Matt Lorenz

1. What did you do in Lab? We discussed several topics relating to the Earth, Sun and Moon. We discussed the early views of geocentrism vs heliocentrism and some of the people and groups who believed in each theory. With a light bulb acting as a representation of the sun, we used globes to and a small ball to represent the Earth and moon. Through these representations we were able to make more clear the plane of the ecliptic, the equator, tropical lines, equinoxes and solstices.  2. What was the big question? If the sun is rising in the East at 7:00am while the moon is setting in the west, what phase of the moon is it? The moon would be a full moon 3. What did you learn in Thursday Discussion? How to determine the phase of the moon based on the suns position The shape of the Earths orbit around the sun is almost a perfect circle with the sun in the middle Phases of the moon The sun and the moon travel together throughout the day "Lines" on the Earth refer to points of direct ...

      This week in lab we started by discussing graphing. Often I think of graphing to be a topic covered during math, however, its applications to science are just as impactful for young learners. The first step in helping young learners graph is teaching to properly label and understand the different aspects of the graph such as x axis, y axis and data points. To practice graphing we plotted the experiment from last weeks pendulum lab. I plotted the number of swings in 15 seconds for a longer string and shorter string. This illustration would be very helpful for young learners as it clearly showed that the number of swings stayed consistent for the given string distance, however it also illustrated that the number of swings increased as the string got shorter.     Next we approached the big question for the week. Again thinking back to the question of how can we support kids play that is safe and exciting, this week we focused on playground surface. What is th...

 This week in lab we started by discussing school of the wild. We reflected on the homework assignment and further prepared for our lesson plans for when we will be leading a school of the wild lesson. Next, we transitioned to a color wheel activity. This was a very engaging science activity that would be great for a K-2 science classroom. It is fairly easy to set up and execute. The students would really enjoy this activity because they would feel like they are creating something scientific when they blend the two colors and create a new color. It is also great for kids to learn the concept of primary vs secondary colors. Lastly, we completed our activity once again based on children play. This week we discussed and explored swings. The activity first called for students to think of pendulums that they have seen in their lives. I'm sure in Elementary classrooms, most responses would be playground swings. We wanted to explore how different factors would effect the number of swings ...