Field notes summary

The following is a summary of the field notes I took all along the research process.

Monday, April 20, 2009.1:15 p.m. - 2:00 p.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 1: Pre-test
N° of students: 22

1. Prayer: a student was asked to lead the prayer
2. Brief introduction to students of the inquiry-based learning unit about the systems of the human body.
3. Reasons for the pre-test: students were told that this was just a diagnostic test and that at the end of the inquiry-based science unit they would be given a post-test to check their progress.
4. Instructions on how to answer the pre-test.
5. A student was asked to explain what they were expected to do to check understanding.
6. Students answered the pre-test.
7. Students were told that in the next class they would answer a survey about the science class.
8. Students were told that they had 10 minutes left to finish.
9. The pre-tests were collected.

Remarks:

-Some students seemed to be worried because they didn't know the answers.
-Others looked around trying to remember information from last year.
-Some asked questions to the teacher.
-Most of them had more difficulty dealing with part B which included open questions.
-A few students answered beforehand and were asked to draw a picture of the skeletal system with the main parts on the back of the worksheet.
-Two students started crying because they couldn't answer part B. They were reminded that it was just a diagnostic test.
-Other students got stuck in part B, so they were asked to draw the picture of the skeletal system.
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Tuesday, April 21, 2009.
2:45 - 3:30 p.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 2: Pre-survey (in Spanish)
N° of students: 22

1. Prayer: a different student was asked to lead the prayer.
2. Students were asked if they knew what a survey was.
3. The teacher complemented students answers and explained the purpose of the pre-survey.
4. A student read the instructions for the pre-survey
5. Another student was asked to explain in his own words the instructions to check understanding
6. Students answered the pre-survey individually.
7. Some students asked questions about some statements in the survey.
8. The teacher walked around the classroom answering any questions if necessary.
9. Students finished answering the pre-survey.
10. The teacher collected the pre-survey worksheets.

Remarks:

-A few students started answering the questions out loud and the teacher reminded them that they had to answer individually and quietly not to influence other students.
-A few students were answering too fast, so the teacher advised them to read more carefully and avoid rushing.
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Thursday 23, 2009.
8:00 a.m. - 8:45 a.m.
Inquiry-based learning lesson 3: The Skeletal system
N° of students: 22

1. A student said the prayer.
2. Students received the folders to keep their portfolio documents.
3. Students read the instructions about their portfolios.
4. Students asked questions about the way they were expected to keep their portfolios.
5. The teacher started the lesson with this question: What are the main parts of the skeletal sytem?
6. Students worked in pairs and reflected on the question.
7. The teacher gathered responses and subsequent questions from students.
8. The teacher showed students a sheet of paper with pictures of the main parts of the skeletal system and asked them to propose an activity to design a model of the skeletal system.
9. Students proposed cutting out the pictures and then putting the parts together to make a model of the skeletal system.
10. Students cut out the parts and built a model of the skeletal system.
11. Students were asked to work in groups. They collected data from their books in order to label the main parts of the skeletal system.
12. Students presented their findings and then filed them in their portfolios.
13. Students were asked to check at home this website and do some of the activities related to the skeletal system: http://www.studystack.com/matching-1680
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Monday, April 27, 2009.
1:15 p.m. - 2:00 p.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 4: The muscular system
N° of students: 22.

1. A student said the prayer.
2. Students were reminded about the importance of their portfolios. They checked what they were expected to have in them.
3. Students asked questions about the muscular system.
4. The teacher wrote the main aspects students wanted to know about this system:
-How do the skeletal system and the muscular system work together?
-What are voluntary and involuntary muscles?
-What kind of tissue do we have in our muscular system?
5. Students were shown pictures about the muscular system in the computers.
6. Students searched in their books, in documents they had brought from home and in this website: www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/body/interactives/3djigsaw_02/index.shtlm/?muscles in order to answer the questions.
7. Students worked in groups and compared their answers to get to an agreement on the right answers.
8. Students sat in a circle and shared their findings. They wrote their answers to the questions.

Remarks:

-Students started checking information they had put in their portfolios. They were willing to use what they had put in them.
-They found it very interesting and motivating to be allowed to ask questions about what they wanted to learn about the muscular system.
-Students chose different ways in which they could gather information to answer the questions (science textbook, documants in their portfolios, internet).
-Lots of oral participation when asking and answering their questions.
-Students took time thinking about what they wanted to know about the muscular system.
-The questions challenged them and they were very willing to find out the answers to them.
-Discussion in the groups was active and they got to agreements on the best answers based on evidence they found in different sources.

