SNS: Science Notebook Sunday- Picture of the Day

I've reached my goal this weekend! In fact I have done 3 posts in 3 days!! I am so proud of myself!  

Since my science notebooks are set up the same way as my math ones, I wont go into detail as to how they are set up.  If you want to find out how I set them up you can read my post here, or decorating them is here, or being able to close the giant monstrosities here. 

I love warm ups!  Whether it's working out (which I am trying to do now) or in class, it's a calming activity to prep me and everyone for the day.  Plus I can get that last second coping done while they work on their warm up.  My math warm up consists 4-5 mixed review problems to solve in their notebook, but in science it's a picture of the day.

At the beginning of the year,we discussed the differences between an observation and an inference.  I read this book aloud to my students (they even gathered on the carpet.....LOVE THEM) 

The mice make observations and then inferences about the object they are crawling all over.  I hid the picture of the object and asked my students what they thought the mice are crawling on based on their observations and why did they think that.  

How does this tie into my daily warm up?  Well I show them the "Picture of the Day" from National Geographic.

Today's picture is this beauty:

I hide the title from the kids so they MUST make observations and inferences without using any word clues. They have to write complete sentences, usually 4-5 observations and inferences that GO WITH that observation.  I have to constantly tell them to give me 6th grade sentences.  "Don't tell me you see an alligator!  What observations can you make that lead you to infer that this is an alligator?"  It takes them awhile to get used to writing detailed sentences.  I also reiterated that their observations and inferences have to link together.  The observation must lead to the inference....duh Mrs. Johnstone.... but I have so many who give me off the wall inferences from the observation. 

Then after about 7-10 minutes of quiet writing, we share their thinking.  I finally give them the title, which they title the page in their notebook. 

There are some great pictures on PINTERST for working on inferring.  I hope this helps!! Have a great science week!