Grade 2
Weather Watchers Observe
Colorado’s unpredictable weather makes learning about weather interesting. Studying temperature, humidity, air pressure, winds, clouds and precipitation help children connect science and math. Children keep daily weather and temperature logs, use the Beaufort wind scale, identify various cloud types, and record weather using international symbols. Children chart and graph their data.
The connection between science and music is taught through several activities. During the weather unit, children listen to classical music that represents weather, such as Cloudburst, in Grofe’s Grand Canyon Suite, and Thunderstorm in Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony No. 6. In both pieces, tension mounts from a quiet melody until the music builds to a crescendo of thunderous kettle drums and basses. At the end of each piece, children picture the clarity of the air and the clear quiet echoes of the receding storm.
As a follow-up lesson, children create their own symphony using body percussion. They recreate the cycle of inclimate weather starting from the calm before the storm through the crescendo of thunder and lightning strikes to a peaceful pitter-patter of raindrops as the storm recedes. By integrating science and music, the children develop a deeper understanding of both weather and the music that represents it.
Studying Insects
The study of insects engages second graders. Children learn about insect habitats, metamorphosis, identification, camouflage and anatomy. The children’s natural interest in and curiosity about insects is used as a foundation for a variety of literature activities, such as learning voice in writing while they pretend to be a bug trapped in a jar and experimenting with literary devices through insect poetry. Children use microscopes and guidebooks to classify and identify a variety of insects and development. All these activities enhance the children’s ability to become independent learners and critical thinkers as they integrate knowledge from one subject area into the next.
Patterns
Learning about patterns and exploring the connections they create in math, music and science, teaches second graders how to use what they learn in one subject area and transfer it to other subjects. By identifying patterns in all these areas, learning across the curricula becomes more meaningful to young students. Children discover how to be independent learners and critical thinkers by developing an understanding of patterns.
In a particular math lesson on patterns, children “compose” their own music. They are given a collection of circles, triangles and squares cut from construction paper. A square symbolizes two sounds, a triangle equals a single sound, and a circle stands for no sound. Each child creates several unique patterns using these symbols. The children subsequently take these patterns to music class, where each composition/pattern is played on a particular instrument – bongos, glockenspiel, etc. Each child plays his own composition, and then the children rotate through the instruments, playing other students’ patterns creating a symphony of sound. This activity demonstrates the connection between patterns in math and music and helps children experientially gain the meaning of symbolic representation.
The same use of patterns transfers into our science curriculum. While studying the states of matter, the children observe patterns in nature. This helps them identify and classify matter into solids, liquids, and gases, creepy crawlies into insects and arachnids, and everyday weather into cloud types, cold fronts, and temperature.