Forums

Now that I have completed the Gravity and Orbits SciPack, I am not afraid to say that most of what I learned there was new to me, and it was hard to figure out a way to address a lot of it with my students at kindergarten level. Just helping kindergarteners to realize that they would each weigh less on the moon would be a triumph. :) The lessons in the SciPack did help me remember various things I had been told in science classes in high school. What I liked about this SciPack is that a lot of little bits of information I learned when I was younger fit together now in bigger pieces, and the information makes a little better sense. That led me to think about how difficult learning is for anybody, but I think that my kindergarteners have it both harder and easier than I do. Their challenge is that they have much to learn while they construct some kind of framework to help them arrange the brand new information in their heads. Doing both of those things is hard, and I like being there to both supply the information and to give them ways to organize it. On the other hand, I think the kindergarteners do have it easier than adult learners in one way. Kindergarteners don’t have either the distractions or a bunch of previous learning in their way as they learn. I find that my own attempts to learn as an adult can be complicated by a number of factors, like “facts” I thought were true but don’t turn out to be true, ideas I had about the way things work that are wrong or only partly right, and sudden gaps in my understanding because I either never learned something or forgot it. It’s always a pleasure to be teaching, and taking classes myself reminds me of how much my students are accomplishing and how important it is.

Veronica, I enjoyed reading your post. You are so correct about watching children learn....that "ah ha" moment is great when the light shines in their eyes and they understand some new concept. That is why teachers need to be careful not to impart any misconceptions to students that then become the "facts" that adults have to relearn sometimes in their lives. I remember the old Coke commercial where the cute polar bears and penguins are playing together. Polar bears live in the north pole regions and penguins live in the south pole regions!! What a misconception that was!!

Veronica Hey, we appreciate the feedback about the Gravity and Orbits SciPack. Thank you for this. Our intention is to help provide self-directed, on-demand interactive nuggets to help teachers with refreshers on specific science concepts they are charged to teach. The pedagogical implications chunk is also supposed to assist with translating that subject matter for the classroom, and help discuss what is pedagogical appropriate by grade level from a cognitive perspective across the K-2, 3-5, 6-8, 9-12 levels, what are promising strategies to facilitate learning, and what are common pre-conceptions. What did you think of this section and how might we improve it? A quick review of this PI object for my edification (it has been a while since I taught this stuff), revealed that gravity is a term that can be introduced as something that pulls things towards the Earth, but at the K-2 grade level the term is not necessarily meaningful. I recall the issues for my student even at the 5-6 grade level, e.g., understanding the differences between mass, weight, etc. and found the book "how students learn" from the National Academies pretty helpful. One example discussed the challenges of students understanding how a table could "push back" on a book, as it doesn't look like a "spring scale" and suggested some illustrations where a "wooden plank" spring-like mechanism may be used to "make the connections" (if I recall correctly). Thank you again for this wonderful feedback and best of success with you students Veronica!

I'm about to start this SciPack myself! If you have access to an iPhone or iPad, Solar Walk is an incredible app that really gives you the feel of the massive planets, how they relate to each other and their gravitation fields. It also includes all of the moons, satellites orbiting earth and other solar systems in real time. I think it can be used on computers too, but I'm not positive. Even if it wouldn't be appropriate for the classroom, it could help you as a teacher get a physical feel of things.