The Science Behind the Experiment

When entering 1F06 before our first science lesson I was nervous. The prospect of having to teach a science lesson is an area of learning I felt I couldn’t do. However, instantly the lesson grabbed my attention and showed me that science can be engaging.

We were all given the task of demonstrating an experiment and explaining how it works. I chose to show how to create ‘cornflour slime’. For this you only need cornflour and water. Once the consistency is right the liquid becomes hard when force is applied and returns to a liquid when there is none. It becomes a solid when force is applied as the particles of the cornflour lock together and then a liquid when there is no force, as the particles are suspended within the water. I believe that this experiment can intrigue children of all ages and is extremely simple to conduct. However, the science behind it is more focused towards those in upper level and this can be broken into the concepts behind the experiment.

Richard made us aware of the importance ‘P-O-E’ (predict, observe, explain). Firstly, you can get the children to predict what they think will occur in the experiment and the outcome. This could be formally written in a report as a hypothesis or just verbally. Secondly, they observe the experiment, this means they can repeat the experiment in groups or later at home. Lastly, explaining why the experiment occurred and what it means, will get them thinking about a variety of science concepts and thinking about real life scenarios that an experiment would apply to.

Science is extremely important to teach within primary schools as children will engage with active learning, whilst learning new concepts. There are many possibilities for future lessons from experiments such as; report writing, presenting, measuring distances and calculating time. Furthermore, I am now less apprehensive with teaching a science experiment and have seen a variety of other experiments that I can now use for a class lesson. These science workshops have demonstrated the many possibilities that science can bring – something which excites me.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *