Transparent, Translucent, or Opaque?

Oops! I forgot to blog about mine and Laura's lesson on Monday!  So on Monday we were covering the light test, and how some minerals are transparent (you can see all the light), translucent (you can see some light, but not all), and opaque (you cannot see any light).  Before getting started, we made sure to go over what we had did the previous week with the streak test, and made it a point to stress the two vocabulary words that the students learned which were observable and identifiable colors.  The students seemed to grasp these terms very well : )  To stay organized and focused, we wrote down an agenda on the board for students to read which stated what we would be doing for the lesson, and two options to do if anyone finished early, which included to either sort the minerals out based on their ability to pass through light or to read about 2 minerals in their journals.

We then passed out a piece of transparency, wax paper, and cardboard to every group and had them discuss and write down words to describe each piece with their partners.  They recorded these words on a chart that we had created.  We then discussed these words together as a class, and wrote them on the board for everyone to see.  Many of the students used words that we were looking for to describe the tools.  Clear was used for the transparency, cloudy and waxy were referred to when describing the wax paper, and the students used not see through or brown for the cardboard piece.

To demonstrate and describe the terms transparent, translucent, and opaque, we shut the lights off in the classroom and used a flashlight to show how much light was revealed through each of the 3 materials.  By doing this in front of the class, I believe it helped those students who were confused about the topic really understand what we were talking about.  After visually teaching the students about these terms, we passed out the minerals to each group, and told them that we would be doing the same light test we had just demonstrated, but with the minerals instead.  We made sure to tell the students that the penlights were going to be used as their tool for the light test, and that it was important to not shine it in peoples' faces.  We did one of the minerals together so that the children knew what kind of information we were looking for.  It was then time to be scientists!

Overall, the lesson was a great success.  We found that some of the students were not writing down scientific words for their descriptions on each mineral, so we made sure that they were informed to use the new vocabulary words they had just learned in the lesson.  Giving the students an activity to do after they were done was a great idea, based on the fact that this test was pretty simple and went by quickly.  I was happy to see that every student chose one of the options to do after they had finished with the penlights.  We even had time to discuss some of their findings.  I can't believe we only have one more lesson left! : (