When we returned from Winter Break in early January I thought it would be a great time to start working with my students (a mid-to-high functioning CDC classroom) on learning about the body, how the body relates to others and how to take care of the body and others... so the first day back we all sat around a table so that I could get their input on what they would like to know. We made our list of body parts or systems that they would like to know more about; then moved on to how do we take care of our body and finally ended the session by planning our full semester of Science topics to cover a topic per week that everyone can help with and participate in learning.
We started with the BRAIN... since that's the most important organ in the body we had to understand how it works, what it's composed of and what the pieces do in working together as a team. We have incorporated Graphic Organizers, we have written songs and sung songs about the brain, but the most fun they had was when we took play-dough and made a copy of each lobe of the brain. We divided up and everyone took a lobe using a different color then at the end we had to put all of the lobes together to make one brain - this generated individual thinking of what we had learned, but then required team work in making sure that each person's lobe would fit together in the outline of the skull that we had made on poster board.
To make it even more fun, we listened to the cartoon characters "Pinky and the Brain" sing the "Brain Song" that identifies the different parts of the brain. I put the you tube video on repeat and it played over and over while we worked individually and together to make "our" brain.
We laughed, we sang, but even more importantly - we learned to work both individually and then come together as a team to make all of the pieces work together.
You can too can make learning fun!
Mr. Don.
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