For this post I would like to present my gamified lesson
plan but also take the time to highlight the already gamified sections of the original
lesson plan which I have chosen to draw out and enhance. For the purpose of
this I will highlight elements I have added in blue and elements of existing
gamification in green.
Session D: Air Resistance
Programme
of study: Explain that unsupported objects fall
towards the Earth because of the force of gravity acting between the Earth and
the falling object
Identify the effects of air resistance, water
resistance and friction, that act between moving surfaces
Working
scientifically:Plan enquiries,
including recognising and controlling variables where necessary
Take measurements with increasing accuracy
and precision
Record results using
line graphs
Identify scientific
evidence that has been used to support ideas
Resources needed: Scrap A4 paper, stop watch,
parachute, Hall or playground time, paper clips, scissors, stopwatches,
sycamore or ash seeds. Access to internet
Badges
or stickers will be required if you plan on presenting the “beat the record”
section at the end of this plan.
Whole class teaching:
Remind the children of their friction experiments from the
previous session and the fact that when two surfaces come into contact with
each other friction occurs. If moving over a surface is difficult then surely
moving through air is easier? Briefly discuss with the children situations
where they have felt the ‘force’ of moving air – running into the breeze on a windy
day, holding an umbrella being pushed inside out, cycling on a windy day, etc.
Give a volunteer child a sheet of
A4 scrap paper & ask them to drop it on command from shoulder height. Use a
stopwatch to record how long it takes to fall to the ground. Record time on f/c. What happens if you change the shape
of the sheet? Does a
scrunched ball fall faster or slower than the flat sheet? What about other shapes (must use whole of A4 sheet each
time)? Repeat with a few other children.
Take a large parachute like those used for circle time
activities (in the Hall or playground). With all the children standing in a circle start to
raise and lower the parachute together. What
do they notice? – It’s hard
work; the parachute feels heavier than it did when it was still. Allow a
few children at a time to lie under the parachute while it is being raised
& lowered. What do they feel? – The
air rushing out and being drawn into the parachute.
Present the children with four balls the same size - golf
ball, squash ball, table tennis ball and a bouncy ball – all same size, weigh
those using digital scales - they are all the same size but each has a
different mass. Record on f/c. Ask the children to vote for which will fall to the ground fastest
when dropped from the same height.
All have the same force acting on them – gravity.
Record the
children’s predictions as a tally on the board.
Ask four children to come to the front to drop them simultaneously from the
same height. What do the children notice? Repeat with several more drops… the balls fall at same rate when dropped. Why is this? – As the shape of the balls is the
same they are all affected by the slowing air resistance in the same way. It is
thought that in 1590 Galileo climbed to the top of the leaning Tower of Pisa
and performed the same ball drop enquiry (& feather & ball enquiry)! Allow children to help Galileo carry
out his enquiry once more by going to http://www.planetseed.com/node/20129 orhttp://www.planetseed.com/popup/41280 (more detail). He was the first
to conclude that all objects would fall at the same rate/speed without air.
Finding an environment without air (a vacuum) is hard although space is the
perfect testing ground! See a feather and a hammer fall at the same speed athttp://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/apollo_15_feather_drop.html.
Group activities:
Tell the children that they are
going to plan and then carry out their own enquiry to explore how spinners
weighted with paper clips fall when dropped. Before starting they must agree in
pairs on the question they are going to
investigate through discussion of the Discussion Drawing (session resource). How does the number of paper clips
affect the time the spinner takes to fall? How does the height a spinner is
dropped from, affect the time it takes to fall? How does the size of the
spinner affect the time it takes to fall?
Allow the children to consider how
they are going to carry out their experiment to attempt to answer their
questions. Remind the children that to be a
fair test they can only change one factor and must keep all others the same.
Discuss with each pair the factor that will change – greater mass, more height, etc.Allow
the children to carry out their experiment, repeating and recording all
measurements as they go. Make suggestions to groups investigating drop heights
so that this can be carried out safely. Allow students to use template to create spinners (session
resource – this can be
photocopied larger for students who choose the option of increasing the area of
paper used). Students should cut along the dotted lines before bending one side
strip forwards, one backwards to create the blades, and folding the main body
to make a triple thickness for fixing the paper clips to.
When the enquiry has been carried out, support the
children as they create a graph and describe any patterns created by their
results. Plot a line graph. Describe the pattern in their results, in the form: the larger the paper spinner, the
slower it fell; the more paper clips added, the quicker it fell. Encourage
the children to draw out a conclusion from their results, e.g. air pushes upwards and gravity
pulls down; it is the size
of the air resistance force that causes objects to fall at different rates, etc.
Inform the learners that now they will have a competition. In their
pairs, they will use the information they have gained from their experiments to
design a spinner that, when released from the same height, will take the
longest time from release to hit the floor. The rules are simple, all spinners
will be released from the same height and the stop watch will start from when
the spinner is released and stop the moment it touches the ground. Spinners cannot
be thrown, only dropped from a static position (to help with this the teacher
may release each of the spinners in turn) The students can make any shape
spinner they wish but can only use paperclips as additional weight and cannot
use any more than a single A4 sheet of paper. Each team may have as many test
drops as they wish during their allotted making time prior to the competition
starting.
After each spinner is dropped and its time recorded, give explanatory
feedback to help explain different behaviours due to shape and weight placement
etc. When all times have been measured, the winners are determined by being the
team with the longest time on the leaderboard.
When the winners have been determined, award points to each of that team’s
members and, if time permits, leaners can be given another chance to redesign
their spinners and try again. On this second attempt do not offer points but
instead badges/stickers for any teams which break the class record set by the
initial winners.
Lesson Materials
All of the
green text above is existing text from the original document which I believe to
be
elements of
gamification already present. It is these elements I have chosen to bring out
by
creating
the competition at the end of the lesson. The elements which are present
include
objectives,
goals, cooperation, leaderboards, failure, replayability, and scoring. A strong
argument
can be made for exploration, experimentation, and autonomy being heavy
influences
within this
document also.
I have
chosen to draw out the cooperation, competition, and scoring with my additional
game at
the close
of the session.
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