Phase I - Introducing the Topic

In the winter, there is no sun and we don't sweat and we don't have to take a wet cloth to cool ourselves off.

But in the winter, we do have to put on warm clothes to keep ourselves warm in the cold, cold wintertime.

an ambulance

rocks falling on playgrounds

September 12, 1997
T: Yesterday, we brainstormed ideas Changes Outside or Changes from summer into fall. Then, we began to categorize the ideas and give a name to the category. We have agreed on one big topic as plants with two subtopics: trees and other plants. Other topics are Animal Survival, Weather, and Time and Space. There are more ideas to be categorized-Changing clothing, and Halloween.
MG: Changing clothing and making costumes is something that goes with Halloween.
AS: Changing clothing is related to Halloween like a food chain.
EK: Holidays and making costumes go together and Halloween is a holiday.
MG.: All things that people do-they change clothes, make costumes, and celebrate holidays.
CZ: We have things that people do- they should all go together.
IK: We could call it Holidays.
MG.: Let's call it, What People do in the Fall.
AP: I object.
T: What do you want to do?
AP: I think they should be put together and it should be called "what people do in the fall".
T: So Arnav, you agree.
AL: Whenever I see people go out in the fall, they wear summer dresses.
T: Do they wear summer clothes all fall-or in the beginning of fall and later they change into warmer clothes for cooler weather?
AL: The kids do but the parents don't.
T: Aren't kids "people"?
JL: I object. Some people don't change their clothes into costumes.
T: By placing "changing clothes" into this category, what's being said is that if there is changing to be done, it's not done by the animals or plants, it's done by the people.
MB: I object.
ElK: I disagree. People don't always make Halloween costumes.
T: Should it say "some" people?
AS: People are animals.
MH: We saw a dog wear a costume last Halloween.
AS: It's not what all people do, it's silly.
ElK: I disagree. People buy costumes in summer. I already have mine. We don't all get our costumes on the first day of fall.
T: We'll come back to this. Due to the objections, it sounds like the name of this category might be What People Do or What some People Do when Summer Changes into Fall. There are more ideas to catergorize: People stop swimming, Swim indoors, Not so many bikers, and Fall activity graph.
CZ: I don't think fall activity graph makes sense.
CF: Swim and People stop swimming should go under a category called swimming.
T: Yes, it doesn't fit with Animal Survival or Plants or Weather. Does it fit under What People Do? (nods yes)
ElK: I don't think we should have a Space category. The sun doesn't have a ring around it.
MG. Fall is caused by things in space like days getting shorter. That means the earth is moving around the sun faster.
ElK: The sun doesn't have a ring around it even though it's a planet.
AS: No, the sun is a star.
JL: We could make like a category called Suggestions of Ways to Study and put Fall activities under it.

10/15/97
T: Did you notice any changes outside this morning on your way to school?
AL: I noticed snow on the grass. It started to rain a little bit last night and it got so cold that it snowed out of the clouds.
J: I noticed frost when I fed my two cats.
AS: I think it going to snow pretty early this year. Because last night my dad had to go to a meeting and I had to come with him and when I went to go to the house I smelled snow.
T: Oh, what does snow smell like?
AS: It smells sorta like bacon.
T: What happens to get frost?
JL: I think it was raining and snowing last night, it was snowy cold last night. So rain and snow that is frozen makes frost.
KH: I agree.
SG: I agree.
IK: I agree.
JL: Frost means it's frozen.
EK: I think it was raining and snowing. It was very cold last night because I was going outside and I felt some drops on my head. I was like, "Is it raining?" and then I started to see snow.
ElK: I think that it just so cold that it just gets there.
T: How does the frost just get there?
ElK: In the summer we saw a dead bunny and our dad touched him with a shovel, and it was dead because of the record. He was frozen. That's how it got frost.
T: The frost got there from the bunny?
ElK: No, the record.
T: Could you tell a little bit more about this record.
ElK: It means that it's a cold record. The weather's cold outside.
CZ: Like a weather record.
DK: Last year it set a record.
ElK: That's what I meant.
T: So you mean that last night it set a record and that's how the frost got on the grass?
ElK: U-huh. And I found some, my dad found some on our car.
T: How did the frost get on the car?
ElK: From a record.
T: How does the record work?
ElK: It's get so cold. I sorta agree with JL. It think it rained and got so cold it froze.
IK: I know what a record is. Do you remember last year, if it the coldest or the hottest that it's ever got, it's called a record and the radio comes on and tells you.
T: Did you hear the radio say that last night was the coldest for this date?
(Shakes head - no)
ElK: I thought it was pretty cold.
KH: I think it rained and then it got on the grass and then the grass--the rain drops started to freeze. But it wasn't snow.
AS: Ice crystals. I learned that in Magic School Bus. But usually when it rains, the ice crystals come from the clouds but when they get closer to the ground, they start melting.
T: So is that what happened last night?
AS: It was sorta backwards.
KH: Even in winter it starts from rain to snow. The snowflake starts out as a droplet but then as it goes down it turns into a snowflake. And then it's just cold ice.
JL: What I was saying is that it was snowing and raining and I'm sorta saying what KH was saying but instead I'm saying the snow and rain started out as snow and then the snow as it got close to the ground some of the snow melted and then they both joined together to make frost.
IK: When I came home from soccer, it sorta smelled like snow.
T: What does snow smell like to you?
IK: Half burned eggs and half burned bacon. I looked out the window and saw a little white dot.

