Playground or gym area. The unit includes readings on the development of flight and technical topics. The older students prepare for their first student teaching assignment by studying diagrams, learning vocabulary, constructing models, measuring flights and computing averages. They develop higher-level questioning skills to be used during their instructional time with their younger learning partners. Students study motion and forces, gravity, drag, lift and thrust and then use their learning to help second grade students successfully launch gliders and kites.
Students experience the connection between the real world and the world of math.
Overall Value Student participation, cooperative peer interaction and the testing of hypotheses are goals developed by the sixth grade group. All reading and math activities are conducted in small, cooperative groups. The project is successful, because it covers a concept which students find interesting. The project requires a significant degree of mastery by the older students.