Technology in a Lesson Plan

 Musical Bottles - Vibration

Lesson Logistics

            Subject: Science

            Grade: 4^th grade

            Grouping: Whole Class

            Materials: 18 pop bottles with 3 levels of water (3 bottles per group), Oatmeal canister, rubber band, saran wrap, pot spoon, salt, xylophone, trombone, recorder, guitar

            Time: One hour

 Standards

·         NSES benchmark: Physical Science (Position and Motion of Objects): Sound is produced by vibrating objects. The pitch of the sound can be varied by changing the rate of vibration (NSES p.127)

·         Learning Targets

·    I can understand that sound is vibration

·    I can understand that sound varies in pitch

·    I can identify pitch as the highness or lowness of sound

·    I can understand that fast vibrations produce a high sound and slow vibrations produce a low sound

Building Knowledge Activities (See Attached Science Notes on Sound with powerpoint slides describe teaching steps used)

·    Before conducting experiment use quick-write and brainstorming sessions for pretest

Wrap Up and Assessment

·    Every student concluded that sound is vibration.

·    Every student concluded that the faster something vibrates, the higher the pitch and the slower something vibrates, the lower the pitch

·    Every student was able to predict correctly on the xylophone and guitar assessment at the end of their science sound notes

Evaluation of Assessment/Reflection (note: inclusion of pre and post test summary)

         An informal pre-test written on the board in a Quick-Write exercise was what I chose to use to introduce this lesson. After the quick-write, the students shared what they had written and I wrote the words on the board. Vibration was mentioned by two students and one student mentioned pitch. After we were done, I went through the list and repeated one-by-one some of the words and asked them to raise their hands when they also had used the word in their quick-write and tallied them next to the word. I included the words vibration and pitch in this exercise and as verified by their work, six students mentioned vibration and three mentioned pitch. This data is recorded on the Pre and Post-test Assessment Worksheet. Although they had just completed reading a lesson in their textbook that defined both of these vocabulary terms last week, these sound vocabulary words were not noted. The learning targets of my lesson were met and evidenced by conclusions and “apply what you know” sections of the lesson which is written in the Science Notes on Sound packets. At the very end, the application of what they learned was assessed by making accurate predictions about the highest and lowest pitch created on both the xylophone and the guitar. However, the prediction asked for explanations based on the experiment, which none of the students included. We were rushed and running out of time at the end of the experiment so consequently this is more likely the reason an explanation was not included, thereby I concluded that the assessment included incomplete data, even though that was my intent. I made the decision shift into reviewing the concepts to provide closure on the lesson rather than allow them extra writing time as I felt closure was more important than the assessment in the moment. I could choose to have another form of assessment at another time. 18 out of 18 students made a correct prediction in the last prediction (xylophone and guitar). The majority of the class did not include a written explanation in their predictions. However, the students’ understanding and ideas were consistent with the scientists’ ideas.  These work examples were chosen because they were a valid representative of the overall class. I concluded from this written evidence that all the students knew that vibration is sound and that the slower the vibration the lower the pitch and the faster the vibration, the higher the pitch. This lesson adequately met the needs of the very diverse learner population of this class by providing hands on work, visual representation, group sharing, and written responses. This particular class included three students who were below level learners that required daily interventions.     

         In conclusion, the students’ conceptual understanding of sound and pitch was cemented by this experiment evidenced by their Science Notes. Although they had just read about sound waves, vibration, and pitch the previous week in their textbook, they had no ownership or conceptual understanding.

         If I were to extend the lesson, I would include a formal assessment of this concept and extend with an exploration of sound waves. After that I would venture into the ear and hearing sound.

Here is the link to view the Power Point (sounds and moving animation excluded) used with this lesson:
http://www.slideshare.net/kyoung1/musical-bottles