Day 94: Whiteboarding, Bouncy Ball Energy, & Classifying Matter

February 8, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / Leave a comment

AP Physics: Whiteboarding

Students whiteboarded their answers to yesterday’s problems. There were a couple of meaty ones on the worksheet, so I had all groups whiteboard the same problem and then we had several consensus-building conversations.

A visual for quantization of charge

Physics: Bouncy Ball Energy

We wrapped up figuring out where a bouncy ball dissipates energy. As part of the follow-up, we dropped a kickball under a motion detector (thanks to Brian Frank for the idea!) to produce energy vs. time graphs and confirm the results from students’ video analysis.

kickball e-t graphs.PNG

Chemistry Essentials: Classifying Matter

Students worked on a worksheet to connect particle diagrams to the vocabulary for classifying matter that we introduced yesterday. I also was able to have really good individual interactions with a couple of students I’ve been butting heads with a lot, which helped make the whole classroom feel more relaxed and positive. I’ve been getting overwhelmed in chemistry a lot this year and have not done a good job of making time to talk to students about things besides chem, and I can’t underestimate the value of those conversations.

Day 92: Board Meeting, Dissipated Energy, & Mistakes Game

February 6, 2018February 6, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / Leave a comment

AP Physics: Board Meeting
Students whiteboarded their results from a Pivot Interactives activity on Coulomb’s Law. There was some debate over whether inverse or inverse-square was the right linearization; I usually don’t have students sketch their points on their whiteboards, but I think that would have been helpful today. Students did a nice job connecting their results to Newton’s Laws and their knowledge from chemistry.

This group ran out of space for their linearization, but I found their set of graphs very satisfying.

Physics: Dissipated Energy

We continued prep for determining which interaction causes a bouncy ball to dissipate energy (my article about this activity was published in the January issue of The Science Teacher) by whiteboarding key points of yesterday’s work. Today really seemed to help a lot of students see the connections between the energy bar charts, free-body diagrams, and velocity vs. time graphs, which is exactly what I was going for.

Chemistry Essentials: Mistakes Game

We used the mistakes game to go over yesterday’s problems. There was some great discussion, but it was very tough to keep students from breaking into side conversations. Next time, I should spend a little more time making sure behavior expectations are explicit as possible and helping students see the value in those expectations. There were also some students who were extremely engaged and clearly developed a lot of confidence in sketching Borh models today, which was awesome.

Day 88: Board Meeting, Energy CERs, & Periodic Trends

January 30, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / 3 Comments

AP Physics: Board Meeting

Students whiteboarded their results from the standing waves lab and the wave equation came nicely out of the discussion. I usually give students a minute or two to pre-discuss with their lab group once we circle up with the boards, but I think I can skip that time in my 2nd hour; they dove immediately into asking questions and making comments across groups, which is a great sign of how comfortable with each other and with talking physics.

waves wb.jpg

Physics: Energy CERs

Students wrote CERs with their lab groups to make qualitative predictions about objects like the seismic accelerator and a ballistic pendulum. A lot of groups struggled a lot with what good reasoning looks like, which is not surprising. We’ve backed away from reasoning tasks in Physics this year because many students are struggling on the quantitative problems, but I need to remind myself that students need the reasoning tasks to practice the sensemaking we want them to do on problems.

nrg cer.jpg

Chemistry Essentials: Periodic Trends

Students used yesterday’s cards alongside their periodic tables to start looking at the patterns in the periodic table. Students made a lot of good observations and started asking questions about the legs used to represent valence electrons, which should make for a nice lead in to atomic structure.

card sort 2

Day 87: Standing Waves, Whiteboards, & Elements Card Sort

January 29, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / Leave a comment

AP Physics: Standing Waves

Between parent teacher conferences and a bad cold, I failed to actually assign the Pivot Interactives activity I’d planned for Friday to any classes, which made it a little tricky for them to complete. Today, I actually assigned it and they collected data to find a relationship between the wavelength and frequency of a standing wave. The upside is my students had a very self-directed activity while I was still not at 100%.

Physics: Whiteboarding

The majority of my students attempted the problems I left for them to do with Friday’s sub, which is a nice sign of progress. Today, we spent some time whiteboarding the problems, mostly using gallery walks. I gave each problem to at least two different groups so they could compare answers and approaches before the gallery walk, which helped build some confidence. In another sign of progress, in one group that is usually pretty quick to ask for help, one member insisted that today, they would discuss every question before they asked me and told me to wait several times when her groupmates called me over. In the end, they were able to reason their way through every question they had.

Chemistry Essentials: Elements Card Sort

Students worked on a card sort activity loosely based on Mendeleev’s process for developing the periodic table. Each group picked two properties to sort by (one for columns and one for rows), and quickly noticed that other patterns started popping out. I also got a lot of students eager to know what some of the features of the cards represent, so it will be nice to tie some upcoming activities back to this one. Though, I need to brush up on my history a little bit to explain how Mendeleev knew some of these properties.

Day 82: Springs, Linearization, & Whiteboarding

January 19, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / 1 Comment

AP Physics: Springs

Students started collecting data for variables that affect the period of a spring. I found it interesting that students were quick to suggest stretching the spring farther to change the period after seeing angle doesn’t matter for a pendulum; I suspect they just aren’t making the connection yet. A lot of groups used motion detectors to measure the period, and one student found the graphs so satisfying she snapped a photo of the LabQuest to show off.

Physics: Linearization

Students were pretty quick to treat yesterday’s data on the compression of a spring launcher vs. a cart’s change in height as linear, probably because we haven’t linearized any graphs in a while. We spent some time today talking about what intercept would make sense and why before a quick review of linearization. Afterwards, groups worked on making linearized graphs of their data.

