So. Many. Possibilities!Wow! The Day 11 Lesson is full of possibilities! It can help you address scads of standards with your students.  Day 11: Moving Water This engineering and design challenge gives you the opportunity to address more than the engineering standards. Students can also explore forces and motion, earth sciences, and properties of matter. Skim through the standards to decide what sorts of guiding questions you might ask to focus student work.
0 Comments
Layers of meaningAs I look back at the comic for this mission, I'm struck by how much impact a word can have. I love the way Ben uses the word zoom in each of the panels below. It shows such motion and reinforces the meaning of the word. 
What could it be?We have one final 3D print to share for this mission. It's a fantastic print to use for a mystery bag or mystery print activity! On Day 11, Curtis joins a crew member is using a jembe (similar to a hoe) to dig a trench. If you are able to print the file out of the view of students, slip it into bag or box so that students can feel it without seeing it. Let them know they saw this object in one of the field videos. Then encourage them to describe the features they feel and predict what the object could be based on what they feel. This activity can be a great way to focus a group while building language skills!
To delete a support, click the delete button. Hover over a support turning it blue. Click and poof, it's gone!
Will there be enough water?
Practical Problem Solving for a Purpose!Unlike most of our missions, students will know if the hypothesis true once they see the Day 12 field video. There will be no doubt if there is drinkable groundwater under HIP Academy, but the impact that water will have is uncertain. How much water is there? How many people can that help? Your students CAN calculate this! We've provided handouts to help you frame this juicy problem for your students. Calculate in jugs or liters depending on your goals and time available. Using liters gives students the chance to work with numbers into the thousands, while using jugs keeps numbers in the hundreds. In either case, providing tens frames and manipulatives can help your students stretch their math skills as they grapple with the problem.
As students grapple with this problem, they'll apply what they know about counting, base ten operations, and skip counting while building a foundation for future work with multiplication. Without a meaningful problem, it can be challenging to get students to maintain focus during productive struggle, but it has been my experience that if students care they really, really try! It can be hard not to swoop in with the answer or even just a more effective method before allowing time for that struggle. I encourage you to ask guiding questions and provide organizational supports instead! I can't wait to see how your students work this out!
An Opportunity to Help.As teachers, we know what it is like to make sacrifices for our students. We work beyond contract hours. We make sure kids have snacks. It goes on and on! Imagine, however, working without a salary at all! Teachers at HIP Academy are making that sacrifice right now! While it is incredibly moving that they are willing to give so selflessly for their students, it is not sustainable. Read on to see how you can help! Spending time with Livingstone has been incredible! It is clear that the village holds him and his brother Fred (a HIP teacher) in the highest esteem. The community knows the education the teachers are providing at HIP is critical not only for the future of the children, but the future of the whole village. Life in Livingstone's village is rich in family time and close community connections. In other areas, however, they have great need. School funding is one of those needs.
Budget shortfalls mean the teachers at HIP Academy are currently forgoing their salaries of just $50 a month. That's why Livingstone (with Beth's help) is launching a funding campaign in hopes of raising funds to pay a competitive salary and allow his dedicated teachers to continue to do their transformative work. Even beginning teachers in the US make more in a WEEK than a Kenyan teacher makes in a YEAR. Please take a moment to check out the campaign. Livingstone would greatly appreciate your help in getting the word out! If you can donate, thank you on behalf of HIP Academy and the whole community. A juicy conversation!
Check out this week's Disciplinary Core Ideas!One of the reasons I post these DCIs for you each week is to help you become more familiar with the standards and language. To be honest, you can address many of them without doing much of anything to "science-y" at all! Knowing these standards helps you maximize teachable moments. If a student shares about a trip to an amusement park or you find a crocus sprouting through the snow you can take a moment to ask questions that push your students to become scientific thinkers which has far reaching benefits!
How to rotate files and adjust supports.We do our best to share files that will be easy to print, but sometimes some files just don't seem to play nicely! There are some variables at work. We've occasionally found that different filament colors will behave slightly differently. Every now and then we get a file that does better printing at a different resolution. The more your play and print the more you learn! Here is a quick guide to rotating files and adjusting supports if you've not yet played around with these! We will demonstrate with the Mini Beth and Curtis Passengers for the Safari Car using our Flash Forge slicer (the software that came with the printer.)  1. This file downloaded in this orientation, but If I print it this way, the posts won't fit into the car.  2. So, I highlighted the model. See how they are white now? Then I clicked on the "rotate" button and changed the Y axis from 0 to 180 degrees. FLIP!  3. Next, I clicked the "supports" button at the center top of my screen.  4. That changed the options available to me at the top of my screen. I selected "Supports Options."  5. When I clicked "Support Options" I got this dialog box. I find that playing with the "Post Diameter" settings can be helpful. I use 3.0mm a lot. It worked well for this file.  6. After I clicked "OK" I clicked the "Auto Generate" button and got this. I hit the "Back" button at the top of the screen and did NOT save the supports to the file. That way I can change them later if needed.  7. The "Back" button returned me to the main screen where I clicked the "Print" button.  8. Clicking "Print" brings up this dialog box. In the resolution area, I selected "Standard" and "Brim." Then I clicked OK and went on to print as usual. The resulting print was of good quality. I popped off the supports with needle nose pliers and had no trouble getting the passengers to fit into the car. Good luck! Let us know how it turns out for you!
|
Meet Beth and Curtis!Presidential Award-Winning teacher and hula hoop fanatic, Beth loves bringing real world science to kids! Beth is fascinated by engineering challenges, technology, and outdoor learning spaces. After 25 years teaching kindergarten, she’s excited to share her passion and experience on-line with classrooms from around the world! Archives
September 2019
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed
