SCIENCE
At Escola Americana do Rio de Janeiro (EARJ) I taught science using the Delta Science curriculum. For each topic of study, I worked with my grade level team to use Understanding by Design to plan the units. My school only adopted two units per grade level. Because this is a less than ideal number of science units, my team developed two more units to study throughout the year. In third grade, I was able to integrate science content into the social studies service learning project that we did. The students researched the vegetables that we planted in the garden. They made brochures and then in small groups they taught their classmates about the plant and what it needed to fully grow into a healthy plant.
The plant brochures the students made for our garden unit.
Presenting their plant research to another third grade class.
Students collecting data from their growing plants.
As a culminating project to my Master of Science in Elementary Education, Curriculum and Instruction, I am creating a climate change STEM program for third grade classrooms. Climate change is a real issue in today’s society and it will continue to be one for our upcoming generations. It is vitally important that students begin to learn about the topic from a young age. The hope is that they will learn the facts before misconceptions arise and also that they feel a need and want to do their part to help keep out planet healthy.
During a unit on states of matter, my second grade students made oobleck, from the Dr. Seuss book.
While we studied animal classification, we adopted a new class pet.