lever

WHEEL and

AXLE screw

wedge

pulleyinclined plane

simple machines Remember!

Science offers a natural context for the practiceand development of literacy skills. Literacyoffers students access to the exciting andchallenging world of science.

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Teaching Science and LiteracyScience is everywhere and everything

Science and Literacy are inextricably linked.Literacy skills allow children to engage in Science.Scientific and social concepts give meaning to a range of fiction and non-fiction texts. The partnership between Science and Literacy is two way: students can not engage with theworld around them unless they understand it.

The question is: how can we as teachers stimulatelinks between Science and Literacy in order tosupport successful learning in our CLIL classes?

In order for students to cope with learning scientificconcepts, first we must help them deal with itsparticular lexis. Students need to have first-handexperience of scientific words, such us ‘habitat’,‘change’ or ‘physical’. Try supporting your studentsby using everyday and scientific terms in tandem(e.g. ‘wet’ and ‘humid’), until pupils are confident intheir use of the scientific term. In this way pupils willlearn to understand that familiar, everyday wordshave a specific meaning within a scientific context.

➜Mobiles

This activity is ideal for a cross-curricular approachin combination with Arts and Crafts.

Help pupils to create hanging word banks(mobiles) displaying words under a specificheading. A ‘simple machines’ mobile would includea hanging word bank consisting of lever, pulley,inclined plane, screw, wheel and axle and wedge.Alongside their mobile students can create theirown ‘pictionary’ (see below).

If you need more ideas on how to make funmobiles for children consult this web page:

www.enchantedlearning.com/crafts/mobiles/

➜Word banks

Create a bank of scientific terms related to eachtopic. Make these words available to children as a wall display, on a tabletop, in boxes or on specialword bank sheets. This will give learners moreconfidence when learning a new topic and serveas proof that science is (indeed) everywhere!

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➜Feely Box

This game is excellent for teaching or revisingadjectives. Take a simple cardboard box and cutout a hole. Put a variety of items in a feely box.Play music while students pass the box around thecircle. When the music stops, the student with thebox feels one of the item and describes it. Otherstudents try to guess what it is. Here is a list ofsome simple objects you can put in a Feely Box:

• An orange: round, rough, big/large.

• A tennis ball: round, soft.

• A piece of wood: hard.

• A piece of cotton wool: soft, light.

• Sand paper: rough, light.

• A pencil: sharp, long.

• A rope: hard, wiggly.

• A sheet of paper: light, thin.

• A hard-boiled egg: oval-shaped, smooth.

Classroom management tips◗ If you are in a hurry and don't have time to

make a box, you can do the same activity with a simple bag (Feely Bag).

◗ Having students walking around can provoke a bit of mess in the classroom. If you prefer amore silent way, call one student to the frontto guess the hidden object.

◗ If you don't have a box or a bag, simplyblindfold the student. However, bear in mindthat this can make some children feeluncomfortable.

It's wiggly and it's thin. I

think it's a rope!

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Teaching Science and Literacy

➜Pictionary

Pictionary is a simple and fun way to use drawingsto elicit vocabulary from students. Ask onestudent to draw a picture on the board. The samestudent then asks a question to the rest of theclass to elicit a response based on the drawing.

The questions should be asked while drawing, not only when the drawing is finished. The pictureshould be drawn really s-l-o-w-l-y. To add morespice, define a time limit and the number ofguesses the students can make.

➜Labels and Captions

Labels and captions are different: a label offersone or two words telling you what something isand a caption can be a phrase or a sentence thatexplains a concept or adds information. Explainthat labels and captions are a way ofcommunicating information.

Teach your learners how to create labels andcaptions to add to their own models, diagramsand displays. It’s important that they always draft,redraft and discuss their labels or captions beforesticking them on.

Try these ways of adding labels or captions to content examples:

Stick-ons

Introduce labels by using Velcro stick-on labels that children can put on and pull off class wall displays or table-top activities, e.g. plants or human body outlines. This makes for a very effective revision activity.

Preparation

Provide pre-cut cards of different sizes with whichchildren can choose to make labels or captions.This saves time and ensures that work is neat andof a standard size.

Design

Make a variety of caption/label designs. Thesecould be hand-written, word-processed, printed,stencilled or multicoloured.

Follow-up activity1. The class labels the skeleton.2. In small groups learners either paint or create

a model skeleton using plasticine. 3. Learners make labels in the form of flags

made with cocktail sticks or straws they stickon the plasticine model.

4. Remind pupils of the need for accuracy whenlabelling and the use of correct scientificwords and spelling.

The human skeleton with Funny Bones: an example of an activity which combinesScience, Arts and Crafts and Literacy.

As a warm-up activity read Funny Bones (Janetand Allan Ahlberg) with your class. During thestory discuss the different types of skeletons(e.g. human, dog, parrot, elephant and snake).

Elicit what they already know about skeletons.Use their own experience to talk about theskeleton: make them feel their own bones orrecall a visit to hospital with a broken bone.Use the book to access science-based ideas:

• A skeleton is made up of different bones.

• Different animals have different skeletons.

• Different parts of the skeleton protect softparts of the body (e.g. the brain, the heart, the lungs).

• Muscles are needed to make the skeleton move.

• What happens if we break a bone?

• The human skeletal system is comprised of 206 bones.

• Lligaments attach these bones to each othervia tendons and joints.

Suggested activity

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