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Hi Sarah,
This is a very relevant question for today’s classrooms. Due to the increasing pressure for educators to teach core subjects, such as math and reading, subjects, such as science are often being neglected. However, because science is everywhere and almost everything can be connected back to scientific concepts and principles; you can incorporate it in to almost any activity and/or academic subject.
Many teachers have a classroom calendar that is discussed every day to teach students about the days of the week and months of the year. You can expand this activity to include the science topic of weather. You can choose one or two students to look outside of the classroom window and tell you what they observe about the weather conditions (e.g. the temperature: cool, warm, cold, etc. and cloud coverage). You can mark this on the calendar and at the end of each week, you can have your students count up the days for each weather type. You can also have the students compare the weather throughout the year, such as the temperature getting colder or warmer to discuss the four seasons.
During your students’ reading block, you can read stories that are specifically related to science concepts. For instance, during the fall season, you can read stories, such as From Seed to Pumpkin by Wendy Pfeffer, Mouse’s First Fall by Lauren Thompson, and There was an Old Woman who Swallowed Some Leaves by Lucille Colandro. As you read these stories to your students, you can discuss various science concepts, such as the changing of weather and the cycle of plants.
During your math block, if you are teaching your students how to sort objects using characteristics, such as size, color, and shape, you can have students collect various seasonal items outside, such as leaves during the fall. The students can discuss the leaves and sort them according to the above mentioned properties. In addition, you can discuss with your students why leaves change color and how different trees have different leaves.
Lastly, if you are doing an art-related activity where students have to use different colored paints, you can briefly discuss what happens when they mix two colors together. In all, I feel that science can be incorporated in almost any activity regardless of how brief or extensive the discussion may be.
~Melanie
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