Does Brand Name Popcorn Pop Better
Carol
Sayles
Second/Computer
Content Area Objectives Addressed:
Math- graphing, measuring of volume
Technology Objectives
Addressed:
Spreadsheet
Graphing
The first week of school I always like to make graphs of students’ experiences. This allows for small group interaction, co-operation, planning, organization, delegation of tasks, and collection of data. I like to observe the students’ personality, maturity, and ability during this process.
The graphs the class made were:
Favorite Sandwich How Many People in My Family
Favorite Breakfast How Many Times I Have Moved?
Favorite Cookie Do you know how to ride a bike?
Favorite Drink Do you know how to swim?
Favorite Number How We Got To School on the First Day
Favorite Dessert How Many Letters in Your Name
Favorite Wild Animal Favorite Day of the Week
Favorite Pet Have You Had Chicken Pox?
Eye Color Have You Been Stung by a Bee?
Favorite Apple How Many Pets Do Your Have?
Favorite Ice Cream Birthday Month
Favorite Color How Many Kids at Your House?
When I began thinking of this lesson, I decided to us the spreadsheet integration. I wanted to have a graphing lesson. The software I used was “Graph Club”. I am a “chicken”, and like to feel confident when using software before a filming. I introduced the software to the students, by making the graph, Our Favorite Apple. In small groups, the students were instructed to duplicate the same graph that I had made, and then they were able to “play” on the software. I must confess my ignoran ce; I learned more about the software as the children “played”. We learn so much from our students. I assessed students’ learning by assigning one of the charts that we had made at the beginning of the year. This lesson was hugely successful. The students were WOWED by their graphs.
Next, let’s go on to the second part of the lesson. I wanted to collect data in the form of volume. I decided to use 3 different brands of popcorn to measure the differences of volume of the three popcorns. The popcorn that I used were:
Orville $3.29
Jolly Time $1.39
Store Brand $0.79
The questions I wanted to know were: Do different brands affect volume?
Do different brand affect taste?
How many kernels pop?
I expected the Orville to pop bigger and better, and to taste better. But I was disappointed because all three brands popped about the same. All three brands tasted about the same.
I did quite a bit a “adjusting” as the lesson progressed. I planned to measure the unpopped kernels by volume, but it worked out better to count the kernels instead.
We counted to popped popcorn only to have more “pieces” than we started out with kernels. The popcorn popped at different rates. When waiting for the other brands to finish popping, the first container was burning. I didn’t put enough oil in the first group, so the amount of kernels popped was decreased. These are all factors that an adult looks at when conducting an experiment, but the kids could care less. Just as long as the popcorn popped they were satisfied the experiment was working.
My “need” was to have the experiment work. So the following week, we conducted an additional experiment. I use a hot plate and popped the kernels in a pot. We counted out 300 kernels for each batch. Only to find out that our previous week’s experiment was about the same. The kernels popped about the same amount, and the taste was about the same for all three brands. I did find that the Orville popped about 2 minutes faster than the other two brands.
The following week we put the created the graphs on the computer. This was done in small groups rotating during activity time.
Teacher Observation and completed graphs.
I listed the steps on the white board that the student was to use as they entered their data about the popcorn.
First week creating charts- 5 days 30-40 minutes -small groups of 4-5 students
Learning the program 1 day -60 minutes- small groups at centers rotating at computers.
Collecting the data -1 day- 60 minutes medium sized groups at centers rotating.
Assessing knowledge- 1 day- 60 minutes- small groups at centers rotating at computers.
Presentation of the project- 30-40 minutes whole class.
The individual students shared their graphs with the class and, explained the information and their conclusions and observations.
The groups of students shared their graphs of popcorn that popped with the class, and explained their conclusions.
The classroom students were the audience.
What prior knowledge was required on the part of the students in order for them to be successful in this project? (Include curriculum and technology knowledge)
Student s needed to:
Collect data
Give information about a topic
Organize information
Work in small groups
Make conclusions about information on graphs
Learn the software Graph Club
Conduct experiment
Control data so that it is equal “fair”
Input data that was collected
Draw conclusions about data
What was the student to computer
ratio?
There are five children to per computer.
How
did you schedule your students’ computer time?
There are small groups rotating to the computers during activity time.
What
was the location of the computers and other technology equipment used by
students?
In the classroom.
How
would you suggest beginning teachers obtain computer resources for their
students? (Knowing some of your strategies would be valuable for our
pre-service teachers.)
Ask your school’s computer person how to obtain additional computers in your room. Then listen and do. Also ask your district’s computer person how to obtain computers.
Rate the level of access for students to use computers/other technologies as they needed --high, medium, low
I have five computers in my classroom. So students have a high access.
Rate the level of supervision required for students during the project, specifically for computer and other technology use –high, medium, low
For the learning of the program, I would say
that the level of supervision was high. I had five students learning the program
during a small group activity time.
For the entering the popcorn data into the
program, I would rate that as low because I had a competent student monitor
other students as they entered the data into the computer.
What
hardware was required for your project?
Computers
What
software was required for your project?
Graph Club
Anything else?
Yes, I used a literature connection. I read Tomie de Paolo’s book The Popcorn Book. This book tells the story of popcorn. It also explains the why of how popcorn pops.
What
kind of assessment did you use for this project? (Include a copy if you can.)
Participation, teacher observation, and completed graphs.
What categories did you assess? (I.e.: content, screen design, depth/breadth, etc.)
I assessed each student’s completed graph.
How
does the product that you submitted
compare with other students’ products for this same project?
I liked the software of Graph Club because it gives each student an exceptional visual representation of the data collected. Therefore, each student has an excellent product in the form of a graph.
What did you like best about this project?
Student involvement was extremely high. The students were excited about the first graph that they completed.
The students were excited about the collecting the data of popping corn.
What did the students like best about this project?
Eating the popcorn
Rank the level of student involvement in this project –high, medium,
low
Super high
Rank the level of student interest in this project –high, medium, low
Super high
Would you teach this lesson again?
Yes!