WHAT IS IT IN THE CENTRE? My AICLE unit…
Do you
know it?
We want
to investigate it… but in a very particular point of view. We are going to
travel back in time to the Ancient Greece, more than 200 years Before Christ.
We
will know Sophie of Samos, daughter of the great astronomer Aristarchus of
Samos, who had brilliant ideas about what was in the centre of the Universe.
However, Aristarchus hypothesis didn’t achieve and Sophie decides to make a “Time
Capsule” (final product) with all their achievements for people in the future
more open-minded than their contemporaries.
Project Based Learning
Interdisciplinary
between Social Science, Natural Science and Technology
Level: 1st of ESO
Number of sessions 19th.
So we are
going to:
- Interpret the
history of the universe using records of the past.
- Design and
build simple technological objects, in this case construct a Solar System (to scale)
in a rope, solve problems and assess the adequacy of the result to put all the
distances to scale.
- Know the past the
classical world: know social, political and economic organization, the culture and
the art of the classical and Hellenistic Greece.
- Chronological and map location of Ancient Greece. Main places (polis)
- Science:
position of the Earth and the Sun in the Universe.
- Legacy: what
do we have from ancient Greece?
- The
organization in Ancient Greece: polis. Social organization. Wars. Believes.
Different
theories about the centre of the Universe: heliocentric vs. geocentric.
The Solar
System. Seasons. Eclipses. Earth-Moon.
THE ACTIVITIES THOUGHT TO ACHIEVE ALL THAT OBJECTIVES
ARE:
1. Maps
2. Keywords
3. Mindmaps: about the
organization in city-states, about the Greek Wars, about Solar System
4. Tests: about democracy,
about the planets in the Solar System, final test.
5. Timeline of the most
famous Greek
6. Drawings: geocentric
theory, heliocentric theory, seasons, eclipse, moon daily register.
7. Theatre performances
8. Investigations: the
movements of the Earth and of the Moon, the planets
9. Constructing a Solar
System (to Scale) in a rope
10. Comparison ancient Greece vs. modern Greece (Olympic Games). Legacy.
11. Compile one of every task elected in the group and
put it in the “time capsule”
OUR DAY TO DAY TASKS:
1st Session: What
is it in the centre?
2.Activity introducing the Project: motivation activity: short performance made with volunteers. The main character is going to be Sophie of Samos, daughter of Aristarchus, the great astronomer. She is 12 year old Greek girl living in Athens. Is 280 century B.C. She heard his father arguing hard with other philosophers and scientists about what is it in the Centre of the Universe… And she wants to know the truth.
2nd Session: Where is Athens?
3. Where is Athens? Watch the video
“introduction to the greeks” and locate different geographical important sites
in a map (the country, the sea, the main polis, countries in their sides…)
4. The Polis: how do they
organize? They need scaffolding with keywords with flashcards that they will
construct, and read a text about the City-States. After that they will make a
mindmap with the words in bold from the text (production scaffolding).
3rd session:
Democracy
5. Democracy: who rule Athens? They have to
search hidden words related to Greek Society in a crossword, with the words
given in a WordLe (scaffolding).
6. After that introduction,
we will have an activity of an “Expert Groups” mixed with a role playing game
based on the society in Greece:
citizen, foreigner, women, slaves. We will discuss and give opinion about this
social organization.
7. Check what we have
learned with a “Test yourself” (hotpotatoes)
4th session:
Peaceful people? Conquerors? Traders?
8. More keywords to help
the activity. We have to read a text and create a mindmap, underlining the main
words. The mindmap is given, they have to fill the gaps (scaffolding).
9. Watch the trailer of the
film: “The 300”.
Opinion about the difference between Sparta and Athens, and nowadays. We
give them useful expressions and time to prepare themselves.
5th session:
Science, Maths, Philosophy…
10. WordLe with names of
the most famous Greeks. The have websites in moodle where they can find the
dates and the facts and build a Timeline online.
11. Astronomy. Another
short performance acted by the students. Aristarchus is watching the night sky.
He can distinguish between stars, planets, satellites… Aristarchus asks Sophie
for help. He needs to make a moon daily register (with a template)
We show the students a
picture of a night sky. They have to write a question about something of the
Universe they want to know. Search an image in the net and send the question as
a task in moodle. (at the end of the unit we speak about all this questions…
how many of them can we
answer?)
6th session: Is
the Earth or is the Sun?
