The Creativity Challenge

Our final lab was entitled the creativity challenge. The instructions for this lab were to bring a completed unit plan and come with an open mind for creativity, we had no idea what would happen.

When we arrived at lab we were instructed that we would be taking a field trip to the Dollar Tree. Yes you read correctly the Dollar Tree, a place where you can find the  most amazing items for only 1 dollar.

On our van ride we were instructed that we were to pick out 5 items that we could creatively use in a lesson of our choosing and we were not allowed to confer with our other lab members for at least the first 15 minutes of the shopping adventure.

For this I decided to find items for my soils and land use unit and I  quickly chose my lesson on erosion to get items for.

As I walked around the Dollar Tree I was amazed, I suppose it has been a while since I was given an hour to spend in just one store. The Dollar Tree has some pretty awesome teacher items when you start to get creative.

When it was all over I walked out of there with green hair curlers, a bag of stones, spanish moss, coffee filters, and blue colored sand.

So heres the plan, what if prior to teaching about erosion and erosion prevention methods I break my class into several teams and they are presented with these materials and perhaps a few more. They are then asked to  create a system of fields that would reduce the effects of erosion and runoff into a nearby stream. Once the students construct their erosion "proof" field we would then test the field with a hefty rain shower, aka a sprinkling can with 1 cup of water in it. The students could then measure the amount of erosion that has occurred. This activity would then lead into our discussion on what erosion is, the problems it causes, and prevention methods. 

When I look at the 5 items I purchased I imagined this playing out. The blue sand would be my soil that is at stake of erosion, the stones would be my creek, the moss would be my grass waterway, and the coffee filter would be placed over the soil to represent no till farming. How the students will use the items I am not sure, but I am excited to try it out and if I get my questioning right this may even turn into an inquiry based activity.

Overall this lab was great, I often class myself as an uncreative person, but today I felt as though I was on my creative game and this is something that I hope to carry fourth with me into student teaching.