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I'm Jackie.
I care for six children in my home, ages three to five.
A big part of doing science is letting children experiment
in doing their own discoveries.
And in order to do this, you need to have an environment
that supports that kind of exploration.
For our water investigation, I put a lot of thought
into setting up different learning centers
with materials that will support deeper science explorations.
I set up an outdoor space for the kids with a hose,
bucket, sticks and shovels so they could explore
how water flows.
- Whoa, mine is going.
- Yes!
Yeah, mine goes!
- Indoors, I filled our water table and set up cups,
funnels and other containers so they could investigate
pouring and transporting water in different ways.
I also set up a tabletop learning center with water,
mirrors, eyedroppers and toothpicks
so they could discover properties of water droplets.
How do you make a river?
Show me again.
Oh, those are different branches of the river?
Can you make more branches for your river?
I put a lot of planning into setting up the learning centers.
But once the students start exploring, I tend to step back,
observe and follow their lead.
Put it in the water.
Squeeze it, squeeze it.
Sometimes I will change my plans based on what the children
are interested in.
For example, even though I had planned an outdoor center,
there was so much interest in sinking and floating
that I decided to set up
a second sinking and floating center indoors.
They loved it.
- It sinks!
- Designing great science learning centers
has become an important part of my planning.
A great center not only engages the children,
it helps them explore a specific aspect of our topic.
Letting children explore water in their own ways
makes it fun and relevant for them.
And at this age, that is what science should be about.
- It floats!
- What's that mean?
- It's floating.