Just because the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic games are over doesn’t mean the enthusiasm students brought to school in August has to be. This installment of the NBC Learn/NSF videos series Science of the Summer Olympics—Maximizing the Long Jump of Bryan Clay focuses on the decathlete’s training for just one of the ten events he hoped to compete in. While Bryan Clay failed to qualify himself, you can find footage of the two American decathletes who did using the search term “decathlon” at the NBC Olympics site.

Optimization, or the process of getting the best result given the constraints, is the focus of the NSTA-developed lessons that connect to this video. While other athletes focus on optimizing their technique for one sport, decathletes have to optimize for ten—long and high jump, shot, 110-meter hurdles, discus, pole vault, javelin and 100-, 400-, and 1500- meter runs. And all are played in just two days!

Sounds grueling. But hopefully this video/lesson package and the rest of those in the Science of the Summer Olympics series will have the opposite effect for you!

–Judy Elgin Jensen

Paralympic long jump silver medalist. Image courtesy of Ryan Taylor.

Video

“Maximizing the Long Jump of Bryan Clay” features Bryan Clay, an Olympic Gold medalist in the decathlon, and focuses on the technology used to study his form and movement as he carries out the most technologically complex event of the decathlon—the long jump. A stereoscopic, or 3D, camera provided by BMW is used to track Clay’s every movement during a jump. Clay, his coach, and engineer and biomechanist Melvin Ramey then analyze the videos to help Clay try and improve both his speed as he approaches the take-off board and, in turn, his jumping distance.

Lesson plans

Two versions of the lesson plans help students build background and develop questions they can explore regarding design optimization. Both include strategies to support students in their own quest for answers and strategies for a more focused approach that helps all students participate in hands-on inquiry.

SOTSO: Maximizing the Long Jump of Bryan Clay models how students might investigate a question about a projectile’s trajectory.

SOTSO: Maximizing the Long Jump of Bryan Clay, An Engineering Perspective models how students might design a launching device and use the device to test factors that influence the distance a projectile can travel.

You can use the following form to e-mail us edited versions of the lesson plans: [contact-form 2 “ChemNow]

The cookbook metaphor is often used to describe confirmatory labs. Much like cooks in a diner or fast-food establishment, students follow a standardized procedure (recipe) to get predictable results. But I suspect we also want students to act as chefs sometimes–creating and testing new recipes and evaluating the results.
As the authors of Open Ended Inquiry suggest, an awareness of levels of inquiry can help teachers scaffold learning experiences: confirmatory, structured, guided, and open inquiry. Using the content from a typical chemistry class (reaction rates), the authors illustrate three strategies that can be used to support open inquiry. They also provide a rubric and suggestions for helping students generate experimental ideas. Eight Ways to Do Inquiry presents a “taxonomy” of teaching strategies that foster inquiry, including protocols, modeling, taxonomy (not just in biology), product testing, design challenges, and discrepant events. [SciLinks: Inquiry]
The author of Adding Inquiry to Cookbook Labs describes how labs in her school were updated to enhance inquiry skills by adding opportunities for more student involvement. Teacher demonstrations were followed by student exploration. She provides examples of two updated investigations that were already part of the curriculum.  The cooking metaphor continues with Now You’re Cooking. The author shows how traditional investigations in heat transfer can be upgraded with extensions to basic recipes. [SciLinks: Heat Transfer, Conduction, Convection, and Radiation]

A Virtual Tour of Plate Tectonics show that not all inquiry investigations have to be hands-on. In this minds-on investigation, students examined real data on plate tectonic boundaries, using a chart to organize and summarize their findings (provided in the article). A recent Science Scope article has more ideas: Using Google Earth to Teach Plate Tectonics and Science Explanations  [SciLinks: Plate Tectonics]
If your school is using tablets (e.g., iPads), Tablets as Learning Hubs has suggestions for science applications to support inquiry, including using the camera as a magnifier or to investigate lenses, and using QR codes, probeware, and applications that are free or low-cost.  For more, see the blog Tablets as Microscopes.
The process of Fracking for Natural Gas is a topic in the news, and the author has suggestions for web-based resources. See also the articles The Keystone XL Pipeline  and Fracking Fury,  published in previous editions of Science Scope.
Don’t forget to look at the Connections for this issue (September 2012), which includes links to the studies cited in the research article. These Connections also have ideas for handouts, background information sheets, data sheets, rubrics, etc.

In Memoriam: sadly, we report the passing of Irwin Slesnick, whose many contributions to NSTA and the broader realm of science education include the NSTA Press books Adventures in Paleontology  and Clones, Cats, and Chemicals. Please see an obituary posted to The Bellingham Herald.

