Alaska Waters Discovery Centers
Overview
Children explore discovery centers focused on seas and rivers, using tools, games, and hands-on activities like a sand table, water table, and bingo games to learn about aquatic animals and environments. They engage in open-ended exploration, share observations, and practice scientific thinking while building curiosity and understanding through play.
Focus Questions
-
What do you notice about ____________?
(The open-ended questions are important for child-guided explorations.)
Enduring Understandings
- Plants and animals can be sorted into groups based on different characteristics.
Engage
20-30 minutes
Take time to notice a particularly interesting shell or rock. Draw children’s attention to it with either an “I Spy” approach or twenty questions with the object in a brown paper bag.
Afterward, introduce Discovery Centers one at a time. Encourage children to use the centers appropriately–“explore like a scientist”–“tell other scientists in the room what you find!”
Centers may include:
- A sand table with shells.
- A water table with shells and plastic marine animals and plankton nets.
- A magnet board with pictures of aquatic or marine animals.
- A flannel board with silhouettes of marine animals.
- A pan balance scale with shells/rocks for weighing and comparing.
- Alaska Seas and Watersheds Bingo Game.
- Freshwater Bingo Boards and Cards.
- Marine Bingo Boards and Cards.
- Marine Biologist’s Lab.
- Subsistence Camp.
Keep a tub of books, puzzles, science tools, and commercial games in the classroom where it will be accessible to all of the center users.
Explore
60 minutes
Allow children to self-select the center they want to explore, with ample time to explore and discover at their own pace.
Explain
20 minutes
Debrief with students after center time. What did they notice? What kinds of animals are on the bingo game? How can you describe them? How did you use a science tool? How were you a scientist today as you used the tools and discovered.
Elaborate
Students will learn from each other when they share their ideas. They will get ideas for rediscovery and replay during the next day’s center time. Move and change centers as children lose interest. Centers can continue throughout the Alaska Seas and Watersheds unit of study, to support understanding and child-directed learning.
Evaluate
Science notebooks can be used with varying choice of focus–looking at a shell, noticing the characteristics of a sea creature (plastic representation), comparison of sand or rocks. Observation and anecdotal notes are another form of assessment that guides student learning. A checklist can also be used for assessment.
Teacher Needs
Teacher Prep
Gather Items to create classroom centers: shells, photos, puppets, plant and animal models, tubs,etc.
Materials List
- shells, photos, puppets, plant and animal models, tubs,etc.
- Science tools, measuring tools, games
- Freshwater Bingo game boards cards
- Marine Bingo boards and cards
Student Needs
Prior Knowledge
Prior experience with use of science tools would be helpful, though not necessary.
Vocabulary
aquatic, awareness, boundaries, compare, data, describe details, environment, eye level, ground level, marine biologist, notice, observation, plot, role-play, science notebook, sort, subsistence, weigh, wonder.
Specific names of plants and animals around the school environment.
Standards
Science GLEs Addressed
K-12 Standards A1, A2, C2, G2, G3, G4
Ocean Literacy Principles
- The ocean supports a great diversity of life and ecosystems.