friends and how well they work together. Some friends work really, really well together while others just distract each other. So I let them chose their own seats and it provides some insights on the dynamics of the various friends. 

So those 2 things took up the majority of the class period. On Monday we begin the notebooks, I am using Weibert's Phenomenal Notebooks for structure in the notebooks. So Monday we will start setting those up. We then move on to the syllabus and safety contract as well as Graph of the Week. For the syllabus I'm thinking of assigning a section to each group to become the expert on and to present to the class with some examples. The safety contract is just the safety contract with a quiz that they need to pass at 90% or better. I also have some Safety Scenarios that we might do to highlight safety. Not complete sure yet. I also have this activity, Prince Charming thinks like a Scientist. They read the story of Prince Charming and Cinderella and then apply the parts of the scientific method to what he did to find her. I'm still trying to figure out how to do this, maybe we read the story as a class and then each group takes one part to figure out what part of the scientific method it is. Then they present their findings and everyone else copies it down so they all have it. I'm not sure yet. I do know that we won't get to any content until the following week, but I'm okay with that if we are establishing procedures and norms for the class. 

Okay, that was week one and overall it went very well. Some things to work on this weekend so that I'll be set for next weekend. Now, it's time for the gym and some me time.