Is it real? Does it matter? CGI and the world of the Nature of Science!

Yesterday Anne Barker, another crazy science facilitator working here at the IPL, Te Whai Toi Tangata, University of Waikato, sent me this lovely picture of a wee dragon hatching on the hills of Wales. It was an interesting coincidence as I had been busy saving some CGI images the day before!
I've been thinking for a while that these would be interesting to use with students and in different ways. With all this miserable weather and the end of the term drawing nigh, I thought these might make for some interesting science activities. If you do use them, do remind children that this is science time -how we observe, think and communicate might be a little different to other subjects and we want to develop that science lens as well as an awareness of what 'science' is, how it works.

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 Before I even start getting children to do the 'thinking', I would grab these photos as a chance to develop those observation skills. Yes, we do want to hone inferencing and 'interpreting data' but for now, ask the children about what they can see. These observations or noticings need to be what we can directly see... I can't say, of my new favourite picture above, I can see very sharp teeth -because firstly, I can't feel these teeth (and would rather not!) and secondly, they might just look sharp but be rather blunt! I could say I can see x amount of teeth. They are all pointed at the tips and look like little isosceles triangles. Then I could add an inference of I think the teeth might be sharp. Another example is looking at the wet fur. Again, I can't be sure it's wet just from looking at it. It may be that the aaaah alli-bear (bear-igator?) is two-tone with its colouring. I notice that the legs and back half of the creature is a lot darker than the shoulders and head. I notice that it's running through water and there's a lot of splashes... I think that fur might be wet. I might do a bit of inferring -do you think the creature is running slow or fast? What do you notice that might help with your inferences? I think that it's running fast because when I run fast through water, the splashes are larger (prior knowledge) than when I walk. It's also on a bit of an angle which leads me to think it's running very quick. Again, we can't be sure of any of these facts, they're all inferences!

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After some observations I might ask the children whether they think it is real or not. Critiquing is an important skill, as is developing that 'sceptical disposition'. There are lots of rather interesting sites out there with some not really being very clear as to whether they are 'true' or not. I'm always surprised how quickly some people will believe a Facebook claim or an internet photo -recently a couple returned home to find a meteorite had landed in their backyard. It was a NZ story and ran for a couple of days until it was realised that there was a prankster involved!

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If we think the picture isn't real, how come? What leads you to believe that? What clues are there? Yes, we can just run to google, but let's spend some time talking about it, thinking about it, critiquing, communicating, agreeing and disagreeing! How do we do this without using phrases like you're an idiot of course they're not real! We want to grow these communication skills so you might need to scaffold the way we could argue with one another. As I was chatting about this blogpost with Anne, she commented again on the Welsh dragons at the top -how could I know if they're real? I wonder if you had some general knowledge, that may help with thinking... We talk about the science capabilities and the Nature of Science and the importance of having contexts -this is the science knowledge bit and something that causes lots of arguments... what knowledge is important for children to have? Is it the life cycle of the Monarch butterfly? How to draw an electrical circuit? To understand how the phases of the moon happen? I have some of my own ideas that I think are important but I really like the way a teacher commented at a recent workshop (and sorry if I misquote you Robyn!) about the idea that simply having some knowledge might give you the confidence and want to know more stuff.
 I'm also particularly interested in clever CGI pictures that have hands in them -it sort of causes me to think twice about whether they are real or not!

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My second idea for these photos is thinking about explanations... What might these new creatures do? What kind of habitats (using scientific vocabulary!) would they have? What would they eat? Would there be predators? How would they interact with humans? Might we kill them all because they'll kill us? Might we keep them as pets? I'm also thinking about what aspects of each animal are retained in the mutation...

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With my little monkey-rabbit... would this new creature retain all the intelligence within the brain of the monkey? Would its teeth be right for what kind of food the rabbit body wants? I'm imagining that the monkey's teeth will be more omnivorous and perhaps not so suited to a total herbivorous lifestyle. With a straight head swap, if there was trouble, the animal would have trouble climbing a tree to get away! A pony's teeth on the beaver head may struggle to eat fish, or gnaw a log for the dam so this creature might need to choose a different lifestyle.
If we decided that the animal has in fact evolved this way rather than a head swap so all the parts work together in harmony, what might it eat? How might it live?

boredpanda

Because we're wanting to motivate our children to want to write and read, could these activities be used as a motivation? As an observer, you see one of these animals in its natural habitat... What do you see? Hear? How does it move? How does it catch food? The children might need to know how the original animals live first (a bit of reading or YouTube videos!) and then decide which parts they want to use for their description. Could they draw a diagram of the creature highlighting features and their purposes eg "monkey brain for intelligence"... If the children decide that this creature has been deliberately mutated, why? By who? And for what purpose? What are the benefits of this mutated animal over a normal one?

