Students in Kimberly Plummer’s class share their Go2Science field journals. Contributed photo
Students in Kimberly Plummer’s Woolwich Central School kindergarten class this year engaged in Go2Science, a web-based program that involves real science missions from across the globe. According to a news release, the classes give students the chance to provide feedback and answer questions that will make a difference in how individual missions are carried out.
Plummer first learned about Go2Science alongside WCS’s other kindergarten teacher, Sarah Sample, at an Association of Computer Technology Educators of Maine conference.
“The structure of Go2Science is such that a teacher can do a little or a lot,” said Sample in a news release. “[Beth] has aligned all of our missions to the Common Core State Standards. You could literally cover every piece of the curriculum with just this one program.”
Funding for Go2Science at Woolwich Central School is provided by a grant from the Perloff Family Foundation.
The current mission, “Water in Kenya,” takes students to a rural, highly impoverished area of Africa where the schoolchildren of the local academy do not have access to a reliable, safe source of drinking water. Plummer’s class and classrooms from around the world are watching as Go2Science investigates the hydrology of the area to find groundwater, drills a well, and installs an electric pump that the school and community can use.
Before the mission began, last year’s kindergarten classes stepped up to support the project by collecting $244 to help fund the drilling of the well and installation of the electric pump; funds which this year’s classes can see in action.
Go2Science carries out three missions a year. In the fall, students learned about tigers in Thailand. They kept journals about the project, and even printed out 3D tiger paws using the school’s new 3D printer, another generous gift from the Perloff Family Foundation.
As Water in Kenya comes to a close, students will start on a new mission, Biodiversity, where Go2Science will take them to the island of Borneo to test a hypothesis about forests.
In Kimberly Plummer’s kindergarten classroom, students watch as their teacher produces a pitcher filled with dirty water, a handful of straw, a coffee filter, and a square of padding to learn about water filtration as part of the Go2Science program. Contributed photo
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