The Thunder Bolt
Grade 3 STEM Students Solve Complex Climate and Math Problems
Concordia grade 3’s Science unit is on Weather and Climate. In math, grade 3 students are learning about measurement and geometry.
"I learned that there was an ice storm in the middle of summer in Guadalajara, Mexico. We are working to solve the mystery of how that could happen. I like figuring out mysteries like this," said Ezra.
The anchor phenomenon for this unit is an icy hailstorm that happens during warm summer weather. In this first activity, Summer Ice Storm, students generate observations and questions about the phenomenon and create an initial explanation of how it could have happened.
As they cycle through the unit lessons they gather more and more weather and climate knowledge. At the end they return to the original question of how an icy hailstorm could happen during a warm summer and at that point should have a reasonable explanation of what could have happened.
“In science, we are learning about evaporation and what will happen if we trapped it. It was a fun experience,” said Ella.
“In math, we are learning about finding perimeters and areas. It was a fun lesson.” Ella shared.
In math, the students are representing data on scaled line plots, exploring the geometric attributes of polygons, classifying quadrilaterals into categories based on their attributes and measuring to the nearest half inch. They are also learning how to find the perimeter and area of regular shapes.
"It's interesting to me that when I find the area of a rectangle, no matter what the different length or width of the rectangle, the area is always the product of multiplying them together. I always want to be challenged with math problems, said Ezra."