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In kindergarten, the curriculum starts with the child and expands to the world. It starts with the fives senses and moves to trees. I like the connection of the tree and the young child.  As a tree,  the  young child grows physically, and mentally. Their curiousity blooms and like a tree,  the child has basic needs to allow their metacognitive skills to flourish. It is our job as educators to water and feed them as a gardener does.

Philadelphia Science Standards:  Generate questions about objects, organisms, and/or events that can be answered through scientific investigation.

Materials:

1. fast plants  2. artifical light (plant lamps)  3. Window area with a lot of natural sunlight 

4. tap water   5. fresh spring water  6. soil 

Rationale/Objectives:

Students will be introduced to structured inquiry so that the teacher may lead students into guided inquiry. Students will also be able to use  scientific method as a guide for inquiry.

Lesson:

Memories of my high school chem class came rushing back to me when I entered the lab room. I was thrilled to get to use the lab and use chemicals, burners and scales. I was not sure if I would have been able to figure out how to measure the water percentage on my own but felt at ease with Kathy. I enjoyed the the experiment and the down time in between. The time we waited for the water to burn off we used to brainstorm ideas for alternate lessons. We talked about the need to fill in the down time. Teachers, myself included, feel that any down time is bad time. Sometimes children need to use down time to just socialize and collaborate. There is no need to always fill down time with busy work.

www.tennessee.gov/education/ci/sci/2009_10/grade_k.pdf

This site gives a link to inquiry for kindergarten

Conceptual Strand,
Understandings about scientific inquiry and the ability to conduct inquiry are essential for living in the 21st century.
Guiding Question
What tools, skills, knowledge, and dispositions are needed to conduct scientific inquiry?

Grade Level Expectations
Checks for Understanding

In kindgergarten the students are learning measurement using inches and centimeters through cubes. They also have an unit in Science on animals. I would like to do a lesson on scale using animals and have them think about animals in comparison to others. I would start with asking them to name different animals and then put them in order from smallest to largest. Next I would have them make an observation about how many inches and centimeters each animal is. I would then  using life size shapes of some of the animals they name,  measure each animal using the centimeter cubes and large rulers. The students could compare themselves and me to the animals. They also can draw pictures of the new order, they can also measure other living objects.

Brielle Stark, 2009