Natural vs. Man-made Science Lesson

Howdy ya'll!

Recently I taught a lesson on natural and man-made objects in a kindergarten class and it turned out to be really successful! The concept of natural vs. man-made can be tricky, because there might be the kids out there who will say that God made the grass, trees, flowers, etc. Which is TRUE! Buuuut, those things are natural, they weren't made by a person in a factory!

The lesson was taught for the math/science in early childhood education course that I am currently taking. I never thought math and science could be so fun! 

The lesson had to include a graphic organizer and a hands-on activity. Graphic organizers are great for any grade level and help students (especially with learning disabilities) to organize and remember information that was taught. 

For my Kinders, I decided to use a T-chart to compare natural vs. man-made objects.When I taught the lesson, I first explained what natural and man-made objects were.  I then would show them a picture of an object and they a.) named the object and then b.) told me if the object was natural or man-made. The students were very engaged during this part of the lesson! It's easier for students to pay attention when they have a visual. 

The pictures are in black and white because I am a broke college student that can't afford color ink............ So what! :)

For the hands-on part of the activity, I had the students go to their tables and each table got some objects that were both natural and man-made and they got to explore these objects and discuss with their table if they thought the object was natural or man-made, and why they thought this. The students had fun during this part!

After the hands-on activity, I had the students match their own T-charts. I found the worksheet here: Nurturing Noggins. This was a great way to assess their learning.

Yay science!

The objects that were used :)

A student writing working on her own T-chart.

We Are Bucket Fillers!

Hello!

Over the past week and a half, I have been teaching a unit on Kindness with my kindergartners! I am interning two days a week in a Kindergarten classroom and I have been loving it. Never thought I would say that! But I can definitely see myself teaching in the lower elementary grades now! I only have three more days with the precious babies :(

Here is the link to the website where I got most of my ideas for my unit on kindness: http://s3.amazonaws.com/rak-materials/pdfs/6630/RAK-K-Caring-for-Others_20130826.pdf

The original website is www.randomactsofkindness.org and there are a ton of great lessons on kindness for all ages!

Anywho, I just wanted to show you guys some pictures of my lessons that I did, and to share how they worked out!

To start, I read the book Fill a Bucket by Carol McCloud. There are a ton of different bucket filler books, but another kindergarten teacher let me borrow this one. Let me tell you, the kiddos loved this book! As I was reading I had several saying "awww". It was the cutest. 

After we read the book, we had a little discussion about the book where I asked them questions about the book for comprehension. They did great and they had some great examples of their own ways that they can fill buckets! I also taught the kids the song that is in the beginning of the book. It's so cute and we sing it during transitions occasionally.

I also made their very own classroom bucket filler tri-fold poster board. The kids loved that as well! There are TONNNNS of bucket filler bulletin boards on the pinterest! Here are some links to some cool ones: http://www.pinterest.com/pin/208854501439030585/ and http://www.pinterest.com/pin/111675265733060444/ . My inspiration for my board mainly came from the first link!

Here is my bucket filler board! If you can't afford to spare a bulletin board, tri-fold posters are the way to go! I bought mine at wal-mart for about $7. Using mod podge and a sponge brush, I put the blue border around the edges of the board. I have found that using mod podge is a lot less mess than a glue stick or glue bottle. I then cut the little paper  cups in half (I found these for really cheap at dollar general!) and used tape (the kind that you tape boxes with) to put the cups on the board. I wrote each child's name on a cup, and even my mentor teacher and myself got a bucket! I found the blue bucket at dollar general and with a black paint marker I drew his face. I keep the pom poms in this bucket.

Each time a student fills a bucket, they get to put a pom pom in the person's whose bucket they filled, and the person's whose bucket was filled gets to put a pom pom in that person's bucket as well. :) The kids get so excited when they get to fill their buckets, and it makes me excited to see them filling buckets and being kind to one another!

The second day of the unit, we watched a YouTube clip of Wreck-It Ralph (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOQyA6Cj_cE) as an introduction to the lesson. Before the clip started, I told them to look for examples of bucket fillers and bucket dippers. It's a short clip, but it was a good way to get their attention. When the clip was done, I asked the students who was a bucket filler, and then asked who was a bucket dipper. When that was done, we discussed some pictures of kindness, which can be found on the first link where I got my lesson ideas. The pictures provided great visuals for the students to be able to see what kindness really looks like! We discussed the pictures - I asked the class what they were doing in the picture and how are those people being bucket fillers. Then we played "Kindness Bingo" and the students had to find the pictures that I had hidden all over the room. Great fun!

The third day was a writing lesson on bucket filling. I modeled writing and illustrating and then the students were given a writing prompt that I found here: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9gdPNfXIsbUNGU1Yzg3MDktZDQ3OC00ZDRmLTg5YzMtZjliMmE5NTdkMGVh/edit?hl=en and http://teacherbitsandbobs.blogspot.com/2011/09/bucket-fillers-activity.html. I had several students give such great examples of kindness! The kiddos are in the emergent stages of writing; they're working on sounding their words out and writing what they hear.

Thanks for reading!  Leave any suggestions, comments, or questions below!