Pumpkins!!

Today begins our week on pumpkins.  We began by filling in our graphic organizer.  We first charted our schema and discussed that schema is what we already know.  Some students said that pumpkins are a fruit and others said pumpkins are vegetables. No one could give a reason why they thought the way they did so we wrote "fruit of vegetable" under misconceptions.  Then we read an informational book on pumpkins and watched a video on the life cycle of a pumpkin.  We then filled out new information that we learned. 

We learned a lot of new information about pumpkins. 

We then broke into two groups and made observations about the outside of our 2 pumpkins.  We counted the lines, felt its texture, and picked it up to see how heavy it was.   Then we predicted if we thought the pumpkin would sink or float.  Twelve thought the pumpkin would sink and twelve thought it would float.  Guess what?!?  It floated! 

Then we went back and filled out our pumpkin life cycle paper. 

http://youtu.be/jibeezS2wt4

We measure our pumpkins using linking cubes.  First we wrote our estimates on the chart. Then we measured.  Most of the students realized that the smooth pumpkin was taller than the bumpy pumpkin so the estimates were greater for that pumpkin :) 

We had one correct estimate! 

Next we estimates the circumference of our smooth pumpkin.  This was a little harder! 

Now it was time to open up the pumpkins. First we all made our estimated and put the on the chart.  Then we 

Our pumpkin had 405 seeds.  Our closest guess was 200.