Hello everyone!
My name is Elaine O’Donoghue and I am teaching 2nd class this year. My favourite space fact is that there are apparently more stars in the universe than grains of sand on all the beaches on the Earth! There are apparently billions of galaxies in the universe each containing billions of stars. We are so small on the grand scale of things!
An inquiry-based lesson that I might do would be challenging the students to design something to float a lego man back to safety from the water.
I would engage the students by standing a lego man on the side of a clear basin of water and asking them to design something to allow him to travel across the water to the other side of the basin, without getting wet.
First, we would discuss the concept of floating and sinking, investigating what objects available to them sink or float. The students would then divide into groups with a variety of materials to design their raft (e.g. straws, popsicle sticks, rubber bands, foil, tape, etc.). Once they design their rafts, they could test their buoyancy and stability in the basin of water. Once they have successfully created a floatation vessel that works to keep the Lego man afloat, they could try optimising it, improving it and making its design more impressive, while other groups are finishing theirs. Each group would then present their raft to the class, discussing what worked well, what problems they encountered and how they overcame these problems.