Under the Microscope: New Science Curriculum and Instruction

Changing curriculum/textbooks is always a challenge, but an exciting challenge that I welcome!  Embracing the science standards and revising the unit of studies from August through May have been just like starting my teaching profession at ground zero.  Attempting to implement interactive science notebooks, making hands-on experiments a weekly part of science class, and embedding technology-based projects to reinforce learning or to make presentations of learning is the very heart of this teacher's pursuit to equip students for further learning and preparation for their impact on society once they leave the walls of our school.  Whew! That being said, each unit has been carefully put together with the hopes that my students will have a love and excitement for exploring their world and an increase in their scientific inquiry of the world they live.

Thinking Involves Doing!

Students utilize the opportunity of experimenting with materials during a unit on force and motion to test a hypothetical question.  Thinking does involve doing!  Students need opportunities to explore before they research and read information pertaining to force and motion.  Often times it is through the opportunity to manipulate the same materials that will be used in later, multiple experiments, that students will have a base knowledge to test other ideas, such as what types of surfaces will affect the amount of force the tested object (i.e., marbles, balls, toy cars, etc..) will have. 

Giving kids the chance to explore prior to the lesson gets them to thinking so that once they learn the answers, they will have made lasting connections.

Classrooms that Cultivate Deep Thinking

Let's examine a classroom where students are challenged to make their thinking visible.  What would that look like?  Isn't this an environment where students have the opportunities to collaborate with a partner based on intentional and practiced opportunities to listen and share, comfortably, with mutual respect for one another's thoughts, opinions, and experiences.  Now, take that concept a step further where the students have the chance to examine a Biblical passage and the opportunity to see how God's word applies to the central theme, a character's actions, or the choices that lead to historical events in the overall timeline of our lives and the lives of people of the past.  What does this look like within the classroom?  Students make connections to world events, personal events, things they have read, and to God's Word.  Why not challenge students to write about those connections to their reading passages or their science and mathematics experiments and work.  Do your students keep interactive journals for core subjects?  What do these look like, and how do they integrate God's Word with their discoveries and notations at the end of the day?  I will be including samples of students' work, and I look forward to hearing what this looks like in your classrooms!  Please share!

What Makes Christian Education Distinctive?

Integrating God's Word into every aspect of the classroom is what differentiates the regular educational environment from the Christian educational environment.  Examining every subject through the lens of God's Word is the very heartbeat of what makes a Christian education distinctively unique.  In shaping the hearts and minds of students with a biblical worldview as the very center of everything we do in Christian education, we must consider the scripture, "Jesus grew in wisdom, and stature, and in favor with God and man." Luke 2:52  How do we move our students to be like Jesus in this attempt to assist them to grow in wisdom, stature, and favor with God and man?  Wisdom is based on core subjects that include application of the Bible.  Students are challenged to make connections to the Bible as they study themes of science, social studies, and arithmetic.  How do students grow in stature?  How does this look distinctively different in a Christian educational environment?  Not only are the heart and mind exercised by God's Word, but students are challenged to excel in athletics and the arts.  To grow in stature is to be given all opportunities to exercise the God-given talents and abilities that develop as children grown into young adults.  Finally, to grow in favor with God and man, what does this aspect look like?  Students are instructed in God's Word through both oral recitation and deep Bible study.  From a very young age, students are to be given multiple opportunities to serve as missionaries to others through opportunities to give of themselves, either financially or physically.  Students are given at least one opportunity to give their time and energy to serve others through missional experiences both within and outside of the community and country.  Finally, it must not be forgotten that any caregiver, teacher, coach, support staff, and administrator is a born-again follower of Christ.  Not only are these people Christ-followers, but they have an active and ongoing daily walk with Christ.  It is imperative that the wellspring of all teaching be based on committed and active relationships with Christ.  This is the foundation of a distinctive Christian education.

Literacy Instruction

What strategies and routines do you implement within your literacy instruction that evoke deeper thinking as evidenced through peer dialogue in pair-share situations?  I am excited to use this venue to share and corroborate with other teachers, literacy specialists, coaches, and administrators best practices, both current and old.