Abby Borth- Elementary Science Methods

  What did you do in lab today? In lab, we first looked at what a rock is and found that a rock is any solid mass of mineral or mineral-like matter that occurs naturally as part of our planet.  These will not be human-made materials.  We then explored rock cycles through an activity with Starbursts. We created two different sedimentary rocks, igneous rocks, and metamorphic rocks. We learned that a sedimentary rock is one that is cemented and compacted together, an igneous rock is melted and then cooled, and a metamorphic rock is heat (not enough to melt) and pressure. The top two rocks represent igneous rocks, the middle two represent metamorphic rocks, and the bottom two represent sedimentary rocks. We created our igneous and metamorphic rocks by using heat and created the sedimentary rocks by compacting them together and changing our pressure and color.  What was the big question? It it a rock? What are the differences between sedimentary, igneous, and me...

What did you do in lab today? In lab, we looked at geological time using an earthviewer. We learned how geology can have an affect on many events such as the 2008 presidential election. We then hypothesized where these events fell on a timeline of earth: humans appeared, dinosaurs ruled the earth, first land plants, first land animals, and moon was created. We then placed these on a timeline. After this, we explored significant events in the history of earth using an earthviewer. Each team worked in the range of a billion years and placed these on our timeline as well. We found that humans have not been around very long compared to the other events of earth.  In order, here are some of the highlights of Earth's history:     1. Earth and moon formed ~4.5 billion years ago (bya)   2. Oxygen begins to persist in the atmosphere (2.4 bya)   3. Origin of Chloroplast (1.6 bya)   4. Cambrian explosion, huge diversity in types of life on Earth, not land animals like...

1. What did you do in lab today? In lab, each group presented on their chosen concept such as origin of the universe, life cycles of stars, origin of the earth, galaxies, space travel, and black holes. My group did origin of the earth. These presentations included preconceptions, current science understanding, and other information. It was interesting to hear all of the preconceptions. I found that a lot of understandings come from religious or cultural beliefs. While these are known beliefs, they are not proven by science. It was also interesting to hear how we are continually learning more and these theories continue to change each day.  2. What was the big question? What are the preconceptions and current science understanding of various space topics? 3. What did you learn in Thursday's discussion? In lecture, I learned more about the origin of the universe. The current theory is the Big Bang Theory. We looked at how subatomic particles inflated to unimaginably huge size in a fr...

1. What did you do in lab today? In lab, we built a scale model of the sun and the 4 inner planets, as well as our moon. This had to be in scale in size and in distance. We learned that the solar system is really big in both distance and size. Planets are much farther away than we can ever imagine. We found that quite a few illustrations of this are inaccurate.  2. What was the big question? How big is the Solar System? 3. What did you learn in Thursday's discussion? In lecture, I learned about the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn. Tropic of Cancer is the northernmost point of direct sunlight (Northern Hemisphere). Tropic of Capricorn is the southernmost point of direct sunlight (Southern Hemisphere). I also learned that for every one revolution, the moon does one rotation, so it spins on an axis similar to how the earth does but much slower. I also learned the most supported theory of where the moon came from. A protoplanet crashed into Earth after Earth had formed and...

  1. What did you do in lab today? This week in lab, we explored the questions below by using a light as the sun and having models of the earth and moon at our tables. We looked at how the earth rotates on its own axis, producing the 24- hour day. We learned that the earth's axis is also the cause of the seasons. When the earth's axis points towards the sun, it is summer for that hemisphere. When the earth's axis points away, winter can be expected. Earth also orbits around the sun, producing the 365- day year. The moon takes about one month to orbit earth. The moon spins on its axis once each time it orbits the earth. Because of this, people on Earth only ever see one side of the Moon. The phases of the moon occur as the moon orbits the earth, this changes the way the sun shines on it and reflects different phases of the moon.  2. What was the big question? What are your best understandings about How the phases of the moon occur? What causes the seasons? What causes a luna...

  1. This week in lab, we continued to look at the question, how can we support play that is exciting but not dangerous? For this we looked at the specific question, how can we design a safe and durable playground surface? For this, we modeled a child's fall with an egg. Our challenge was to prevent an egg from breaking when dropped from a height of 1-meter. Our surface could not be any thicker than our bowl. We were able to choose from various materials to place in the bowl. We had options such as rubber, hay, saran wrap, and sand. We chose to try the rubber. This worked at 1-meter. The egg did bounce when it hit the rubber, but it did not crack. We then tried 2-meters and it bounced then cracked even after adding hay and saran wrap. In this lab, we learned that too much force will break an egg. But the more gradually the egg slows down, the smaller the force.  2. We did not have lecture this week.  3. Pendulums and Energy  I learned that energy can take many differ...

  1. This week in lab we continued to explore the question, how can we support play that is exciting but not dangerous? This week we investigated swings with the question, what affects how long it takes a swing to go back and forth? My group investigated the variable weight. Our question was, how does weight affect how long it takes a swing to go back and forth four times? We did three trials with three different weights. We did this by adding weights to a string that was connected to a stick. We made sure that we started the string in the same position each time. We timed each trial then calculated an average. We found that weight did not impact how long it would take a swing to go back and forth. There was not a large enough time difference to make it meaningful.  2. In lecture, we learned what forces acted on a child on a swing. We found that the force of the rope does and the force of gravity, and possibly air drag. The force of gravity pulls straight down and the rope pul...