THE FROZEN GROUND

Ely Learning Bridges First Grade Science Fair Project

THE PROJECT
In 2014 during my Student Teaching Internship my first grade class worked collaboratively to solve an authentic problem that was affecting our school-Why the doors to the 4th, 5th, and 6th grade classroom wouldnt open. To solve the problem the students followed the paths to inquiry by understanding, questioning, and analyzing differing perspectives in the classroom on the problem as they completed a science fair project called The Frozen Ground

THE PROBLEM
The outside doors to the 4th/6th and 5th grade classroom would not open. The doors were scraping the cement on the ground.
To identify this problem we took many mini-field trips to the doors and made observations when the teachers tried to open the door. The students were encouraged to question why these doors would not open.

OUR HYPOTHESIS
We started with many hypothesis from the students and analyzed each of these perspectives.

We eventually narrowed them down to the idea that when it rained or when the snow melted it caused water to go underneath the cement and freeze causing the ground to heave up.

EXPERIMENT TIME Next was time for our experiment- The students had to design an experiment to test our hypothesis. The students worked collaboratively to create an experiment that we could use.

CONCLUSION
After making observations during our experiment the class had to come up with a conclusion using our hypothesis. The students had to analysis each others perspectives in order to truly master the content.

THE RESULTS

We won first place in our schools science fair!

THEN

We went on to win state!