YEARS 7–12 IDEAS FOR THE CLASSROOM
Year 7 Practical Skills for Inquiry Learning (continued)
Lesson 2 – the first practical activity
• Sets of Role Cards – one set per group (perhaps a different
coloured cardboard for each role and laminated – they will
last for ages);
The first lesson will have given you a chance to get a feel for
your class and you can now move on to a practical activity. It is
important to make sure that standards of behaviour set in train in
lesson 1 are adhered to and further standards are developed as
each lesson progresses. We need to help the students develop
an understanding that practical work is very serious and important
to their enjoyment and understanding of the science and not an
excuse for ‘messing about’.
Per group
• large sheet of cardboard;
• scissors, sticky tape, glue stick, string, stapler, marker
pens of various colours, glitter? ...
• heap of rubbish from your ‘Rubbish Box’ (make an ongoing
collection of stuff for this e.g. pieces of paper and cardboard
– all colours, bits of material, straws, balloons, wool, wire,
cardboard tubes, pasta, crepe paper, tissue paper,
paddle pop sticks, twigs, ping-pong balls, empty cotton
reels, Alfoil – anything which can be fixed to cardboard in
some way, including things no longer needed in the lab);
2. Baggie Science!
If we want our students to be active learners rather than passive
recipients of a teacher’s knowledge, then we need to help them
gain the necessary skills and confidence to work independently.
This is even more important if we want to move away from the
more traditional ‘recipe’ practicals towards student-designed,
investigative experiments which are fundamental to the inquiry
approach to learning. It is never too soon to start, so how about
the second lesson with Year 7?
• Try to have all the ‘stuff’ needed by each group at each
work station. This saves time and minimises the need for
students to be dashing about!
• You may want to go through the roles: e.g. recorder –
does the writing/drawing on the poster; reporter – will do
the explaining to the class; equipment officer – is the only
one who can approach the teacher for more equipment;
organiser – keeps an eye on the time and tries to make
sure everyone puts forward ideas ...... There need to be as
many roles as there are students in a group – using role
cards helps students to learn how to work in co-operative
groups. All students must contribute to the main task. This experiment is fun to do and quite safe (no glass, no heat,
chemicals from home). It is written as a student-centred activity,
so you must resist the urge to give extra instructions or answers
to the students.
• Once students are in their groups send them to their work
stations, explain the task and set the time limit. • what makes an observation accurate and detailed?
It can be used to introduce the following ideas:
• the need to make accurate and detailed observations;
• what is an observation?
• the need to be able to account for our observations, i.e.
produce evidence for any conclusions we draw;
• The teachers’ task is to wander round encouraging,
keeping students in their groups, checking their roles etc.
but not giving them ideas or answers.
• the need to be able to find ways to help get this evidence if
necessary;
• Hopefully there will be enough time for each group to
show and explain their poster to the class (establish rules
for this beforehand?)
• the beginnings of ideas about ‘fair tests’;
• how to work in a co-operative group – roles; stay in your group;
• Gather together all the different ideas which the groups
have included and you can add a few too? You will probably
get the different branches of science but it would be good
if things like ‘fun, experimenting, finding things out ...’ also
were there;
• ability to follow written instructions accurately;
• begins to develop good laboratory behaviour;
• how to tell if a chemical reaction has taken place (changes
in temperature and colour, gas evolved ...) – if you want to
include this at this early stage.
• The posters can be displayed in the classroom for a
reasonable length of time – that values the students’ work
and adds to a positive classroom environment.
It also begins to develop the practical and thinking skills needed
to undertake an investigation and to work on the confidence of
the students that they can carry out experiments successfully
and ‘can do science’.
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SCIENCE EDUCATIONAL NEWS VOL 68 NO 1