12. Aristarchus is in a
trouble. Aristotle is more famous than him. Everybody believes Aristotle’s
ideas about astronomy, but he thinks he’s wrong about what is it in the centre
of the Universe… Short performance again (in this case we imagine we are in
Epidaurus Theatre, we have the image in our digital board).
- Video showing a selected
piece of the film “Agora” where Hypatia discovers the ellipse in the Earth’s
orbit.
13. Heliocentric versus
Geocentric. Drawing each theory and explain it with their own words. Search
information on internet.
14. Exercice: correct the
sentences about the two theories.
15. Aristarchus is a hard
working man. He never give up. He is one of the first scientists in history…
What is it in the Solar
System? Reading a text and organize the ideas about what are the celestial
bodies in the Solar System, which are the inner planets, which the outer
planets, which the dwarf planets, the Kuiper belt, etc…
16. Organize all the main
concepts in last exercise in a mindmap with pictures of the website of NASA.
The words used in the mindmap are given in bold in the text. (scaffolding for
production)
We revise the registers of the Moon.
8th session:
going deeper in the Solar System knowledge (II)
16. Video: “Spyboots the
solar system”. Activity 1-2-4. First individually every student takes a sheet
and writes the major number of words they can remember, of the song, related
with the subject. Listen again and check it with a partner. After that they put
in common the four members in the group (as a reception scaffolding activity)
17. We increase our knowledge of the Solar System
and all the celestial bodies in it. Every group has to check the information of
every planet, but is mixed! They have to decide which sentence is for every
planet. (webs helping in moodle). They will need this information for the next
activity.
9th , 10th,
11th and 12th session: A Solar System in a rope!
18. How big is the Solar
System? Can we imagine the distances between the planets and the Sun? Let’s
make an exercise calculating the distances and diameters of the planets to
scale.
To motivate the activity we
watch the video in youtube: “Solar System to scale”
19. Construct the Solar
System to scale in the Technology Workshop, with the correct tools, DM boards,
painting them as they are in real, and hanging them in a rope where the
distances between them are also to scale.
20. The evaluation is going
to be with a Rubric and between them.
13th – 14th
session: Eppur si muove... And yet it moves!
21. Many centuries after
Aristarchus and Aristotle, Galileo Galilee has real problems with the authority
when he tries to explain his theories about the centre of the Universe…
Aristotle won!
We want to demonstrate that
the Earth spins around itself in a rotation mode (program Celestia).
22. And why do we have the
Seasons: cold winter and hot summer. Make a drawing showing the sun rays
impacting in different ways in the different regions of the Earth and in
different moments of the year.
The “Centre de Recursos
Educatius” has a resource, “The parallel Earth” that fits in this activity. Is
a big planet placed in the playground that shows perfectly how after some
minutes, the Sun heats more in Ecuador
than in the Poles. Shows the seasons, day and night…
15th session:
Let the gods help us!
This month Aristarchus can’t really develop his
theories because they have to go to Olympia,
to the Stadium, where the Olympic Games are hold. It’s important to thank gods,
have them happy and not angry them.
Sophie’s favourite god is
Athena, goddess of wisdom (also warfare and handicrafts). Which is your
favourite god? We have a lot of them, you can choose!
23. Video about Greek Goods
and activity where they can name their favourite god and explain why.
16th – 17th
session: Final Task, present failed… let’s think of the future!
Aristotle’s
ideas prevail. He is a big philosopher and scientist, but he is wrong with his
Geocentric Theory, and Sophie, a girl in a man’s world, has no chance to help
her father.
She decide to keep all the
knowledge in a “time capsule” to preserve all the investigations.
25. With all the group we
collect all the activities made in this project and choose the bests to keep it
for the future in a box as a Time Capsule. Sophie wants to bury it in the most
important place in Greece:
the Acropolis in Athens, in Parthenon Temple,
those with corintian style in its columns, just under the sculpture of Laocoon
and his sons…
26. And that’s all… really?
Do we really know what is in the centre of the Universe?... Final activity
watching images from “Hubble’s telescope” of the different galaxies.
27. “Planeta mòbil”: a resource from La Caixa. They
set an inflatable structure in our high school where students can go in and see
a planetarium. It’s amazing!
19th session:
Can you demonstrate what do you have learnt?
28. Test to evaluate
concepts and competences achieved along this unit. They have to give the
handout with all the tasks and activities done.
When we have the exams and handouts corrected, we give
them and have a feedback in another session.
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