Unit Reflective Summary

Molly ONeill
Murdock
Fourth grade

Lesson: Weather

I created thisunit based on the data I collected from their weather pre-test.
The students had a great deal of knowledge on most of the concepts except
fronts and air masses.

This lesson began with engaging the students will a fun song about fronts
(Youtube).

Students were put into groups and given a weather map. They explored fronts
and weather by predicting the types of weather that would occur at each front.
They did this on their own and collaborated with peers to make their
predictions. We then came back together and I conducted an experiment with
blue ice cubes and red water. This demonstrated how the cold air moves under
the warm air. Students shared their weather predictions with each other and
misunderstandings and incorrect predictions were addressed.

As a class we had a small discussion about fronts. The students took notes in
their journal on fronts and air masses.

Last, the students reflected on the activities and explained cold and hot fronts
and the weather associated with those fronts in a written essay.

I feel that the combination of the weather map, experiment, and class
discussion really helped all students to understand fronts. They had some
really great collaborative discussions within their discovery groups with the
weather maps. They were much more engaged, then if they were reading about
it or listening to me talk about it. Overall the whole activity was successful and
all but one student showed a solid understanding of the content through the
reflection.

The weather front activity did not work the first time I tried it. I had not tried it
at home first, so that was a mistake. The second time we tried it was
successful and the blue cold water went under the red warmer water. I did not
provide a stable enough place the first time.

I felt as the students were creating the weather reports that it was a train
wreck. But once we got them filmed and I assessed them, it was much better
than I thought. Just a few groups had missing parts and that was mostly
because of poor time management on their part.

I feel that the student objective were attained in the activity.

When I teach this lesson again I will conduct it in the same way, because I did
feel that it was successful. I will have a better handle on the experiment part. I
will also have all the weather maps be completely different and add seasons to
the map. I was nervous that having too much diversity in the maps would be
too hard to manage. Therefore, I used maps that were pretty similar. I also did
not specify a season and I realized after that would make a difference. I think
more diversity would have created even more conversation and a deeper
understanding. I was able to successfully use strategies I have learned through
my coursework with KSU. I was also more confident with the knowledge on the
content.