Travelling Teacher: WONDERLAB The Equinor Gallery

The Wonderlab offers over 50 hands-on exhibits which will make you feel like a true scientist. The Science Shows offer brilliant learning experiences for everyone. You can even have your birthday party there!

Bilingual vocabulary wall

Working in a bilingual school makes you really think about the vocabulary you are teaching. I have just started the Cells unit with my grade 8 MYP students and the vocabulary list is pretty extensive. To support my pupils, we created a bilingual vocabulary wall.

I started by translating the list into Chinese using Google translate. To make sure that the translation is accurate, I asked my phenomenal technician to review it. Once she added her corrections, I used the list as a starter and asked my students to write down the words on cards I prepared early. What's more, we can add more words as we progress with the unit. Simple yet effective, that's what I like :)

Here's an example of Grade 10 vocabulary wall:

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Traveling Teacher - Mathematics: The Winton Gallery, London, UK

I absolutely love traveling and discovering new places. I always look for science-related locations where I can get inspirations. In my new weekend series I'm going to share some of the places I visited so far.

I'm going to start with photo inspirations from the Science Museum in London where you can visit The Winton Gallery which allows you to explore the importance of mathematics and its role in the world we are living in. Great place to visit with your students.

Upthrust practical

I recently had to teach a lesson on upthrust. I wanted to make it more interesting with a class practical and not just have a dry, theoretical lesson. After some research, I came across an interesting practical called "Design a boat" (click here). Despite being designed for primary students, I used it with my Grade 8 MYP Science classes. I was extremely pleased with how much engagement and scientific discussion it created. I really enjoyed watching my pupils going through many designs, testing them and trying to improve it. Having them talk about real life applications was brilliant.

 I wish you great lessons!


 Karolina

Chemical magic

If you need to run an open evening and showcase your department it´s good to have a selection of experiments and demos that will leave the audience speechless. I have already discussed the classic ammonium dichromate volcano (click here) and today I would like to share some chemical magic. This simple to set up experiment when paired up with a bit of acting can easily surprise your audience as you turn water into wine:

Then wine into water:

and lastly water into milk:

I tested it in beakers but for your "official" demo I suggest following the instructions and use wine glasses and a glass milk bottle.

If not used as a demo, you could use it in your lessons to discuss phenolphthalein as a narrow range indicator. Furthermore, it could be used in precipitation reactions lesson.

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Book of Achievements for KS3 Science Club

Science Club is for me a place where the students have an opportunity to conduct experiments they wouldn´t normally have a chance to do. It´s an opportunity to further deepen their curiosity and develop lab skills. I created the Book of Achievements to teach my students organisational skills and show them how much they can do. The list of "achievements" to complete is a great starting point to create independent learners who know how to plan.

The reward system is flexible and can easily reflect whatever your school is doing - merits, stickers, postcards home etc.

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Dowload the Book of Achievements - click here

Let YouTube help you teach Science #6

As a Chemistry teacher I feel confident to deliver demos and practicals within my subject specialism. I always know how to modify the experiments to cater to my students' needs. When I need to deliver Biology or Physics lessons, I always like to do extra research to make sure the lesson is interesting and that my subject knowledge is sound. A few years ago I came across this demo to show how the digestive system works and it's absolutely brilliant!

Which topic/s could you use this video with?
 - digestive system

Key words: bile, blood, digestion, enzymes, large intestine, mouth, oesophagus, saliva, small intestine, rectum, stomach,  teeth, villi

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

KS3 Science Club - Scheme of Work

I have been running after school clubs since I started working as a teacher. I really enjoy the freedom a science club can give you to try experiments that you wouldn't normally have time to do in a lesson. One of the restrains that I had to face, however, was the issue of money to buy the resources I needed. This I managed to overcome by applying for grants and getting free resources (I mentioned some of the places here). After testing a wide range of experiments and getting feedback from my students, I put together this KS3 Science Club Scheme of Work, which I hope is going to be useful for your students too.

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

What is Kahoot!?

Kahoot! gives you an option to engage your students in highly addictive quizzes and learn at the same time. Students absolutely love the competitive aspect of those quizzes. As a teacher, I really like the fact that I can either create my own quiz or browse through the database of thousands of quizzes created by others. Another interesting feature is the option of creating a report which shows you in detail how well your students performed and what are the areas that still need work.

Click here to access my easy Kahoot! quiz on components in electrical circuits.

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Where to find free resources?

If you are working in a school which provides you with every single resource you ask for, you're in heaven! The reality is, however, that such schools are very rare to find. So, what to do when you want to inspire your students but you are struggling to get resources? Here are some of the places I came across over the years that can support you on your journey.