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Tuesday, April 28, 2009.
2:45 p.m. - 3:30 p.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 5: The respiratory system.
N° of students: 22.

1. A student said the prayer.
2. Students asked what they wanted to know about the respiratory system and the teacher wrote the main questions on the board.
3. Students were told that they would watch a video about the respiratory system. They were asked to pay close attention since they would have to do an exercise based on the video.
4. Students went to the auditorium and watched the video.
5. students went back to the classroom and were given a worksheet in which they had to complete a text about the respiratory system by filling in blanks with the correct words based on the video, information in their science textbook and materials they were asked to include in their portfolios.
6. Students worked in groups and completed half of the paragraph that described the flow of oxygen from the nose to the lungs.
7. Students were given a sheet of paper with the instructions on how to conduct an experiment related to the information they had gathered about the respiratory system. they were told that the first step had been done for them.
8. Students worked in groups and completed the experiment on their own with the teacher guiding them when necessary.
9. Students recorded their observations in a chart.

Remarks:

-Students were very willing to show to the teacher what they had brought for their portfolios about the respiratory system.
-They were more eager to ask questions than in the previous lesson.
-They were very happy whenthey were told that they would watch a video about the respiratory system at the auditorium.
-They were very attentive when they watched the video.
-Some of them relied only in the video to complte the paragraph about the respiratory system.
-most students used their textbooks and documents in their portfolios to complete the text.
-A few students found the task difficult to complete. The teacher encouraged them to use their books and other sources to get the information they needed.
-Students were very excited when they were asked to do the experiment.
-Most students looked at the pictures that accompanied the instructions to carry out the experiment.
-A few students took tim eto read the instructions carefully to fully understand how to do the experiment.
-Some students got more involved than others in the experiment.
-Students were very happy when they got to complete the experiment.
-Some students insisted they wanted to take the experiment home.
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Wednesday, April 29, 2009.
9:30 a.m. - 10:15 a.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 6: The circulatory system
N° of students: 22

1. A student said the prayer.
2. Students checked their portfolios and they completed the exercise they had started last class in which they had to fill in the blanks showing the flow of oxygen in the respiratory system.
3. They finished completing the second half of the paragraph based on what they remembered about the video; using their textbooks and other materials they had in their portfolios about the respiratory system.
4. Students were given a chart to write their observations about the experiment they did in the previous class. They completed the chart individually and then answered some questions about the experiment in groups.
5. Students were asked about the importance of self-evaluation. They were given a self-evaluation sheet to evaluate their individual performance in the experiment activity they carried out in groups.
6. The teacher asked, "Where does the oxygen go from the air sacs in the lungs?" Based on the students' responses the teacher introduced the circulatory system.
7. Students thought about the mechanism that helped take the oxygen to the cells in the body.
8. Students asked lots of questions about the circulatory system and the teacher encouraged other students to answer them based on what they already knew about it or on information in their textbooks.
9. Students got to the conclusion that the main organ of the circulatory system was the heart.
10. As a homework Students were asked to investigate about the main parts of the heart and how it worked. They were asked to bring any information they found to include it in their portfolios.

Remarks:

-Students were very attentive and willing to participate in class.
-Students enjoyed completing the chart about the experiment based on their observations. They discussed actively with their peers when they answered the questions about the experiment in groups.
-Some students asked questions about vocabulary they needed to complete the chart. They were encouraged to look for the words they needed in their textbooks and in the materials they had in their portfolios.
-Students mentioned that they had liked the self-evaluation and they wished other teachers gave them the same opportunity.
-Students were surprised when the teacher asked them to answer the questions some of their classmates were asking about the circulatory system. Some of them started getting the answers from their textbooks.
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Thursday, April 30, 2009.
8:00 a.m. - 8:45 a.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 7: The heart.
N° of students: 22

