An over-arching theme in the science curriculum my school is developing is the question: "What is the energy doing?" So, when I was thinking about the water-cycle unit I thought, "Hmm... the sun is driving this but I don't want to waste all the time involved in marching my students outside and setting up a lab in the outdoors to use the sun's radiation. What can I do?" I was talking to a colleague about this and he suggested using hot plates. So, I went online to see if anyone else had ever done this and found this video that shows how to desalinate water with stuff you have in your own kitchen. After watching the video decided to adapt this guys system to simulate the water cycle. The bonus is that each student will be able to drink the water he will distill.
Instead of using metal pans, like in the video, I am going to have my students use 1L cans (the cafeteria is setting them aside for me.).
The students will build their own desalination plant and label the parts of the desalination plant as follows:
Hotplate - "Sun"
Can with salt water - "Ocean"
Aluminum or plastic funnel at top of can - "Clouds"
Tube leading from aluminum funnel to catchment basin - "Precipitation"
Catchment basin - "Lake"
Tube from catchment basin to can - "River"
ASSESSING THE PROJECT ACCORDING TO BLOOM'S TAXONOMY
Notice this description is limited to the cognitive domain of Bloom's Taxonomy. I am not sure that much of what is called the affective domain or that any of the psycho-motor domain are relevant to what I do in the classroom or to what any science teacher does in the classroom. It might be that seeing the finished project might give the students a happy feeling, and that might be related to the valuing skill of the affective domain, but they should have mastered everything in the psycho-motor domain before coming into a 6th grade science classroom.)
Knowledge - Students will have to display knowledge of terminology (labeling), sequences (the steps of the water cycle), and universals (conservation of energy)
Comprehension - Students will have to display comprehension by taking knowledge gained in the unit and translating it to a real-world model of the water-cycle.
Application - Students will have to use the material they are given by me to model the more abstract idea of the water cycle as a table top desalination plant. They will have to identify the parts of their desalination plant with the parts of the water cycle.
Analysis - they will have to analyze the effect of the energy from the sun on water.
Synthesis - students will be asked to think about problems associated with industrial or civic desalination plants (e.g. energy source, brine disposal)
Instead of using metal pans, like in the video, I am going to have my students use 1L cans (the cafeteria is setting them aside for me.).
The students will build their own desalination plant and label the parts of the desalination plant as follows:
Hotplate - "Sun"
Can with salt water - "Ocean"
Aluminum or plastic funnel at top of can - "Clouds"
Tube leading from aluminum funnel to catchment basin - "Precipitation"
Catchment basin - "Lake"
Tube from catchment basin to can - "River"
ASSESSING THE PROJECT ACCORDING TO BLOOM'S TAXONOMY
Notice this description is limited to the cognitive domain of Bloom's Taxonomy. I am not sure that much of what is called the affective domain or that any of the psycho-motor domain are relevant to what I do in the classroom or to what any science teacher does in the classroom. It might be that seeing the finished project might give the students a happy feeling, and that might be related to the valuing skill of the affective domain, but they should have mastered everything in the psycho-motor domain before coming into a 6th grade science classroom.)
Knowledge - Students will have to display knowledge of terminology (labeling), sequences (the steps of the water cycle), and universals (conservation of energy)
Comprehension - Students will have to display comprehension by taking knowledge gained in the unit and translating it to a real-world model of the water-cycle.
Application - Students will have to use the material they are given by me to model the more abstract idea of the water cycle as a table top desalination plant. They will have to identify the parts of their desalination plant with the parts of the water cycle.
Analysis - they will have to analyze the effect of the energy from the sun on water.
Synthesis - students will be asked to think about problems associated with industrial or civic desalination plants (e.g. energy source, brine disposal)
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