Scientific Saturday: Gummy Bear Lab

We had a great week!  We are finishing up our study of the scientific methods, the physical properties of matter and states of matter.  This lab was perfect.  I had never done it before and was very surprised at the results!  The lab took three days to complete and the experiment packet had pages to go with each step.

Here is one free resource from TPT that I found.   There are many others available.  I am used the lab with my fifth graders and found it age appropriate.

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I even played the Gummy Bear song which is now stuck in my head.  (My kids loved it)

Mathematical Mondays: Decimal Pointer

I have been teaching multiplying decimals using the Powers of Ten this week and came up with a clever tool... The Decimal Pointer.  I glued a felt circle to the end of a pointer and it works great.  I can move the decimal to the left and right.  Get a dowel or ruler if you don't have any pointers!  

Scientific Saturdays: States of Matter Brochures

My students created brochures this week to demonstrate their knowledge of the Three States of Matter: Solids, Liquids and Gases.  The project is available in my Matter Really Matters.   The kids did a great job!  This type of activity could be adapted for any science topic.

The project included:

Cover- name, date, title, illustration

Solids- five examples with labels and characteristics

Liquids- five examples with labels and characteristics

Gases- five examples with labels and characteristics

The illustrations could be from clip art, magazines or drawings.

Here are some of the completed projects:

Mathematical Monday: Exponent Foldable

Things have been crazy with the start of school and I feel like I'm starting to get a handle on everything.  I am a day late with my math post…better late than never.  I keep forgetting to take pictures of my students' notebooks but I will post the one I made.

I found a great example of making an accordion foldable for expanded form numbers.  I used a sentence strip and showed my class.  They loved it and wanted to make one.  I decided to make the accordion foldable to show exponents for the notebooks.  

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Scientific Saturdays: States of Matter (Freebie)

I am currently teaching the scientific method.  We are observing and collecting data on our "Going Bananas" experiment.  Hopefully my room doesn't smell too ripe tomorrow!!!  We will be creating data charts and writing up our conclusions during the week.

We are going to start "States of Matter" tomorrow.  We read a non-fiction article last week that came from Superteacher for homework.  They will use the article to create a brochure for homework this week.  The photo is a quick example that I made today.  The kids need to have at least five pictures that demonstrate solids, liquids and gases with facts describing each state.  I will post the students' work next week.

I will use this book as a read aloud during the week.  Great level for third grade and up.  Many books on this topic are too basic for my fifth graders.

Here is a page that my kids will put in their science notebooks.  I will have them use notebook reinforcer stickers to represent molecules.  I just drew dots on my example that I made.  I bought stickers and they are at school.  The page would be great on a bulletin board. 

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