Science Lesson Three - "Mixing" Science and Fun!

                                                          
This week was our third lesson in third grade science.  Our changes unit, working with solids and liquids and how they change has been going quite well.  The students are learning more and more each week and seem super excited when we come every Monday.  This week we focused our students on the science process skill of classification while we worked with mixing and separating solids.  Our big science question of the week was, "What is a mixture?"  The students were not very familiar with mixtures at the beginning of our lesson, but by the end of the lesson they were able to tell us that the properties of the solids in a mixture remained the same when mixed and were again able to be separated. I think giving the students a question of the week really helps the students understand the reason behind performing their experiments and helps them focus their attention on the task at hand which is trying to answer the science question.  I think my partner Debi and I are a great partnership and definitely feed off each other and help each other throughout the lessons.  Our preparation for the lessons has definitely  

helped us keep our lessons focused and organized.
This week Debi gave a great review of last week and an introduction for our lesson this week.  After we reviewed our science safety rules our experiment got underway.  I definitely think material management is our strong suit.  Preparing our students' materials has helped us manage our time and get our students into the activity quickly and effectively.  We took our students step by step through this experiment in mixing two solids: gravel and salt.  I definitely think this helped us manage our time and keep the students on track to answer the science question.  With the help of a record sheet prepared by one of our classmates, Becky, the students made great observations of the substances they were using and were able to practice using their science process skill of classification to classify the substances as solids.  We worked on our classroom management this week by asking our students to put their materials down and give us a thumbs up when they are ready to move on to the next step.  This helped us keep the flow of the experiment moving and also allowed us to see which groups needed more help.  Upon conclusion of the experiment the students were able to answer the science question of the day, "What is a mixture?" by telling Debi and myself that a mixture is a combination of two or more things that when mixed retain their properties and can be separated.  I was thrilled to hear their answers!  After this experiment they understood so much more about mixtures and the properties of these solids.  I was especially excited when one little scientist asked if we would get a different result if we mixed a liquid and a solid.  This was the perfect introduction into our next lesson which is going to involved mixing solids and liquids.  What an inquisitive little scientist!  I am very excited to get the opportunity to answer this question for our students!
I feel like we are getting better each week with our lessons and becoming more and more confident in our teaching ability.  I think I could get stronger at being more clear with the objectives for each lesson and making sure the students are aware of these objectives.  I also think I could do a better job at being clear with instructions and getting the students excited without allowing them to lose focus.  I am sure by the time we make it to lesson seven we will have worked the kinks out!