[Music]
When teachers engage in intentional and
ambitious efforts to build vocabulary
and content knowledge, they support
student's literacy learning. In this
classroom, children have been learning
about light and shadow through books and
explorations for several weeks.
In today's follow-up discussion, the
goals are to encourage talk among
children, and for children to review and
use new vocabulary in a meaningful
context. You will see the students using
words like shadow and opaque and light
source and path of light. I'll often have
the students repeat the word to me and
then we talk about the meaning of it, so
that they understand those words and can
use them through a discussion practice.
Today what we're going to do, is we're
going to have a discussion about our
observations. Can you say the word
observation with me? Observation. And if you look
up here, we have the word - these are our
science words. Here's the word
observation. Things that we notice
through doing a science investigation.
Things that we notice are our
observations. So the word wall in our
classroom, we have a basic word wall and
we also have a science word wall, so
those scientific words are on there so
they can use that as a resource and also
during lessons, I'll often point to the
word wall and so then it becomes more
natural for them, and so that resource is
always there and it's something that
they can access and use throughout their
learning and hopefully those words then
become natural in their vocabulary. So
scientists, turn and talk with your team
about your observations and the data
that you collected from your
investigation. Ready, go!
[students inaudible discussing their observations]
They're learning these new vocabulary
words through practice, and then the goal
is for them to be able to discuss them
in small groups and with each other
through a whole group discussion, since
they're really truly understanding the
meaning of them, the more practice that
they're seeing it, hearing it, and
understanding those words, they can
foster discussions with each other.
They're able to add to conversations and
that they're forming real conclusions
using their data and their practice that they've had.
The light source, the
flashlight, it has to be straight, not
wobbly, so corrected it has to be
straight to make the shadow. Okay, can you
explain that? So you have two
things going on. Could you use this piece
of string to show me what you mean with
the light source coming off and the, the
path of light that's coming from the
light source, could you use that? What if I
hold the light source, could you show me
how the path of light would go? So in a
straight line, and then what did it do
when you hit the object? It made a shadow.
It made a shadow. I noticed that when you
were doing your investigation, some of
you had a light source really close to
the object and others pulled the light
source away from the object. Did you
notice anything happening? Axel, what did
your group notice? That, um, it was making
big shadows and little shadows when
you move it far, it was a little shadow and
when it's closer, it was big shadow.
Oh! So, if we were to do an investigation
with shadows, and we went outside and it
was a sunny day, what do you predict we
might see? Madison? Our shadow. Why? Because
it's a light source and light source,
when it's like um, a light source and
you're an opaque object, it can always
make you a shadow. So, you're gonna see
your own shadow? Yes. Well, what would be the
light source though if we were outside? The sunshine.
Natural or man-made? Um, natural.
I think it's refreshing that we can incorporate
vocabulary practice embedded within
their learnings so it's not something
separate from, because I also think
that's not as meaningful to them and
they're not going to learn from that,
they're just going to forget it by the
end of the day. The goal through this
type of practice is that the students
are using the vocabulary in meaningful
ways, so I believe that incorporating
everything within, especially within our
science curriculum, is an amazing thing
for our kids. Now though, how would I change
my thinking, if I wanted to explain the
idea of a shadow to a third grader, maybe?
Um, that some things are an opaque kind of
thing and then, um, usually under shadow goes
around you and um, if it go - if it's- if the
light is behind you,
it goes funny, and if it's
in front of you, it goes behind you.
I think that would really help them to
understand that as long as there's a
light source, you will have a shadow. I
like that you took it one step further
Maya, and you explained how the light
will affect where their shadow appears
like we just had happen in our classroom.
Gibson, do you want to add a thought to that?
Your shadow is just where your
opaque object, um, the shadow I mean, the
light, can't go through you, it goes
around you, and if the light source isn't
in front of you, it's behind- the shadows
behind, and if it's in front of, I mean
it's in the back of you, it's at the
front. How else could you explain it to
them like a scientist talking to a
kindergartner? Noah, what what might you
say? Don't be afraid, your shadow is just
like you. It does what you do! If you eat
a turkey sandwich, then your shadow would
eat a turkey sandwich. Emmett, what might you add?
Your shadow is from a light source and
it follows you wherever you go and it
does what you do, and so you cannot
escape from the shadow only when it's
stuck. It's truly fascinating and some
days it's just like, you sit back and
you're just, wow, you are all so capable of
doing amazing things and if we continue
to set the bar high for our students and
continue to allow them to grow through
this, the sky's the limit.
Learn more at literacyessentials.org
[Music]