The Arizona STEM Acceleration Project

Developing a Presentation of a Scientist from the Atomic Theory Timeline Using Scratch (Atomic Theory Lesson Part II)

Developing a Presentation of a Scientist from the Atomic Theory Timeline Using Scratch (Atomic Theory Lesson Part II)

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A 6,7,8th grade STEM lesson

Author: Tim Malan

Date: 10/24/2023

Notes for teachers

This lesson can be done independently from the 3D modeling the Atomic Theory Lesson or together.

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If done separately, students can fill out the timeline in a variety of ways. You can teach them about each of the scientists, or if you feel unprepared there is a great video the students can watch on Youtube titled “Mystery of Matter - Into the Atom” that does a great job explaining the process.

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They can fill out the timeline on Google Slides or you can have them cut and glue the labels on with hard copy paper.

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When they finish the timeline (and the 3D modeling) they can make a scratch project about the life and invention of onoe of the scientists.

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List of Materials

• Laptops
• Atomic Theory and Models Timeline
• Scratch Sample Project
• Google Slide for understanding some key scratch blocks
• Scratch Practice

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Standards

• Educational Technology
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• 1. Empowered Learner - Students leverage technology to take an active role in choosing, achieving, and demonstrating competency in their learning goals, informed by the learning sciences.
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• 4. Innovative Designer - Students use a variety of technologies within a design process to identify and solve problems by creating new, useful or imaginative solutions.
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Standards

Science

6.P1U1.3 Develop and use models to represent that matter is made up of smaller particles called atoms

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8.P1U1.2 Obtain and evaluate information regarding how scientists identify substances based on unique physical and chemical properties.

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Objectives: Students will be able describe big contributions to the atomic theory timeline by filling out a timeline graphic organizer and making a scratch presentation about a scientist.

Agenda

The teacher will give direct instruction or have students watch the Into the Atom film on Youtube and fill out their organizer. I would do this either by teacher for about 10 minutes then pausing and have them work with their partner to cut and glue the next part of the model on their timeline, and then repeat. (50 minutes)

Students then watch the example Presentation provided about Moseley. (10 minutes)

If students have no coding experience, have them connect the descriptive sticky notes to the code blocks. (See slide 9). This will teach them about some basic block functions that they will probably use. The blocks that are used the most are Say Blocks, Control Blocks, Event Blocks (especially Broadcasting). They also need to know how to upload photos of scientists as Sprites.

Students work on a scratch presentation project about a scientist in the Atomic Theory Timeline. Some options are John Dalton, J.J. Thompson, Ernest Rutherford, Henry Chadwick, Niel’s Bohr. You can have them draw from a hat if you want an even distribution of presentations or you can have them choose the one you are the most interested in. (60 minutes)

Students then have a Gallery Walk where half of the students share their projects to the other half of the students rotating around the room. Then the groups switch. (40 minutes)

Intro

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As said previously, the teacher will have students work on filling out the timeline on Google Slides or printed out. The timeline is a background so students cannot delete it accidentally.

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Then students can move the components on the next screen onto the timeline. These components are all draggable.

Answer Key

Here is an answer key for the teachers.

Hands-on Activity Instructions

• To help students that don’t know the basics about Scratch blocks have them work in pairs on the assignment on the right. They have to connect the descriptive sticky notes with the blocks that activate that code. This will teach them many of the basic functions for Scratch. The link is on Slide 3.
• Tip: Broadcast blocks might need more of an explanation, so finding a Youtube video might be important for that concept.
• After this they have to create a Scratch project about an Atomic Theory scientist you assign them, or, they choose on their own.

Assessment

Here is a rubric for how to score their Scratch projects.

Differentiation

You can remove some descriptions of levels of performance from the rubric. For example, they could have them omit the background of the scientist.

Remediation

Extension/Enrichment

Students can focus on the advanced section of the rubric.

You can have them animate the experiment and even create buttons that allow the user to trigger the experiment.