Bugs Bugs Bugs!

The research article that I chose was called, "What's Bugging You?" There are multiple reasons what drew me to this article. One of the main reasons was because of the colorful palette that is displayed in the front. I'm not a fan of bugs, but I know there are a lot of misconceptions when it comes to bugs. Students are always discovering new attributes when it comes to finding bugs. This article went into depth on how there are misconceptions that students need to figure out on their own. Let's break this article down into tiny pieces. The main point of this article was to show the 5 E's in the inquiry process. This is an important aspect because this helps the students hit a higher order of thinking, which relates to Bloom's Taxonomy. Through each process this teacher pre-assesses the students prior knowledge. The first aspect that she hits is having the students circle which insect best fits their perception of how insects should look. After that the teacher begins to talk about an insect-collection excursion, this is where the students are going to use the 5 E's to explore about more insects. This article breaks down the 5 E's into smaller sections to explain the main difference. First let me write down the 5 E's before discussing them. The 5 E's include: engage, explore, explain, elaborate, and evaluate. These 5 E's all have distinct attributes that are discussed within this article. The first E is engage and the teacher engaged her students by asking what is the most common insect that you know. Not only is she engaging the students, but she is also asking them to tap into their prior knowledge to answer the question. After she heard some of the students answers, she shows them a well known website that goes more into depth about insects. Before starting the lesson she makes sure that students know the concept of classifying. If students are unsure of this concept then she explains what it means. She does this by relating other objects and having the students classify distinct features. Once the students have an idea of what they will be doing she hops right into the Explore section. At first the teacher most model how to do this experiment before the students proceed on their own. The students are collecting data on the insects that they see outside. The materials are listed below that are needed for this experiment:

With these materials the students are to find different bugs that are placed within the bins and compare and contrast the bugs that are inside. The bugs will range from different sizes to having distinct features. Students will have to write down features and draw pictures based on what they see. Towards the end the students can even ask questions that relates to the content and base their answers of the question. Depending on the age you can take this a step further on writing a report about the bugs they discovered. After the explore section comes the explain phase. This is where the students are asked to go more into detail on explaining their insects. The features that make up this insect, the drawing they created, why they chose this insect. Those are some examples of what students might explain during this section. This is also a time where the teacher can ask students questions based on their observations. She can relate the questions to different content and see if the students are understanding this process. The fourth step is Elaborate and during this the students are making models of their insect. This is going to be a hands on experiment for the students to conduct. They will use the data they collected in the previous section and create a bug using different materials that are supplied within the classroom, but they must make their insect adapt to their natural settings. This would include making insects with wings, legs, long bodies, etc. Last but not least is the last E which is Evaluate. During this section the teacher evaluates the students on the content they previously just learned, also known as a formative assessment. This is an individual assessment for the students. The teacher will ask the students to write down three attributes that make up an insect. Based on the results the teacher will see if the students understood the content. It is important to do this because if the students didn't understand this assignment then they are not reaching a higher order of thinking. I like to think of the 5 E's as a process. Students have to finish one step in order to make it to the following steps to understand the material. This article is a prime example of how to follow the 5 E's. I'm glad I chose this article to analyze. I look forward to blogging more about articles I find online. Until next time bloggers :)