writing like scientists

Kindergartners spent the week leading up to February break thinking and writing like scientists! We began this informational writing unit by looking through some of our science teaching (nonfiction) books. The children explored these books with their science partners and used sticky notes to record what they noticed. We found real information, details, glossaries, tables of contents, and zoomed in pictures.

Kindergarten scientists then looked through their own science journals to find evidence of science writing. Again, we noticed details, labels, and real information. Realizing that we have already been writing like scientists, kindergarteners were set up to have a great week of exploring and learning more about what it means to write like a scientist!

We applied our knowledge of writing labels to pictures from a mentor text for this unit, Animals in Winter, by Martha E.H. Rustad. Writing labels is not something new for the kindergarteners, as they have done it in many other ways (like in narrative writing and labeling our blocks, legos, and small building structures). But thinking like scientists, we had to be sure to label the important parts of the images to give as much information as we could.

The following day, scientists were given a spot to spread out, either in our classroom or in the preschool, where they could look out the window and draw what they saw. Using our eyes, we thought a lot about details. We defined details to be "noticing the small things" and "adding a lot". We began these observational drawings with pencil, trying to include as much detail as we could, before adding color. And of course, we had to add labels.

 

In another writing workshop, kindergarteners were excited to draw and label objects from nature that we had collected on the playground. Among the many things we had to choose from were sticks, pinecones, and rocks. In our mini lesson that day, I invited kindergarteners to really think like scientists and write labels that taught lots of information. We asked ourselves questions like what does it feel like? What does it look like? What does it smell like? We added descriptive words to our labels (such as color and texture words).

By the end of the week, we reviewed all we knew about science writing. Scientists write about real information. They add details and labels that teach. I shared with the children that scientists also do research. They choose something they want to learn a lot about, and they research it. We defined research as collecting a lot of information. We used our science teaching books to make lists of animals we could find in Vermont/New England with our science partners. We shared our ideas and created one big list together. From that list, each kindergartener chose an animal they were interested in learning about. This will carry us into the upcoming weeks, in which we will become animal experts and continue to think and write like scientists!