1. A student was asked to say the prayer.
2. Brief review about the heart. Students said what they knew about it based on what they did for homework.
3. Students analized a poster that showed the main parts of the heart.
4. Based on the poster, students suggested how the heart works. The teacher only povided prompts for students to keep on explaining.
5. Some students asked questions about the heart. Other students were encouraged to answer those questions based on the poster and any other information they had brought from home.
6. After analizing the poster and listening to various explanations from students, they were asked to put all their materials away and were given a pisture of the heart to label the main parts.
7. Students who had trouble identifying the left and the right side of the heart were asked to raise their left arm and then the right one, and then to identify the two sides on the picture.
8. Students labeled their pictures individually and then compared their answers in pairs.
9. Students were asked to get as much information as they could about the digestive system for the following lesson. They were reminded that they could bring pictures, photos, drawings, magazines, posters, or anything they wanted to include in their portfolios.


remarks:

-Students were satisfied when the teacher started checking the homework and everything they had brought in their portfolios.
-Students anjoyed answering other students' questions using the information they had.
-Some students had trouble labelling the picture of the heart because they confused the left side with the right side.
-A few students had trouble labeling the picture because it looked different from the one in the poster at the bginning of the class. The teacher got them to understand that the distribution was the same by means of asking them questions and showing them some other pictures.
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Monday, May 4, 2009.
1:15 p.m. - 2:00 p.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 8: The digestive system
N° of students: 22.

1. A student said the prayer.
2. Students showed the teacher what they had found about the digestive system as homework.
3. Students were asked to look at their workbooks page 48. They read the instructions and a few of them asked questions about what they were expected to do.
4. Other students were asked to explain them what they had to do. Students had to read some statements about the digestive system and say if they agreed or disagreed with them but they had to provide evidence based on information from the materials they brought for their portfolios or they could look for information on their books pages 152-153.
5. Students worked in groups of three to gather the information they needed.
6. While students were working in groups, the teacher called each group to his desk and showed them a short video that showed how nutrients were absorbed in the small intestine.
7. Students gave their answers and then were asked to explain the path food follows after it enters the mouth. Students explained the process based on what they had just read and the pictures they had.
8. Students were able to get to the conclusion that most of the digestion takes place in the small intestine because it is there that the nutrients pass to the blood to be taken to the whole body.
9. Students read tthe statements in their workbooks and students from different groups gave the evidence to support each answer and said where exactly they had found the evidence.

Remarks:

-Students were willing to start the class. Some of them were waiting for the tacher at the door with their portfolios to show him what they had brought about the digestive system.
-Some students wanted to form their own groups. The teacher told them about the importance of working with other students different from their best friends.
-When students were working in groups, some of them led the discussion asking, "Do you agree or disagree (with the statement)? The others pointed to the part of the book or the materials they had where the evidence was.
-After watching the video that showed how the nutrients were absorbed in the small intestine, students were even more enthusiastic trying to answer the questions in their small groups.
- Students were very happy when they confirmed that their answers to the workbook exercise were right. Most of them were very willing to participate.
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Tuesday, May 5, 2009.
2:45 p.m. - 3:30 p.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 9: The nervous system
N° of students: 22

1. A student said the prayer.
2. Students were told that they would do an experiment in which they would watch some pictures of animals with the names of each animal on top. They would work in pairs and time each other to observe how long each one of them took to name all the animals.
3. Students worked in pairs. They looked at the pictures of animals with the names on top of them and recorded how long each one of them took to name all the animals.
4. Students shared their results with the class.
5. Students were asked to do the same, but this time the words on top of the animals did not match the animals. They were asked to ignore the words and name only the animals.
6. Students worked in pairs again and recorded how long it took each one of them to name the animals ignoring the words.
7. Students had more trouble this time naming the animals since the words did not match the pictures so they took longer naming all the animals.
8. The teacher asked students what part of their bodies was responsible for the change in how long it took them to name the animals.
9. Students answered that the brain was. Students were encouraged to ask questions related to the brain. Some students said it was part of the nervous system.
10. Students said what they knew about the nervous system and its parts.
11. Students watched an interactive presentation about the nervous system at this website: http://kidshealth.org/misc/movie/bodybasics/bodybasics_brain.html

12. The program asked them to repeat the names of the main parts of the nervous system and they did so.
13. Some students were asked to read aloud the brief explanation about the function of each part of the nervous system.
14. Students were asked to discuss in small groups the conclusion they could draw from the experiment based on what they had observed about the nervous system.
15. Students concluded that since different parts of the brain control different actions, there was interference of one part of the brain on another when trying to name the animals with the mismatching words on them.
16. Students were told that in the next class there would be a general review of all the systems of the human body studied so far. They were asked to review at home all the materials they had collected throughout the inquiry-based unit and to include in their portfolios any other material they found.


