Brenna Hunt

Today in lab, we began with review about last week's lab. We talked about NGSS practices, core ideas, and cross-cutting concepts. We discussed which concepts could be used across disciplines. We also talked about our week 1 reflections, and how what we wrote was similar and different. My group agreed that we all were not really exposed to NGSS before this class and used Common Core standards instead. We discussed how NGSS is more hands-on and less about memorization than Common Core is. To begin our learning today, we expanded on the characteristics of living things. We watched a video on the differences between living and non-living things, and then we made T-charts about the characteristics of living things that included pictures and small descriptions (pictured above). After we shared our posters with the class, we began talking about seeds. We were asked the question "are seeds living?" which led us into a conversation about dormancy. We did 2 more activi...

  Our "dream" classroom Today was focused on introduction to topics and each other. We introduced ourselves and then got into pairs to draw out what we thought our dream classroom would look like. After we shared, we started asking ourselves, why is science important? What skills do we practice when teaching/learning science? We brainstormed together to come up with different ideas, such as develops problem-solving skills, sparks curiosity, builds knowledge, and teaches new processes. Then, we started discussing the NGSS science standards that have been adopted by the state of Iowa. There are eight practices for science and engineering, and we discussed the format in which they are all broken down, disciplinary core ideas (DCIs) in each, and how they cross into other subject areas. We discovered that these standards help us to make sure all students are understanding material and give the basis for assessment and next steps. At the end of lab, we began practicing how to read ...