This week we began our science unit with probably my most favorite phenomena: DISSECTING.

But why did we chose to start off our unit with dissecting…?

Well, what I absolutely love about science here at MJDS is that in science, we begin each unit with a different phenomena to drive our unit and keep the students working to “figure out” rather than “learning about.”

Throughout our entire unit we will reference this dissection to aid us in answering our driving question, “Where have all the living creatures gone?” Throughout this unit, the students will be investigating the perch and sea lamprey populations in the Great Lakes and the science behind it.

By the end of the unit, the kids will be able to answer this question and explain it in depth about all populations.

This week, we started off by examining the internal and external anatomy of the perch. The kids did an AMAZING job noticing, observing, wondering, and recording throughout this process.

We were even lucky enough to have two female perch that were filled with thousands of eggs.

Next week, we will continue our dissection process and investigate the second part of our phenomena: the sea lamprey.

Stay tuned for more pics next week!

Take a look at the pics below and over the weekend, ask your child about their noticings and wonderings from  dissecting the perch.

Have a great weekend!

-Gev. McAdams