10/29/97
AL: There was frost again this morning.
T: We had a conversation about frost on October 15. You had this to say about the frost on that day:

I noticed snow on the grass. It started to rain a little bit last night and it got so cold that it snowed out of the clouds.

What's your thinking on frost, now?
AL: It looks like snow.

11/18/97
A : It snowed last night. All those kids that said it would snow in November are right.
T: On October 15, we had a conversation about snow and frost. On that day it was said:
JL: I think it was raining and snowing last night, it was snowy cold last night. So rain and snow that is frozen makes frost.
KH: I agree.
SG: I agree.
IK: I agree.
JL: Frost means it's frozen.
T: Does the snow that is on the ground look like frost?
JL: No.
T: So what is you thinking on frost, now?
JL: I don't know.

11/25/97
T: Did you notice anything as you came to school today?
KH: There was frost.
T: On October 15, we had a conversation about frost. On that day the conversation sounded like this:
EK: I think it was raining and snowing. It was very cold last night because I was going outside and I felt some drops on my head. I was like, "Is it raining?" and then I started to see snow.
T:Is that still your thinking about frost?
EK: Yes.
DK: I think frost comes from grass. It's white stuff before it turns into frost.
AS: I think it's some ice.
DK: It's there in mornings. It's called dew.
AS: Not in the summer.
MG: I've heard of that.
DK: Frost is made out of dew.
AL: Frost melts in summer. Frost is dew.
MG: No, it's not.
PF: Hail storms are white. Maybe it hail stormed in the middle of the night. But I didn't hear any.
LS: When I was getting ready, frost was on the roof. It can get on cars, too.
AL: My mom said dew comes from out of the ground and frost comes from the sky.
ELK: Your mom's wrong.
J: I've got an experiment that uses a magnifying glass. Maybe that would tell us. This is how I think frost forms. I think dew is drops of water that gets formed on grass. Dew freezes and frost is formed.
T: What are the conditions for dew? Where does dew come from?
MG: From the ground. Maybe the ground on the other side of the world and it comes through the earth( I don't know how it get past the hot lava) and then it comes out of the ground as dew and then frost.

12/16/97
AS and ElK picked up leaves on their way into school and asked to put them in the freezer to save the frost.
J: I looked with a magnifying glass at the frost as it was melting. Do you know what it looks like? Crystals!

12/17/97
KH, TH, EK, DK and ElK and AS picked up leaves with frost on them and put them in the freezer to save the frost. Tess checked one hour later and reported the frost was gone but the leaf was hard.

September 23, 1997
T: Konlin, you were in the pond water study group. Did you notice anything that you would like to report to the class?
KS: I dropped 3 apples in the pond. 2 apples floated and 1 sank.
T: That's interesting. I wonder why.
D: A small apple is going to have less weight. It isn't as big so it would sink and a big one has more place for the water to hold it up.
T: You may want to try to do an experiment in our classroom with water and try things to see if we can duplicate Konlin's experiment and come up with a theory of why things float and sink.
AS: I threw in a big apple and it sank.
MH: Big things sink and little things float.
T: Why do you think that's true?
MH: I just thought it up.
AS: Actually the smaller would sink and the bigger would float.
RL: Were there a big one and 2 little ones?
KS: They were all the same size.
AS: Maybe 2 were slightly tinier.
?: Maybe one had a worm hole in it.
CZ: And the water got in the hole and made it sink that way.
AS: Or maybe the water made it float because the hole made it lighter.
AP: Maybe the heavier the thing, the lighter...No. If the thing has much air then it stays up. The thing that don't have air stays down.
PF: Deer like to eat apples. Maybe the deer took a bite out of the apple-a really small bite and then the deer didn't like the apple and just left it. It was a really small bite and Konlin didn't notice it. And the bite filled up with water and sank.
KS: I didn't see any bites.
T. So we'll need to experiment with apples with and without holes.
DK: You could do another experiment with apples the same size.
MB: I noticed that I saw a couple of tadpoles.
CF: I noticed fish
KS: I also noticed seaweed.
LH: We collected pond water.
RL: Where did you see the fish, Colin?
CF: Near the sand.
T: Thank you for reporting about the pond water.

September 23, 1997
T: Now Chloe, E'Bria, Elizabeth and Ian will report what they noticed about insects.
CW: I thought we'd find insects in the tall grass next to the pond.
ElK: There was a butterfly, a dragonfly, a spider, and a grasshopper. Sheri caught the grasshopper for me.
T: Where did you predict the you could find insects next?
EBK: We went in the woods that were next to the pond. We picked up a log and looked under. There were beetles and centipedes.
AP: I think insects are more frightened than animals.
MH: Did you find any ladybugs?
ElK: IK found one.
AS: What colors were the bugs?
ElK: Brown, black, and orange for the fuzzy caterpillar.

Feelings-Material to come soon!