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Perhaps the students would like to create their own creatures? Was just thinking it could be interesting if you had a pile of cards and whatever is drawn out is used! What if we wanted the perfect animal for eg climbing or swimming?

Finally, where did I get all these pictures from? The dreaded Google and Facebook! oh, and if the photos have 'boredpanda' attributed, they're real!

Keep on sciencing
Paul

Gathering Evidence: or "prove it then!"

Had a lovely week away driving around the hills of Wairoa West and admiring some beautiful views. As always, I tend to be looking out the window and thinking about what I could use for a science context in this area -farming, forests, native birds, streams, waterfalls and even chemicals with a cyanide drop warning found. With all this in mind, it did get me thinking about how it would be neat to plan and teach units that were not just cross-curricular eg Science and Technology or Science with literacy and maths integrated or even Science and The Arts together (anyone for an interpretive dance sharing our understanding of sugar dissolving in water?), but also units that have more than one context strand in them.

Learning Media

The Building Science Concepts resource has a few books with more than one context strand. In fact #9 Shadows (sorry for the quality of the photo) covers three! I've always thought that the NZC has lots and lots of ideas for each strand. The Physical World strand at Levels 3 and 4 (in this case the AOs are the same) has this to say:

New Zealand Curriculum

If we only focused on this strand, I can see at least 8 possible units: movement, forces, electricity, magnetism, light, sound, waves, and heat! I do like that this strand really reflects the essence statement with "explore, describe and represent" as some of these phenomena are still argued about voraciously!
Perhaps a teacher could develop a unit with the Physical World concept of heat alongside the Material World concept of insulation (pinched that idea from the BSCs!) -what keeps heat in?, how does heat 'work', what makes things lose their heat?, and most importantly, why is my cup of tea always cold by the time I remember it! I'm wondering if you could squeeze some Technology into this too...

Anyway the reason for the blog was to think about 'gathering evidence'. Some schools are in the midst of report writing so I thought a little bit on the idea of assessment might be helpful. If we are deliberate about wanting to develop the students' thinking and capabilities in science, we need to know what they know, as well as where we think they might need to be eg at Level 3. Unless the unit of 'Heat' is taught every year, the assessments will probably be summative: Paul knows/does not know about heat... If instead we look at the Nature of Science or the science capabilities, we can probably be more formative: Paul is able to represent his ideas in a drawing clearly showing that he is aware that heat transfers. He is beginning to use scientific vocabulary to describe his diagram to the teacher... Although this looks like a context strand assessment, I'm actually assessing this delightful little student's "Communicating in Science" (NoS) and "Interpret Representations" (science capability) ability through the context of heat (Physical World). From this I can see Paul is starting to use this capability and as he's Level 1, I'm quite pleased with his progress! Where to next might be thinking about getting Paul to show movement or change in his diagrams/pictures, or perhaps critiquing other students' work. I might like to move him from "beginning to" to "using" scientific vocabulary... And as he gets older, he might be able to record these ideas on the paper with more confidence...

Me at Level 1!

At Year 7/8 I might expect students to share more information, use arrows, represent the transfer of heat, use scientific vocabulary and write in the correct genre for a diagram. 

In terms of gathering evidence to show how Paul is going, I could look through his science journal where he has scribbled ideas, drawn diagrams, posed and answered questions, planned investigations, gathered data, interpreted data, formulated/suggested/written explanations, etc... It might be through a video that his group has put together sharing their investigation and what they think happened or a chart or a diagram... It could be through something quite wildly different. I wasn't joking about children doing an interpretive dance for dissolving sugar in water! I once watched a video (and I wish I could find it now to share) where children were showing what happens to your shadow as the sun moves through the sky (and yes, I know the sun doesn't move, it's us!) with a child being the sun, a child standing and another child being the shadow. One group clearly showed that, as the sun is higher in the sky, the shadows are shorter and always exactly opposite wherever the sun is in the sky. It might look like a straight context assessment but really, this is ticking off the NoS too! 

For me, I'm still working through how much knowledge is needed or necessary and whether we should assess this part of our science curriculum. I do think it's important as knowing 'stuff' may help us want to learn more (and practice the capabilities more!) but I'm just not sure how much is 'enough' and how to ensure the children are developing this knowledge with my support and not me simply dumping it on them!

Anyway, that's enough for a quick share on gathering evidence... I'd love to hear how you are trying out different ways to find out where the children are at... Oh, and we haven't even started on progressions :-)

Keep sciencing on...

Paul