My students need basic lab equipment including propane torches for the study of metals, corrosive actions, and investigating real life situations of product failure.
I am trying to keep our 8th graders interested in science and show them the different opportunities available that may not include a traditional four year college. I studied corrosives this summer and want to implement a metals unit with properties, uses, and weaknesses of different metals.
Our students are ones who have not been successful in a traditional school setting, have unstable home lives, and have rarely been told they are good at anything.
Our students are assigned to our school after a disciplinary hearing and are required to complete a minimum of 45 days with satisfactory behavior and progress. If this is not accomplished they are assigned another 45 days. Many of our students have problems with authority and understanding the importance of an education. Our eighth graders do not see themselves graduating from high school and do not believe they will ever set foot on a college campus. Our students are in a high poverty area near New Orleans and many come from families where no one is at home to care for their basic needs. Any thing you give these students is treasured by them and they love coming to science to actually do things. I am pushing for technical programs for my students as well as apprenticeships.
My Project
I am requesting basic lab torches for corrosive testing, metallurgy, and glass making. I also want to introduce forging as well to my students who are interested in making things and creating things. Our classroom has NO lab at all so I bring and find as many things as I can to support our learning. We NEED high temperature flame sources as well as safety glasses. The best way to engage my students is with activities that they had no idea could be done. I will be able to show annealing, heat treating, and cold working with paper clips. We will make glass with heat and Borax, we will investigate changing of crystal structures with the use of heat and will view the structures with the digital microscope. We will test tensile strength after heat treating different metals. By having students perform these labs I anticipate regular attendance and less behavior problems.
I teach eighth graders who need a reason to stay in school and a reason to participate in class.
This is the crossroad where we catch them or they fall away. With these basic lab supplies I can do so much to engage our students who see little guidance from home, their peers going to the juvenile detention facility, and their family members being arrested. Students who are engaged in class are better behaved and exhibit pride about their own work and their own self.
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