I chose to answer the question about marbles momentum changing based on surface. I figured that this would be a good way for my 1st/2nd graders to get introduced to guided-inquiry. I expected to find that the marbles would have more momentum on the smoother surfaces, and that is exactly what I found. The more friction the marble encountered the less momentum it had. I think that this experiment would greatly benefit my students. They are young, so they have very little experience with guided-inquiry, because they are not quite to the place where they can receive a question from me and then design and experiment to answer that question (Banchi & Bell, 2008). This would be a nice question to ease them into that process. They would not have to build anything complicated. All they would need to do would be to come up with different surfaces to roll the marble on. There are not that many options for what they could do, and I think that would be helpful to them, because they would not feel so overwhelmed. They might struggle a bit at first, but once they get started I think that they would do great. I feel that I could have them create their own experiment to answer this question. The main thing that I would want them to learn is that they can come up with an experiment on their own.
References
Banchi, H., & Bell, R. (2008). The many levels of inquiry. Science & Children, 46(2), 26–29.
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Ann
ReplyDeleteI have a six year old who is very inquisitive and independent, I think she would love to create her own experiment about how marbles roll. I think the hard thing to control in this experiment is keeping the speed consistent for all trials but with first graders I guess the process is more important than the results.
Ann - I did the marble inquiry as well! It was fun wasn't it? I was a bit more focused on minimizing the variable because I teach 7th grade; however, I think that 1st/2nd graders would love this iquiry in a simplified form and it would give them a great visual how friction affect movement.
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