Remarks:

-Students liked the idea of going out of the classroom to the auditotorium to do the experiment.
-Some students were very anxious about the experiment and they couldn't wait to get started.
-A few students had trouble timing their peers since they did not have a cronometer. The teacher asked them how they could time their classmates without a cronometer. A student suggested that they could count while closing and opening their right hand.
-Students realized that it took them more time to name the animals when the words did not match the pictures.
-Students were very involved in the activity in which they had to repeat the names of the main parts of the nervous system and almost all of them wanted to participate reading aloud the definitions of the different parts.
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Wednesday, May 6, 2009.
9:30 a.m. - 10:15 a.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 10: Unit review
N° of students: 22

1. A student said the prayer.
2. Students showed to the teacher the materials they brought to include in their portfolios after reviewing at home the different systems of the human body.
3. Students were told that they were going to review the whole inquiry-based unit by answering some exercises in their workbooks.
4. Students worked in small groups and were told that they had to answer the exercises they had in their workbooks on pages 46 to 48 on their own by reading the instructions carefully, discussing before writing their answers, and using their textbooks or any other materials they had in their portfolios.
5. Students answered the exercises following these steps:
-First, they read the statements about the systems of the human body (skeletal, muscular, respiratory, circulatory, digestive and nervous).
-Second, they placed a check mark in a circle to indicate whether they agreed or disagreed with each statement.
-Third, they reread al the statements.
-Fourth, they placed a check mark in the Correct circle if the information they gathered supported their choice, and then wrote how the information found supported their choice.
-Finally, they placed a check mark in the Incorrect circle if the information they gathered did not support their choice, and they wrote an explanation of why their choice was wrong.
6. Students answered the unit review.
7. Students shared their findings with the class and made any necessary corrections.
8. Students were told that in the next lesson they would have the opportunity to demonstrate how much they had learned in the inquiry-based lesson by taking a post-test.
9. Students were asked to study at home their answers to the unit review and to check all the materials they had in their portfolios so that they improved the results they obtained in the pre-test.
10. Students were encouraged to bring to class any other materials they found at home while preparing for the post-test to include them in their portfolios.


Remarks:

-Students were very enthusiastic about showing the teacher the pictures and documents they had collected while reviewing the unit at home.
-Students were happy when they were allowed to form their own groups.
-Some students had difficulty to understand some of the instructions to answer the workbook exercises. The teacher asked other students in the same group to explained them what they had to do.
-Anytime students asked questions about the content, they were told to search in their documents, pictures and textbooks for the information they needed.
-Students were very excited about the post-test in the next lesson.
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Thursday, May 7, 2009.
8:00 a.m. - 8:45 a.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 11: Post-test
N° of students: 22

1. A student said the prayer.
2. Students were given the post-test sheets face down.
3. Before turning their sheets to start the test, students were advised to read the instructions and each of the statements carefully.
4. Students answered the post-test individually.
5. Students finished answering the post-test and their test sheets were collected.

Remarks:

-Students were eager to take the post-test. They seemed to be very confident.
-Some students mentioned that they had prepared for the post-test using their textbooks; others used the internet and others the materials they had in their portfolios.
-This time, students did not complain and did not ask as many questions as they did when they took the pre-test.
-Only a few students asked questions about the content of the post-test. They were advised to reread the statements more carefully.
-Some students commented that they had found the post-test very easy.
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Monday, May 11, 2009.
1:15 - 2:00 p.m.
Inquiry-based lesson 12: Post-survey (in Spanish)
N° of students: 22

1. Prayer: a different student was asked to lead the prayer.
2. Students were asked if they remembered what a survey was.
3. The teacher reminded students that they had taken a pre-survey at the beginning of the inquiry-based unit. He complemented students answers and explained the purpose of the post-survey.
4. A student read the instructions for the post-survey.
5. Another student was asked to explain in his own words the instructions to check understanding.
6. Students answered the post-survey individually.
7. Some students asked questions about some statements in the survey.
8. The teacher walked around the classroom answering any questions if necessary.
9. Students finished answering the post-survey.
10. The teacher collected the post-survey worksheets.

Remarks:

-Students were much more relaxed this time answering the survey compared with the pre-survey at the beginning of the unit.
-A few students started answering the questions out loud and the teacher reminded them that they had to answer individually and quietly not to influence other students.
-A few students were answering too fast, so the teacher advised them to read more carefully and to avoid rushing.