Periodic Table with a Twist!
This was my students’ all time favorite project of the year and mine, too! I had them do this project because we started out learning about chemical reactions. I was going to start out with a tournament between elements in which the children had to argue that their element was the most valuable, interesting, or useful. I took this idea from byrdseed.com. The tournament bracket idea evolved into this more fantastic project.
Children chose an element that they wanted to research. I did this with elementary students, so what I was asking of them was pretty advanced! I asked them to find the group, period, symbol, atomic mass, atomic number, atomic structure, and the other elements that they reacted with. They created a rectangle to wear on their chest so that they resembled a periodic table rectangle. In addition they had to dress up like their element. Children created a mini speech from their research explaining the element to parents and the students who visited. I received many compliments about this project! I called it the Living Periodic Table. I love that this name added some mystery since the idea is very original. I didn’t “google it”. The idea naturally came as we were working on research. I arranged the students in the cafeteria in rows and columns like the real Periodic Table. This is why it was called “The Living Periodic Table”. Another added element that I loved was when I told the students they had to defend why their element was better than another element. The children absolutely LOVED this!
“I’m better than you because I’m more malleable,” one metal argued with another.
One more aspect that added fun to this was that the children had to create a button that someone had to push in order to listen to the speech about their element. This idea is similar to when one walks through a wax museum to listen to the exhibit. I had been collecting lids, and the children painted and/or decorated lids to make their button. They could place the button anywhere around their exhibit. Many of the students decided to place it on the Periodic Table rectangle they were wearing. Teacher alert…I had to caution the girls about doing so because I wouldn’t want the button to be inappropriately placed on a girl’s anatomy. Ha! I’m sure you understand!
I invited parents to drop by and listen to their child while we were set up. They were set up in the cafeteria in the same order of the Periodic Table. This definitely made it amusing when all of the radioactive elements were closer together because of doing it this way! They definitely had fun debating about who was more deadly while wearing their caution tape! We didn’t have every element, but we had about 30 kids which is enough to make it work. All who came were impressed. It was a win, win.!
Teachers, if you decide to do this, know that I had children plan a speech that was about 90 seconds to describe their element. We worked on our public speaking skills beforehand. Also, at first I thought I would have to have classes walk through the exhibit in a line, but it really worked for the children to free flow. I scheduled about 10 minutes for a classroom to walk through the exhibit with about five minute for transition. Only children who can’t handle a little independent freedom would need to be supervised. I hope this sparks some unique lesson idea for you!
Hold It in Your Brain!
While teaching have you ever walked the plank with small children? It goes something like this. You get everyone on the carpet with a quiet mouth. Everyone is criss-cross-apple-sauced. Then one raises their hand. Do you call on this one child? You know you could lose the captivated audience but you do it anyway. You call on the one hand.
The child says, “It’s my mom’s birthday.”
I say, “Well, happy birthday to your mom!” It goes down hill from there.
Another child raises their hand. You call on them. “It’s my dog’s birthday.”
Then another child is reminded that it’s his uncle’s cat’s birthday and so on. Before long, you have spent 15 minutes learning about everyone and literally their dog’s birthday. Then someone raises their hand and asks permission to go to the bathroom. To remedy this I began saying this, and it worked so well the first time that I continued using this phrase.
Can you hold it in your brain? I hold my clenched fists beside my temples to resemble holding my thoughts in my brain. It works wonders for self control! I hope this idea is a gift to you!
Shut the Door and Teach
I’m reaffirmed in my stance on math education. I’ve been a math interventionist, math coach, and worked with advanced learners. A few years ago I was working with a gifted learner because he couldn’t get the correct answer to a multiplication problem. He had spent three fourths of the page trying to solve the problem with the box method/area model. With our current math education we teach multiple strategies to learners. You can do it this way, or this way…..or this way…whatever strategy works best for you. Students end up with so many strategies they can’t find their way out of a paper sack! Even when I sat with this particular child and showed him the “old fashioned” way of multiplying double times double digits, he still wanted to gravitate towards the area model. Another child this week was confusing two different strategies and was not able to get the correct answer because of it.
Last week I went to visit a former students who had left to go to a private school. He was excited to show me his sticker collection, his cats, and how he was leaning long division. Guess what?! No 15 strategies to arrive at the answers, and he was getting it right. Why are we making math difficult for students when it doesn’t have to be? At my school by the way, math fact drills are forbidden unless it’s covert. I’m of the ask forgiveness and not permission on the math fact drills. I will continue. Why do we have to make learning so difficult when it doesn’t have to be?
My Favorite First Grade Spider Lessons…
Since my original post here., I have honed and improved my spiders lessons. Here’s the simple approach.
Lesson 1: I read the Hey Little Ant book and we talk about the perspective of ants and spiders. Should you or should you not squish the ant? What if it was a spider? The students do a short writing piece and draw a picture about what they would do. I tell students to be looking for spiders and ants on the playground. We sing the spider song in Deanna Jump’s spider unit. (I repeatedly sing this every time I come while teaching spiders.
Lesson 2: I share a spider power point with lots of different spiders. We talk about which ones are poisonous and which ones aren’t. We also discuss spider body parts.
Lesson 3: We build the spiders which you see pictured in this post. I give the children labels for the spider body parts. If students do everything correctly, I give them a bow (Deanna Jump’s idea) which they can turn into a girl spider’s hair bow or a boy spider’s bow tie.
The children really enjoy this, and it brings happiness to the hallway which in turn makes me happy!
Cheer Up Your Colleagues!
When morale is low, I like to surprise my coworkers with a surprise treat in their mailboxes. It doesn’t take much to grab some cookies and candy from the grocery store and put it in a little sack with a kind note. This gives someone something to look forward to eating all day. Here I picked up some pumpkin cookies, threw in some candy corns and attached a cute note. On the note I included a riddle…What makes jack-o-lanterns so smart? A candle makes them bright!
A Hug? But like This?
Many times the best ideas come fromm the students. This year I was teaching the kinder students how to say hello to me in the hallway. I tell them to tap their head when they see me. I tell them that this is like our secret handshake. Many kinder children cannot contain themselves and want to hug me in the hallway and jump out of line. I can’t be disturbing the teacher who has just herded kittens to travel someplace, and I warn the children accordingly.
Well, enter grand idea! So I notice this one kindergartener tapping her tummy. I asked why was she tapping her belly. She said it is a secret hug! Oh my goodness!! How precious! Love this!
Children have the best ideas!
Coordinate Grid Update
This great resource had an update due to a customer request. Someone asked for an alpha numeric version, so that is also now included in the document. I still like the true coordinate grid version best. Check out this popular resource!
