April 12, 2015

Our second to last Unit of Inquiry

for the year is titled, How the
World Works.
The Central Idea:
Understanding forces and
energy helps create inventions
that impact our lives.
During this unit students
will:
Visit Sharjah Science Museum
to explore how force and
energy make machines work.
Visit Fun Robotics to build
simple sensors and motors
that will be made to move
with the assistance of
software.
Participate in hands on
experiments to observe what
happens when simple
machines work together.
Collaborate in groups to
hypothesize, plan and build
simple machines that will
make something move.
Analyze how machines affect
our daily lives.
Apply their creativity and
problem-solving skills by
exploring the Rube
Goldberg machine
challenge which involves a
series of simple machines
that work together to
perform one simple task.
Use rubrics, checklists and
various reflections to monitor
their progress.

Concepts and Strategies

Please read the attached
Curriculum Map. It summarizes
what we will be exploring in the
next 6 weeks across the transdisciplinary subject areas.

Taking Action
We are pleased with the creative
and differentiated studentinitiated actions that continue to
take place at different stages of the
units of the inquiry.
Remember to document and share
your childs taking action
moments during this unit of inquiry
by taking photos, recording on short
film and/or sending us an email. We
would love to reflect on the learning
and thinking process that take place
at home.