Properties of Air in First Grade Science
Brittany Rios
EPC 314
The Properties of Air in First Grade Science
1. At what level of cognitive development were Jenny’s students likely to be? Was her instruction effective for that level? Explain. By watching the video I could determine that the kids in Jenny’s class able to formulate ideas that were indicative of a preoperational level of thinking. However, I believe that there were students in her class that had the mental capacity of concrete operational thinking. I feel as though the type of instruction that she was giving her class was appropriate in respect to the thinking level that the students had, and her strategies were effective because it made the students reflect on concepts that they may not have interacted with in their personal experience. When Jenny prompted the kids to think about the air that was in the cup, I could see that there were students in the class who had a difficult time understanding what the point of the lesson was. At the end of the lesson it was apparent that the kids had overcome their difficulties understanding the concept and were entered a mental frame of mind that allowed for the growth of new ideas and different varieties of reality than they had been accustomed to their whole lives. I believe that the students in that class were on the border of preoperational and concrete because there were many students who could reason logically and who could classify objects into new sets of ideas and concepts.
2. Why was the medium of water important for Jenny’s lesson? How does this relate to Piaget’s levels of development? I feel that the use of water to demonstrate her concept was essential to helping the students reach new ideas about water and air. This is because many of the students had plenty of experiences interacting with water before, but now that it was being used in a comparative sense to the property of air, it was a new way to think about something that they might have guessed they already knew a lot about. Her
EPC 314
The Properties of Air in First Grade Science
1. At what level of cognitive development were Jenny’s students likely to be? Was her instruction effective for that level? Explain. By watching the video I could determine that the kids in Jenny’s class able to formulate ideas that were indicative of a preoperational level of thinking. However, I believe that there were students in her class that had the mental capacity of concrete operational thinking. I feel as though the type of instruction that she was giving her class was appropriate in respect to the thinking level that the students had, and her strategies were effective because it made the students reflect on concepts that they may not have interacted with in their personal experience. When Jenny prompted the kids to think about the air that was in the cup, I could see that there were students in the class who had a difficult time understanding what the point of the lesson was. At the end of the lesson it was apparent that the kids had overcome their difficulties understanding the concept and were entered a mental frame of mind that allowed for the growth of new ideas and different varieties of reality than they had been accustomed to their whole lives. I believe that the students in that class were on the border of preoperational and concrete because there were many students who could reason logically and who could classify objects into new sets of ideas and concepts.
2. Why was the medium of water important for Jenny’s lesson? How does this relate to Piaget’s levels of development? I feel that the use of water to demonstrate her concept was essential to helping the students reach new ideas about water and air. This is because many of the students had plenty of experiences interacting with water before, but now that it was being used in a comparative sense to the property of air, it was a new way to think about something that they might have guessed they already knew a lot about. Her