Academic Musings & Tech for Learning

In a 4th grade science class this past spring, I assisted with a project found on the Internet to look for iron in cereal. The 4th grade curriculum includes magnetism and iron is one of those metals attracted to a magnet. Another teacher told me she had tried this without success, but we plunged ahead anyway and this project became the class Science Fair entry.

Students use bar magnets to extract iron particles from crushed up breakfast cereals. You can find several versions of this experiment online, including here http://www.chemed.org/kids/docs/funExp_2006March.pdf, http://www.kbs.msu.edu/k12/participants/documents/IroninCereal.pdf, and http://chemistry.about.com/cs/howtos/ht/ironfromcereal.htm.

Students keep a science journal. After a brief discussion, they wrote out a simple hypothesis. They also documented materials, procedures and outcomes. We used Total Cereal, water, plastic bags, a 3 or 4-cup capacity container, coffee filters and plastic spoons.

We did it this way: Each group divided 1 cup of cereal into a baggie for each person. Students ground up the cereal in the baggie using their elbows, knuckles, spoons and such. They filled the container with the crushed up cereal, added about 1 cup of water and stirred the mixture with a bar magnet. We used the coffee filters to wipe off the mixture, and magnifying lenses for examination. With a group of students who found some black particles, we used to magnets to pass the tiny dot back and forth to confirm that it was magnetic, and the iron we were looking for.

Here’s some tips for improving the odds of your success. First, pick a cereal with the highest levels of iron fortification. The finer you grind the cereal, the better your chances of success. Switch from paper towels or paper to coffee filters, and have a magnifying lenses available and an extra magnet.

Here’s the Science Fair Poster:

To see the entire photo series on Flickr.com start here http://www.flickr.com/photos/lynnemb/page6/ .

The students really enjoy doing these hands-on experiments. When choosing an activity, it is interesting to compare different results. It was important that some groups succeeded in finding the iron in the cereal. Students concluded that the finer the cereal was crushed up, the better their results.

It is also a nice bonus to be able to show them photos of this experiment from other sources. Feel free to show them ours, and see the link below for another idea.

To do this experiement with a blender and scale it up to a chemistry class, check out this version from the University of Nebraska developed with Robert Becker of Kirkwood High School in Kirkwood, Missouri, which uses a blender and includes video clips.

All the best… Lynne

It is with a certain sense of nostalgia that I read an introduction I wrote for another website two years ago. I have since completed 33 credits of graduate school, learned much and have two more years’ life experience including working for NYIT to coach teachers directly for a Title IIB STEM grant in the bronx, running FunMasters entertainment company, and occasionally getting to do face painting or air brush tattoos myself. As I near the completion of my degree, and have been immersed in elementary school environments and a couple of middle schools, I have grown into a better-rounded educator, more seasoned and even more, prepared to tackle new challenged.

This has been an exciting time and I have had such great experiences and successes doing this teacher training. I’ve met dozens of new people, been in numerous schools in the Bronx, created and delivered science and technology workshops, taught kindergarten and 4th grade classes, and had class discussions with students in grades K – 5 as I worked with their teachers on integrating science and technology throughout the curriculum.

This time has been very rewarding and satisfying. I was warmly received and appreciated by many – both teachers and students – and shared some of the joys of teaching and learning that are so dear to education professionals.

In some kindergarten classes, I worked with teachers to deliver a wheel-and-axle experience by building wooden models of cars, covered wagons, bulldozers and bi-planes with the students. In another kindergarten class, we got out the laptops and went online to hear the sounds of animals and label the parts of animals. The kids dragged and dropped boxes and jumped with delight when they got them all in place. 4th grade students “oohed” and “aahed” watching a video of a butterfly emerging from its cocoon in a lesson about life cycles, or as they found the iron in their ground-up cereal.

Teachers of all grades and subjects participated in science workshops, and brought some of those resources into their classrooms. It was wonderful to hear of their successes. And to think I hadn’t taken a science class in over 20 years – I presented earthquakes and plate tectonics, hurricanes, simple machines, Newton’s laws, the scientific method, and our planetary neighborhood, with videos, podcasts, online interactives, hands-on experiments and added some computer software training. My ratings were excellent and I am very pleased with these accomplishments.

I now live in Rutherford, New Jersey in a house I purchased with two of my friends. I still do the budgeting, coordinating and business work of the

To teach again would be great, as a cluster teacher in elementary school, even a science cluster teacher, seems a reasonable aspiration, or to get back into a high school and facilitate learning about, and how to use technology to bring new life to students projects. But beyond that, I strive to have a greater influence on bringing technology to a learning community, to collaborate with other educators on making their classrooms more in-tune to the 21st century.

Who knows what challenges await our students? This increasingly complex world needs well-educated students who can think critically, use technology without a second thought as part of their toolbox, collaborate well with others, and navigate a world whose resources are being stretched and whose boundaries are being constantly challenged.

With world population approaching 7 billion people, it is, as Aldous Huxley penned, A Brave New World. Educating our children is an urgent endeavor, and I am anxious to continue my part in it.

to all you other educators out there.. keep faith …
all the best,