"It's a measuring cup because it has numbers on the side!": Messing About with Science Tools

Op., L., D. and E. built a habitat of layered rocks, sand, soil and water in a clear cylinder--an experiment to discover which environment worms liked best. 

Their theory:

"Whichever [layer the worm] likes best, it will be in the most."

A few days after creating the habitat, observing the worm for a while and writing down their notes,  the group was itching to switch up the layers and add more substances.
They drew plans for differently layered habitats, and asked me to get more "test tubes" for the next day.

I emailed Dan--Sabot's Science Specialist--with the group's request and was embarrassed when Dan reminded me that what we wanted were large graduated cylinders, not test tubes. Because, he wrote "...[graduated cylinders] have markings on the side." I promised Dan that I would correct the boys' terminology first thing.

But in the morning when I went to collect the said graduated cylinders, Kara, the middle school science teacher, suggested that I take real test tubes back to the group, claiming that I had asked for test tubes and received something else entirely...

Later, in the classroom:

 Teacher: I asked Dan and Kara for test tubes and this is what they gave me.  

              [shows small test tube]

Op: No, not like that! Bigger, like this. [holds up worm habitat]

Teacher: So then I asked them for a bigger one and they gave me this.

              [shows largest test tube]

D: Huh? 

L: It [indicates worm habitat] isn't a test tube. It's a measuring cup because it has numbers on the side!

We head to the Science Cottage in order to get the right materials (and make a stop along the way to write an apology note...

                                                                                    ...after breaking one of the test tubes). 

Op. finds what we are looking for in the kitchen, and Dan and Kara helps us notice all of the different sizes to choose from. 

"We need one with 500."

Five hundred what? 
"Mill..."
"Millions."
"Millimeters."
Are you looking at the M and the L and thinking about what that stands for? 
"Yes."

Dan brings us a beaker full of water. 

We begin to mess about. 

"This [the beaker] is five hundred too!"

"It's at exactly 100." 

What if I tip it this way? Is it less than 100 now?

"No, it just looks like it is."

"Because it's tipping."

So when scientists measure, they look at the water on the table so that it's level. 

"I wanna drop this eraser in."

What's your theory about what will happen?

"The water will go up."

"How much water do we have altogether?"

 "600 and a half!" 

600 and halfway to 700?

"Yeah!"

[The water in Op.'s the graduated cylinder reaches to an unlabeled mark--one mark less than 100ml.]

How much water do you have?

"A little bit less than 100."

But how much less?

"A little bit."

[Op. grabs a smaller graduated cylinder--on which every count of 10 is labelled--and pours its contents into the larger one. The water now reaches to the 100 mark.]

Now it reaches 100! How much did you pour in?

"It was 90 before because that's 10 less than 100. And there was 10 in the smaller one."

So from one mark to the next on this larger one is 10?

"Yeah."

When it's time to head back to the classroom, none of us want our messing about to end. 

Dan, Kara and I agree--what an amazing way to come to a genuine understanding of scientific tools. 

Without direct instruction, the boys have come to understand that:

-The amount of water stays the same no matter what size cylinder it's in.

-The measurement of water changes when something is dropped into it. 

-The width of a cylinder, and not just its height, contribute to how much it can hold. 

They have figured out so much, just by being given time and trust. 

-Posted by Mauren Campbell 

Using Greek Mythology to Understand the Solar System Part II

As seen in a previous post, there was great interest in the location of the moon in our solar system, and in an effort to deepen their research to find out the facts, we continued our book research.  K. noticed that in one book, there was a sculpture (a 19th century hand-operated planetarium) that showed more than one moon:  "I think it was Mars with two or three moons."

This posed the question:  Is there more than one moon?  How many moons are there?

I:  Is there a moon for each planet?
B:  Maybe two or three for each planet?
R:  There is more than one moon.  I know this because of the books I looked at.  You can see the other moons when we go up to space.
S/I:  You can see all kinds of moons:  half moon, quarter moon, full moon...
F:  But those are all the same moon!
R: It's the same moon, but the sun is not getting reflected off the part you can't see.  In crescent, it's almost all dark.  It's dangerous to go to the moon when it's in crescent.  You'd be in the dark and you couldn't find your way back.  
S:  There's a medium moon, a half moon, a crescent moon, and a full moon.
K:  These are the phases.  We can only see the part that's light.  But where it's dark, the moon is still there.  

In a lovely “aha!” moment, K., our resident Greek mythology scholar, noticed that all of the planets were named after Greek/Roman gods and goddesses.  Using what they knew about Greek mythology, the children became even more invested in building a model of the solar system, this time, using the gods and goddesses that the planets are named after, as well as their attendant moons.  Each child in the planet group chose a planet to investigate, and were encouraged to learn what facts they could about their planet, what god/goddess it was named after and why, its location relative to the sun, and how many moons it might have.  

When trying to figure out how many moons each planet had, the children learned a valuable research lesson:  it is necessary to consult more than one source.  At one point, they thought that Uranus and Jupiter had only a few moons, and were very surprised when we went online and found that these gas giants had over sixty each.  They also came to realize the moons orbit around their planet.  

Above: Mercury (a very tiny little planet)

Left (top/bottom) and right:  Venus (Aphrodite) 

Below:  

Earth and our moon
(envisioned as Artemis) 

Mars (and its two moons) 

Jupiter (Zeus) on his throne:

Above: Saturn (Saturnus):  R: This is Saturnus. He has wheat, watermelon, strawberries, and blueberries.  He has a little underground farm (it's secret).  

He's holding a ring.  The ring never ends.  It shows a never ending life.  

The planet has multiple rings that split up.  

Above: Uranus (and little moons...back when K. originally thought it only had four)

Below: Neptune (Poseidon and one moon...back when I. thought it only had one)

Further research revealed that we'd need to make many more moons for Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.  N. helped the group understand the reason behind all these extra moons:


N:  The reason why the gas planets have to many moons is that they're larger and have more gravitational pull.

Once the group figured out how many more moons we needed to make, it did seem a daunting task:  as D. said in the video below:  "Great moons of Jupiter!"

To handle the work, R. suggested we create a moon making machine, 

and the children all joined in to help out:

Counting the moons of Jupiter by tens

 The children had to count carefully. Recently, in our math investigations, 
they have been learning to count by twos, fives, and tens, 
and counting out the large number of moons for the gas giants 
gave them extra practice with these skills.  

Each large group of moons was counted using each of these three methods.  

The children are now co-constructing a new picture of the universe, 

using their new knowledge about the moons and the planets.