Participation Project
Journey North: Monarch Butterfly
The 4th quarter 2nd grade
science unit is Life and Environmental Science. The unit
focuses on characteristics of organisms. The major organism
is insects. Students study characteristics of insects and
then begin to focus on butterflies for the remainder of the unit.
Larva arrive in May for each class and the students have the
opportunity to see the larva progress through stages until they emerge
from their chrysalis as butterflies. They continue to observe
the butterflies until it is time to release them. This is the
culminating project for science and it has always been met with great
enthusiasm by both students and staff. While the students
study many aspects of the butterfly from body parts, to what
they eat. They don't receive additional information on what they
migrate from, how they survive winter, etc. I felt that
participation in this project would fill in some of the gaps in knowing
more about butterflies. Since this is a project that starts
in February , it can also help to prepare the student for the arrival
of the larva in May. It can also heighten their curiosity
about the upcoming science unit. Even though participation in
this project will start before the science unit, it will still be
considered an extension to what the student are learning.
This will also enable teachers to use geography and
mapping skills by studying the migration of the Monarch. The
fact that the larva we receive are Monarchs, just makes this project
even more authentic for the students and teachers.
Goal:
Students will gain additional knowledge in the life cycle, migration, and characteristics of the Monarch Butterfly. The migration and characteristics aspect is an extension of the curriculum goals which is student will use scientific skills and processes to describe basic needs and life cycle of an organism.
Technical needs:
Access to laptop or classroom desktop computer with internet access throughout the project phase Feb-June
Other needs: composition book for student journaling
Activities:
Participation in project will be discussed with students.
It will be explained that the Monarch's journey begins in Mexico where they have been since Nov. and that the class will be monitoring their "journey north" to warmer temperatures in the spring.
Because much of this activity will be going on simultaneously with other science units, the entire class will only participate in certain components at one time.
Students will work in small groups (3 students) and be the "monitors" for the week. They will be responsible for journaling, following the "news" that week, and reporting their observations to the class. They will also be reporting their observations to the "Journey North" project. Due to the length of the project, each group should have a chance to be the monitors two - three times during the project. The teacher will have to review the calendar before the project starts to get a good handle on how many weeks it will last. This will ensure that each group gets even participation time.
The week before, groups will be told by the teacher who will monitor for the next week. The monitor activities will take place as a warm up first thing in the morning and the update to the class will hopefully occur at the end of the day. The Journey North website has links to all the information that the class would need in order to participate i.e. mapping resources and related lessons.
Difficulties:
When technology is involved there is always the possibily of problems, such as no internet connection. I don't expect that will occur for the entire week therefore groups will just need to change when they do observations. In addition, this program isn't dependent on our participation. If for some reason we can not particitpate for a week or two ( during spring break, ex.) the project will not be hindered.
Since this is a nationally known project, I don't expect that there will problems on their end.
Closure:
Since the culmination of this project will coincide with the release of the classroom butterflies, I think this is a natural ending for the project and the science unit.
Evaluation:
As suggested by Journey North, journal entries could be used as a assessment tool. This can also be incorporated into Language Arts by initially discussing with students the expectation for journal entries. For the 1st year of attempting this project, I don't know that I would have a formal assessment, since this is a new venture for teacher as well as the student. In addition, this is an extention to the science unit where they are already being evaluated. I would probably add a couple of questions to the regular science assessment that would incorportate some of what that they would have learned doing the project. I would determine the success of the program by discussing the results with the students and assess their level of enthusiasm.
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Goal:
Students will gain additional knowledge in the life cycle, migration, and characteristics of the Monarch Butterfly. The migration and characteristics aspect is an extension of the curriculum goals which is student will use scientific skills and processes to describe basic needs and life cycle of an organism.
Technical needs:
Access to laptop or classroom desktop computer with internet access throughout the project phase Feb-June
Other needs: composition book for student journaling
Activities:
Participation in project will be discussed with students.
It will be explained that the Monarch's journey begins in Mexico where they have been since Nov. and that the class will be monitoring their "journey north" to warmer temperatures in the spring.
Because much of this activity will be going on simultaneously with other science units, the entire class will only participate in certain components at one time.
Students will work in small groups (3 students) and be the "monitors" for the week. They will be responsible for journaling, following the "news" that week, and reporting their observations to the class. They will also be reporting their observations to the "Journey North" project. Due to the length of the project, each group should have a chance to be the monitors two - three times during the project. The teacher will have to review the calendar before the project starts to get a good handle on how many weeks it will last. This will ensure that each group gets even participation time.
The week before, groups will be told by the teacher who will monitor for the next week. The monitor activities will take place as a warm up first thing in the morning and the update to the class will hopefully occur at the end of the day. The Journey North website has links to all the information that the class would need in order to participate i.e. mapping resources and related lessons.
Difficulties:
When technology is involved there is always the possibily of problems, such as no internet connection. I don't expect that will occur for the entire week therefore groups will just need to change when they do observations. In addition, this program isn't dependent on our participation. If for some reason we can not particitpate for a week or two ( during spring break, ex.) the project will not be hindered.
Since this is a nationally known project, I don't expect that there will problems on their end.
Closure:
Since the culmination of this project will coincide with the release of the classroom butterflies, I think this is a natural ending for the project and the science unit.
Evaluation:
As suggested by Journey North, journal entries could be used as a assessment tool. This can also be incorporated into Language Arts by initially discussing with students the expectation for journal entries. For the 1st year of attempting this project, I don't know that I would have a formal assessment, since this is a new venture for teacher as well as the student. In addition, this is an extention to the science unit where they are already being evaluated. I would probably add a couple of questions to the regular science assessment that would incorportate some of what that they would have learned doing the project. I would determine the success of the program by discussing the results with the students and assess their level of enthusiasm.
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