Continuing with the Science Projects...

This past week in the field, I worked with the students on their group science projects again. However, this week I was able to work with the second graders. I helped many of the groups with putting organizing their information, helping them type things up and where to position them on the board. During this time, I was able to ask some of the students to explain to me what they did and how they did their experiment. It was interesting to listen to the students’ descriptions of their experiment and how they went about doing it. One student went through the results they had come up with when the gathered evidence about who had bigger hands, boys or girls. They had everything almost done this time around, which was not the case the last time I was helping them. They had some problems figuring out how to organize their information on their board, and many of the student needed guidance in what they were supposed to be doing. I went to a few of the groups and helped them figure out which person was going to do what job, such as writing out the procedure that was used or finding a way to organize the information on the board in a presentable manner. This definitely helped them move along at a smoother pace because it cleared up much of the confusion that they were having. This kind of activity allowed me to interact with the students for an extended period of time as well, letting me into what they were thinking as they worked on their projects. I was able to see how many students understood what was going on, and how many were lost during the group work and could not seem to find a job to help their group. Talking to my CT about what is occurring in the classroom is also helpful as he has explained why he is doing this project with them, among other things. Many of the students would struggle with this type of project if they had to do it individually, so doing it in groups with help from the teacher and people like myself allow for the students to experience all of the steps that are necessary when doing a science project such as this one.