Chemistry Essentials: Whiteboarding

Students did some whiteboarding the problems from yesterday. I had all groups whiteboard the same problem, when we shifted to whole group discussion. The physical space in my room lends itself pretty well to having whole group discussions with students at the lab tables, but a lot of students were having trouble with the transition to whole group discussion. Next time, I think I will have students physically move to give a clearer cue that we are changing the kind of activity.

Day 80: Big Pendulum, Mistakes Game, & Phase Change

January 17, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / Leave a comment

Classes were short today so we could work with our homerooms on registration for next year.

AP Physics: Big Pendulum

After a quiz, we went to the front entrance to measure the period of a 5 m long pendulum so students could see how well their model so far fits the result before tomorrow’s board meeting. I’m hoping the period of this pendulum will push students to try linearizing their data.

Physics: Mistakes Game

We did some mistakes whiteboarding with energy bar charts. One of my AVID students commented that it reminds her of AVID tutorials, which is spot on. I also had a group tell the class “If you need a hint, you should read the problem”, and I took the opportunity to point out that is always good advice.

Chemistry Essentials: Phase Change

Students graphed their data and we started talking about the results of the phase change lab. Last tri, when I let students have one group member put the data into Desmos, I found that the rest of the group would typically ignore the graph, so I had every student graph by hand today. while students paid more attention to the shape of their graph, it was pretty laborious so I want to keep thinking about how to approach the graph for this lab.

Day 77: CER, Mistakes Game, & Particle Diagrams

January 11, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / Leave a comment

AP Physics: CER

Students have been struggling to explain their reasoning effectively, so we took a day to do some TIPERs problems on projectiles and energy using the CER framework. Most groups started with their claim, so I think next time, I will give some time for students to draw and interpret diagrams before I ask them for an answer. Its tempting to see what would happen with a goal-less TIPERs problem.

Physics: Mistakes Game

We played the mistakes game with yesterday’s pie chart problems. This is the first time I’ve done it this trimester, and I was surprised at how many students were very nervous about the prospect of presenting a board with unintentional mistakes, even after some discussion about whether anyone would know whether or a not a mistake was intentional. I need to keep working on building a sense of community and safety in this course.

Chemistry Essentials: Particle Diagrams

I showed students some examples of thermal expansion and had students whiteboard particle diagrams to explain what was happening. A few students made some great connections to the labs we’ve done.

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Day 76: Projectile Practical, Pie Charts, & Whiteboarding

January 10, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / Leave a comment

AP Physics: Projectile Practical

Students did a lab practical to predict where a horizontal projectile will hit the ground. Once they succeeded, I asked them to predict where a lighter marble would land without any new measurements aside from mass. Some groups had an easier time than others explaining their prediction, so I need to keep embedding these opportunities in labs and holding students accountable for thorough explanations.

Retired referral forms work well as carbon paper

Physics: Pie Charts

Students worked on sketching energy pie charts. I added defining the system today; during forces, we almost always ended up with systems that had a single object, so a few students were bothered by including multiple objects. I also worked very hard to avoid telling students whether they were right or wrong, which drove a few of them nuts, but pushed them to justify their answers to their groups.

Chemistry Essentials: Whiteboarding

Groups whiteboarded yesterday’s problems. I decided to have all groups whiteboard the same problem without any intentional mistakes, then have a consensus-building discussion for each problem. Students were pretty engaged; a lot of students who checked out yesterday felt like they had some extra accountability, which in turn pushed them to ask more questions and have some good discussions.

chem wb.jpg

Day 75: Projectile Whiteboarding, Pie Charts, & Gas Laws

January 9, 2018January 10, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / Leave a comment

AP Physics: Projectile Whiteboarding

Around half of my students were on a field trip today. We did some mistakes whiteboarding with the problems from yesterday, followed by some practice writing good explanations for “explain your reasoning” problems using CER.

Physics: Pie Charts

A lot of Physics students were also on the field trip, so my classes were pretty thin. After discussing yesterdays’ lab and introducing the “flavors” of energy, students worked on drawing energy pie charts. I usually skip this representation, but we decided to see if it helps with the struggles students have had this year with conceptual understanding.

Chemistry Essentials: Gas Laws

We went over the results of yesterdays’ simulation to derive the gas laws. Just like last trimester, I’m introducing them as proportions, rather than equations, and am pleased with how that’s working so far. I skipped spending a day on temperature and particle movement this tri, but I ended up missing that a lot today.

Day 73: Multiple Choice, Forces, & Gas Laws

January 5, 2018 / Marta R. Stoeckel / 1 Comment

AP Physics: Multiple Choice

After a quiz on projectile motion graphs, we spent some time using Plickers to practice multiple choice on energy and projectiles. One of my classes pretty openly started guessing, rather than thinking about the problems, so I think we may be doing multiple choice a little too regularly. I may start either alternating each week between relevant multiple choice and free response or just use quiz days for explicit AP practice less often.

Physics: Forces

Before today’s quiz, students whiteboarded their diagrams for the problems earlier this week. Pretty consistently at this point, the students who take the time to get their diagrams right do fine on the calculations, which is not surprising. Getting students to put units in their work is still a challenge, but I saw a lot more confidence from my students today than I have in a while.

forces wb.jpg

Chemistry Essentials: Gas Laws

Before today’s quiz, we did a quick debrief of yesterday’s lab on the gas laws. Since the ice water didn’t work well yesterday, I tried putting them outside (the air temperature was -10 degrees F today!), but still didn’t see much change, so I think the syringes I have just don’t seal well enough. We’ll finish the post-lab discussion on Monday.

Maker:S,Date:2017-10-21,Ver:6,Lens:Kan03,Act:Lar02,E-ve