Our Take Action: Teaching a Lesson at Becker's Green Garden
What We Did: Our group went to Becker Elementary School to teach a fourth grade class about the water cycle and how it affects their school garden. We prepared a lesson plan that connected what the students were learning in their science class to the garden. This lesson included an activity that simulated the movement of water molecules in the water cycle by having each student act as a water molecule that follows the instructions at different stations that each represented collection, condensation, evaporation, and precipitation. After completing the activity, we had a few questions that we asked the students to respond to in their journals as well have the kids draw a diagram of the water cycle. During this time we also took half of the class to water their garden plot and used watering the plants as an immediate visual example of the water cycle.
How it Went: We felt that our lesson went well. The kids seemed very engaged, and it helped them to understand how the water cycle affects the garden, and them in their everyday lives. The only thing we struggled with was that we underplanned a little for the amount of time we had to teach. Our game didn't go for as long as we were expecting it to, and we had to improvise. This ended up working out, as we were able to demonstrate how the water cycle worked in the garden, by watering the plants and sparking conversation between the kids.
Feedback: We got some feedback from the teacher who's class we were teaching, Sofia Rodriguez: "Thank you for coming to teach the lesson! The materials your group prepared were very creative and the activity was engaging. You were successful in connecting the water cycle to the importance to our garden and all living organisms. Some room for growth: The game was a lot of fun, but it would be more the engagement part at the beginning of the lesson. The core lesson would follow after the game, perhaps a reading piece, a sort, or a project. After the core lesson would follow some sort of closing to the lesson where the students can work independently or discuss the concept further with a small group. Instead of having students generally write about the water cycle, it would be interesting to have open-ended questions that dig further into the topic. I would suggest typing up the questions and have the students glue it in their journal so they can have a guideline of what they are supposed to write. I would then have students share their writing with their group followed by picking a few students to share with the whole class what they wrote."
Below is a gallery of photographs taken by Des during our lesson. The gallery includes photos of our teaching materials being used by the kids, of the journaling we had the kids do after our activity, of our group members teaching, and of the garden we were teaching in.
How it Went: We felt that our lesson went well. The kids seemed very engaged, and it helped them to understand how the water cycle affects the garden, and them in their everyday lives. The only thing we struggled with was that we underplanned a little for the amount of time we had to teach. Our game didn't go for as long as we were expecting it to, and we had to improvise. This ended up working out, as we were able to demonstrate how the water cycle worked in the garden, by watering the plants and sparking conversation between the kids.
Feedback: We got some feedback from the teacher who's class we were teaching, Sofia Rodriguez: "Thank you for coming to teach the lesson! The materials your group prepared were very creative and the activity was engaging. You were successful in connecting the water cycle to the importance to our garden and all living organisms. Some room for growth: The game was a lot of fun, but it would be more the engagement part at the beginning of the lesson. The core lesson would follow after the game, perhaps a reading piece, a sort, or a project. After the core lesson would follow some sort of closing to the lesson where the students can work independently or discuss the concept further with a small group. Instead of having students generally write about the water cycle, it would be interesting to have open-ended questions that dig further into the topic. I would suggest typing up the questions and have the students glue it in their journal so they can have a guideline of what they are supposed to write. I would then have students share their writing with their group followed by picking a few students to share with the whole class what they wrote."
Below is a gallery of photographs taken by Des during our lesson. The gallery includes photos of our teaching materials being used by the kids, of the journaling we had the kids do after our activity, of our group members teaching, and of the garden we were teaching in.