1. The Crunch Kit (Wellcome Trust)

If you are working in the UK you can get your hands on 2 different kits. These are tailored for  primary and secondary students. Each kit consists of superbly prepared experiments together with all the equipment you need to deliver it.


2. STEM Learning resources

This is a collection of various resources focused around STEM. You can easily find here materials suitable for your students. These can be used both in a classroom setting as well as in an after school club.

3. DIY experiments from STEM Newcastle

This is an amazing collection of experiments perfect for the use in a Science club. Instructions are clearly laid out with numerous pictures and drawings to aid understanding.

4. School Science list

Here you can find a list of 30+ websites which offer free resources.

5. TES resources

Times Educational Supplement is a goldmine for resources. You can find absolutely everything there from worksheets through lesson plans and power points and schemes of work. I started uploading my resources there as well so click here to see what´s available (more to come!).

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Let YouTube help you teach Science #4

Cells is probably the first topic all students cover in their first biology lesson when they join secondary school. It's often the first occasion when they use the microscope and you get a lot of "wows" in the classroom as they look at different specimens. I like using the video below as fun introduction or in the revision lesson. I like the fact it also reinforces correct spelling of scientific key works with the lyrics coming on the screen.

Which topic/s could you use this video with?
- Biology - cells
- Animal vs. plant cell

Key words:
- animal cell, cell, chloroplast, cytoplasm, membrane, mitochondria, nucleus, organelle, plant cell, vacuole

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Mystery Boxes

I recently came across an interesting hands-on activity which will help the students learn how scientists work and how they come up with different theories.

As you can see from the video it's very easy to set up and extremely engaging. I can't wait to try it soon.

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Let YouTube help you teach Science #3

I really like introducing Science concepts to my students using demos and experiments they can later do at home. This really ensures that the pupils are interested in the subject and maintains their curiosity. Furthermore, if students decide to conduct the experiment at home, it helps to develop their dexterity and lab skills. Here's a simple experiment you can introduce your students to:

Which topics could you use this video with?
- How does soap work?
- How does washing up liquid work?
- Hydrolysis of fats
- Saponification
- Science Club experiment

Key words: hydrophilic, hydrophobic, saponification, soap molecule

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Let You Tube help you teach Science #2

In the second installment of my "Let You Tube help you teach Science" I would like to introduce you to the idea of showing experimental instructions through short videos. It's a great visual aid for the students and it allows you to save time on a demonstration. Consequently, the pupils have more time to conduct the experiment. Below is an example of a simple experiment you can use to investigate osmosis:

Which topics could you use this video with?
- osmosis
- lab health and safety
- recording observations

Key words: importance of water, investigation, osmosis, water

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Zip Grade - the marking app to make your life easier

Marking takes a lot of time. It's something we all teachers have a love-hate relationship with as we know how important it is for the students' progress but at the same time it can be extremely time consuming. There are tools, however, that can save us a lot of time and provide quick feedback for our students. One of the marking apps that has been working extremely well for me is Zip Grade. It's perfect for marking multiple choice tests.

Once you download the app on your phone or tablet you are given free 100 scans each month. You can, of course, purchase unlimited number of scans. The yearly subscription costs $6.99.

You start by creating the answer key for your test:

Your students answer the test questions on special answer sheets which you can download from the website. It offers grids for 20, 50 and 100 questions. However, you can also create customized answer sheets on your profile and have the exact number of answers your test has.

Scanning a test takes a second. I like to use a highlighter to mark the questions my students got wrong. You can also print out the screen shots of individual review sheets (but that's just being extra :)

I found the app to be extremely useful to mark paper 1 of the IB Chemistry course. After some time of using the app you can easily create a nice bank of tests ready for marking. To find what you need easily simply add a tag while creating the answer key and you can later use it to filter your test bank:

An extremely useful feature is item analysis which allows you to see how your class did as a whole and identify the questions that you need to revisit:

You can also create individual learners' profiles and monitor the progress throughout the year. It also gives you useful data for parents' evening conversations.

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina

Welcome to "Keep them curious"

Thank you for visiting my blog. Here you will be able to find ideas and tips that will help you keep your students interested in Science. My subject specialism is Chemistry and this is going to be the main focus of my posts. Please check out my Twitter @keep_curious_ as well as Instagram @keep_them_curious

I would love to hear your suggestions so please feel free to comment under blog posts or drop me a line at keepthemcurious@gmail.com

I wish you great lessons!

Karolina