Inferring & Constructing a Hydrometer

In Reader's Workshop students learned more about inferring.  They met at the carpet with their Reader's Notebook and began copying the chart I had on the easel. 



Next we reviewed what it means to make an inference and how to do so.

I began reading the beginning of the story The Other Side by Jacqueline Woodson, and modeled two inferences I was able to make. Students copied them onto the chart in their notebook. 

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Next students split into small groups.  I gave them a photocopied sheet of two pages in the book.  As a small group their job was to make at least two more inferences from the middle of the book and record them on their chart

After that we came back to the carpet to share inferences.  Finally I finished reading the book and students recorded at least one more inference they could make on their own.

In science, students created a hydrometer to further investigate how the buoyancy of objects is affected by fresh and salt water.  Their task was to make a hydrometer with a straw and clay.  Each cylinder was filled to the 10 centimeter mark with fresh water and each straw was marked with a pen to indicate the point at which it floats.  Groups were to create the hydrometer so that the mark on the straw is level with the liquid in the cylinder.  Once they proved that to me, we poured out the fresh water from the cylinder and filled it with salt water to the 10 centimeter mark.  Groups then dropped the hydrometer in the salt water and recorded their observation.  Students noticed that the hydrometer floated higher in the salt water.  This means that salt water is heavier than fresh water.