Inferencing in Action

Wow...we came into school today after our "Columbus Day Holiday" and were met with quite a surprise.  First let me show you the last journal entry Tamia did on our worm habitat.
Not a whole lot seemed to be going on.

I walked in the room this morning and found that two worms had wiggled out or the ecosystem model and wound up on the floor.  Several worms were dead inside the habitats as well. 

The grass exploded!  We had grass everywhere...each habitat had grown at least 4 or 5 inches of grass...and the roots were crowding the soil.  So when it was time to record our new observations, I asked the students to make an inference as well....why do you think the worms are dying?

The list was amazing...they are really thinking like scientists:

I think there is too much light in here and the light is hurting the worms.

I think that there isn't enough dirt for them to dig down into.

I think that we missed three days of water and the soil became too dry.

I think the roots have taken up too much space and they can't tunnel.

Maybe they die after they have babies...we've had a lot of babies.

Here is what Tamia recorded in her journal today:

Wow...check out her representation.  She definitely followed the ABCD of diagrams:  Accurate, Big, Colorful and Detailed.  She also made some excellent observations as well as inferences. 

I think we are making progress!