Laura Obs #3- Feb 26, 2019 Ciencias

1:00 Transition from library to classroom for science. Positive and Respectful
Laura immediately tells them to have water, sit
down and listen for their number. She assigns
numbers and they reorganize into table groups.
What did we learn yesterday in science? Connects Content
She re-phrases their idea. Asks follow up questions- Higher level thinking
how can materials change nature. Questioning
Explains they will get a photo and talk in their group
about what they see. Photo pasted on card.
1:05 Work in groups to look at photo- pass around.
What will this look like in 100 or 1000 years? Talk in Active Engagement
your groups. They get right to talking- and are
focused. Laura tells them she can’t hear the student
talking, in order to address the side chatter. Manages behaviors quickly
Has them share and asks follow-up questions.
Validates responses and then refocuses (student
who just described the image).
Laura makes sure they heard each other. Student Represented
Laura is careful to ask follow-up questions about Questioning
“why” so students have to justify their responses or
explain their reasoning.
Laura says that they will do a new experiment (they Connects Content
had been studying how water affects the earth) to
think about what affects the earth.
Hand out book with an experiment. They have roles Students Represented
and all begin to organize materials.
Materials are all prepared on the table in sets for Varied Materials
each group.
Laura asks them to look through the directions to
start figuring out the first step.
They are working in groups with some students Varied Delivery
walking around to get more supplies, etc… Active Engagement
Laura circulates to make sure they are following
direction and to hand out the glue.
I am wondering if they know what they are
mimicking in nature?

1:28 Laura gets their attention with the same attention- Procedures
getter. She mentions she is getting the same
question from many of them- and explains what
they need to do with the index cards. A student
Positive and Respectful
 came back in and the group explained what they Adaptations (scaffolding)
have done so far.
Laura circulates and helps them to formulate
sentence to describe their observations in Spanish.

1:42 They begin to clean up and will work on the

handout.
Debrief Laura expected it to be noisy and dirty- that is a part
of the science kits. Students worked out jobs for
working the group- some worked better than others.
Could you add in some self-reflection on how the
group worked?
Laura thought that the timing went well despite
starting late. They don’t have to bring out the
materials again.
Things to work on- classroom management is tricky-
Laura will work on being more aware of when to do
whole group instruction and what to do in small
groups, based on what you observe. It is hard to
know the balance- comes with time.
The materials are in English, which is tricky. Sra.
Figueroa usually translates, but this was not the case
because the projector was broken.
Laura made explicit connections to what they had
learned before.
Handout was very useful to organize the information
to compare- a support for the students.
The toolkit is very hands-on- so what is the
connection to the real-world/nature? Could this be
stronger with the discussion questions.
Laura is thinking about which activities more closely
mirror nature- making connections back to nature.