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Monica Chavez
Kealakehe Intermediate
HI

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Love turtles, traveling, and teaching!

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Recent Posts by Monica

Sun, Nov 04, 2012 8:28 PM in Teaching Cell Parts in a "fun way"?

I haven't done a cell model since my first year as a teacher. I feel better prepared in introducing this activity back because it's a great way to engage the kinesthetic learners in an abstract unit. I do like Nancy's idea of using the candy 3D model, since it is something that the kids could easily do after Halloween! I have had students make a key where they describe the different parts of the c...

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Tue, Oct 23, 2012 6:03 PM in Use of Scipacks in teaching

The sci packs obviously offer a wealth of knowledge and scaffold it logically. I really liked the Science and Food Safety" Sci packet and have been struggling with how to implement it into my "Cell unit" that I begin this week. I have my students do a pathogen research Glog poster (an on-line virtual poster) and this sci guide offers great resources for me to pull out, especially the section on ha...

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Wed, Oct 17, 2012 9:57 PM in Living vs. Non living

Our school is focusing on argumentative writing. I used the NSTA web site lesson book and adapted one of the activities to create an activity where students argued on whether "Fire Bob" is living or non-living. I provided information on this "new scientific discovery" and asked student to make a claim. They also backed up their claim with evidence, not opinion, from the given information. I had st...

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Reviews
Recent Reviews by Monica

Reproduction and Heredity

Sun, Sep 09, 2012 8:41 PM
My SciGuide Review

I like how the SciGuide provides an overview for each focus. In this case, I reviewed the "Reproduction and Heredity" SciGuide. The SciGuide map outlines the themes and keywords for the two specific themes. Each keywords had resources for teachers and students that each listed the features for that specific resource. The resources provided are reliable sources, but some sources did not work (http://school.discovery.com/lessonplans/programs/whodidit/ ). I like the "Do-It-Yourself: Strawberry DNA" activity because it provides visuals and a hands-on inquiry lesson for students to concretely understand that DNA is in all living things. This will work perfectly with all my students, especially my ELL students. The videos provided by PBS and Nova will also provide another source of visualization to help my students.

Cell Structure and Function

Sun, Sep 09, 2012 8:12 PM
Cell Structure and Function Review

Woo! I just completed the cell structure and function sci pack! It has so much detailed, specific information that I wish I could provide to my gifted and talented students, but for all my students too. There were a lot of interactive computer animations I also felt would benefit all my students. I especially liked the section on cell surface area ratio because it involved math. This is a great reminder to me how I can make a lesson where students recognize the purpose to having small cells. Overall, I felt this sci pack was a great refresher on many important facts. I like how the information was organized because it helped remind me how to align my curriculum and to be mindful of the common preconception students might bring. The pedagogical section, it was helpful to have helpful ways to teach this unit that I feel is very abstract, but can be understood in chunks. Again, this was great for me to review and to prepare my students in understanding how to better approach teaching and learning about cells.

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