 
During the first weeks of school many preschool and kindergarten teachers have their students draw self-portraits as a way of getting to know children’s fine motor skills and developmental age in drawing, as well as teach vocabulary for parts of the body and sense structures. (See the lovely gallery of self portraits from Clipston Primary School in the UK.) Copies of the beginning-of-the-year self-portraits are kept in a portfolio of student work. When students make final self-portraits for the year, they can be used to see the child’s growth in abilities in fine motor skills and in using symbols to convey meaning, such as hearts drawn around a family group.
Drawing a self-portrait is just one of many activities that can be part of an investigation into the human body. Children may have stories to tell about visits to the doctor, the birth of siblings, learning to use the toilet, losing a tooth, and developing physical abilities such as jumping or riding a bicycle. The Illinois Projects in Practice article, “Helping Children Sketch and Draw from Observation,” lists the many ways drawing and telling stories relate to Illinois Early Learning benchmarks throughout the curriculum.

As children get to know the parts of their body, they can make comparisons with the body structure of other animals. They begin to understand that animals can be grouped—worms have no legs and a soft body, insects have six legs and a hard exoskeleton as contrasted with our four limbs, soft exterior and hard skeleton. Using playdough to make models is one way to document observations. If the children find an earthworm or a cricket, contain it for an hour so children can observe it and record their observations by drawing, modeling with playdough, clay, or pipe cleaners (aka “fuzzy sticks”).

Children like to make models of their family pets. When children find their larger playdough models won’t stand up, ask them, “What helps you to stand?”, beginning a discussion about bones. Pipe cleaners or sticks representing the skeleton can be added to the models to make them able to stand. In the September 2012 issue of Science & Children I write about looking at bones and making models to learn about our bodies. Children are often very interested in bones—read about Jake in Scotland who began collecting bones when he was 6 years old with the support of his father. To observe animals with and without bones, visit the Smithsonian National Zoological Park’s OctopusCam and view the giant Pacific octopus–and its human visitors as they view it in the Invertebrate Exhibit.

Science teachers often integrate topics in health/nutrition/wellness with science. Most children know that nutritious food and exercise are important for good health, and science classes provide opportunities for children to explore how and why.
Teaching Young Scientists About Their Bodies uses observation and model-making for students to begin to understand the complexity of the human body, particularly the skeletal system. [SciLinks: Animal Bones]
Children aren’t the only ones who have misconceptions about health. Even adults have misconceptions or incomplete understandings of science phenomena. In this month’s Formative Assessment Probe, Confronting Common Folklore: Catching a Cold, Page Keeley presents a way to uncover what students do (or do not) understand about infectious diseases, specifically the common cold. As usual, a brief background discussion accompanies the probe document. [SciLinks: Viruses, Germs, Germ Theory of Disease, Infectious Disease]
Several articles focus on food and nutrition. From Soda to Smoothies has a 5E lesson in which students learn about nutrition and food quality by developing recipes for fruit smoothies. The author of Chef of the Week describes a project that gave students a way to learn about and incorporate healthy snacks. How Much Have You “Bean” Eating? describes a simulation that looks at the relationship between food production and population growth.   [SciLinks: Nutrition, Vitamins, Foods as Fuel, Human Population]

Knowing and using social skills can be another facet of healthy living. Morning Meeting and Science has a rationale for using this time to model and practice appropriate social skills which can be applied in science lessons (and other lessons, too). For example, students may need explicit guidance on what listening to others “looks like” and “sounds like” and these are suggested in a table in the article.  It might be harder for secondary teachers to carve out time from a 45-minute class period—perhaps a brief “Monday Meeting”?
When one of their school’s teachers participated in a research project in Antarctica, the students not only followed her experiences, they were inspire to meet goals in reading and physical fitness. The authors of Read-and Walk-to Antarctica suggest how similar projects could be done at other schools, even if teachers don’t have a similar adventure.    [SciLinks: Polar Climates]
The title Inquiry Takes Time says it all. The authors document a year-long project in a third-grade classroom to incorporate inquiry experiences. Each season (fall, winter, spring) focused on a level of inquiry (structured, guided, open) with familiar topics (rocks, circuits, plant growth. The authors provide a template for a student form and an example of a completed one [SciLinks: Rocks, Electricity, Plant Growth] This Is Inquiry, Right? has suggestions for updating activities to become more inquiry-focused. There is an informative table that shows how sections of a traditional activity on magnets could be modified. [SciLinks: Magnets, Magnetism]
Note: From Cookbook to Inquiry is the theme of the September Issue of The Science Teacher and other NSTA blogs. Inquiry was the year-long theme for the 2010-2011 Science & Children.
Kindergartners, Fish, and Worms…Oh My! shows how younger students can engage in observations and discussions when studying living things. The article includes a rubric and examples of student work. (I wonder if for some students this was the first opportunity they had to touch a worm or fish and observe them up close.) [SciLinks: Earthworms] In Life Cycles, trade books are used to stimulate student interest in science, and the article includes lessons for observing life cycles of insects and frogs. [SciLinks: Butterflies, Amphibians]
Case studies aren’t just for advanced students. Using a story about the spread of the kudzu plant, On the Case shows how fifth-graders can use this learning strategy [SciLinks: Invasive Species]
Many of these articles have extensive resources to share, so check out the Connections for this issue (September 2012). Even if the article does not quite fit with your lesson agenda, there are ideas for handouts, background information sheets, data sheets, rubrics, and other resources.