Science with Standard 5: Toads and Microscopes



We became familiar with the different
 magnifications by looking at a handwritten letter before
moving on to plant and animal cells.



This past week, I brought out the microscope for the first time in my Standard 5 Science class.   As I entered there were excited whispers of "it's a microscope" and "Teacher, is that a microscope?".  As I introduced the different parts of the microscope there was dead silence as all of my pupils fixed their eyes on me and listened to every word.  Although it was slightly chaotic after the initial introduction, (the lab was supposed to take place in the classroom but had to be moved spur of the moment to my house where I had students on my floor and on mats outside), it was inspiring to see their faces light up as they peered through the eyepiece at the onion skin and rectangular outlines of the plant cells.  I had students who shut one eye and tried to peer through half of the eyepiece, those that were glued to it and couldn't tear themselves away, and those that wanted to come back to look again and again.



I love that you can so clearly see Owen's expression
of surprise as he looks through the microscope.



   This same class is also doing weekly observation journals of a site that they picked around campus.  Although they initially found it a challenge to describe what they were seeing closely, there have been some wonderful journal entries with students describing the colors, shapes, and sizes of what they see, drawing detailed and labeled drawings, and even giving some of their site residents different characters.  In one journal entry by Elton, aged 11, he describes his toad's home and how he loves his fat and very "handsome" toad.  In the several weeks since his initial discovery, this toad has become the focal point of many of the journal entries and much observation.  I have found pupils out at his home during lunch and after class, and several students have come and searched me out to show me how he likes to eat grasshoppers, or to investigate new found holes with my flashlight.