Today I led my whole class lesson relating to the five senses. It was a lot of fun and it went very well! The kids seemed to enjoy it a lot and I got great positive feedback from my CT, so overall I would say it was a success. It went much more smoothly than I expected, though the kids were very talkative and energetic which resulted in a very loud classroom!
I began the lesson by asking my students if they knew anything about the five senses, which they didn't even after I told them that one was seeing. We discussed what they were, and I read aloud from the "big book" that went along with this lesson. The big book was interactive and allowed the kids to answer questions pertaining to the lesson. After the discussion, I read the book "My Five Senses" by Alkali, which explained clearly the five senses. After this, the kids were able to all tell me the five senses, the body parts correlating to them, and their uses, as well as how they help us observe things and figure out things in the world around us. One student contributed "when I brush my teeth, I am touching, smelling, tasting and seeing. And I can hear the brushing too", which I thought was a very good connection and real world application to the lesson!
After the discussion and story, we experimented with different instrument sounds, for which the kids hypothesized the sounds that would be produced. This was a quick and simple activity. Next, the kids all went back to their tables (4 kids at 7 different circular tables) and we did the "What's in the bag?" activity, where the kids had a numbered brown bag with something inside. They couldn't look inside the bag, but could use their senses of touch, smell, and hearing (by shaking the bag) to guess the contents and write what they thought was inside the bag next to the corresponding number on a sheet of paper. After every child at the table observed the bag, we would switch bags. There were 8 bags in all containing the following items: sugar, rice, pennies, popcorn, jelly beans, strawberries, marshmallows and raisins. The class did very well with this activity and followed directions quite well, I was impressed. Hardly any students peeked inside the bags, which I know is hard for kids.
After each child had observed every bag and written down their guesses, we met back at the carpet area to share ideas-kids came up with great ideas. Some "incorrect" ideas were: kitty litter, sprinkles, grain, and seeds for the rice; sand, dirt and flour for the sugar; and marbles, rocks, big M&M's, and nuts for the jelly beans. I loved hearing their ideas, a lot of them were quite relevant or possible and many kids did correctly guess the contents-they did very well and could tell me the senses they used and characteristics that determined their guesses. I brought extra marshmallows and jelly beans for the kids to enjoy at the end of the activity, which they of course loved!