Fostering An ‘Attraction’ To Learning

By Larissa Lytwyn

Head O’ Meadow’s second grade students recently celebrated their first-ever Magnet Fair. Designed by the school’s five second grade teachers last summer, the event was inspired by last fall’s highly successful Dinosaur Day.

Each color-coded class circulated between the five classrooms for five unique lessons centered on the use of magnets.

“The magnets really reflect the different themes each class is working on,” explained second grade teacher Karen Blasko. Her program “Will A Magnet Attract This?” had students measuring a small magnet’s attraction to various materials, including tin foil, rubber, and cloth. The students had to predict whether or not the magnets would attract the material and then record whether they actually did or not.

Second grade teacher Sara Washicko taught “Face to Face,” in which students learned whether different magnets, differentiated through color, would “attract” or “repel” each other. Students colored in the different combinations of magnets that drew or repelled each other with crayons. “It’s a great, hands-on activity,” said Ms Washicko. “The students are having a lot of fun.”

Teacher Christine Wharton directed another activity, “Hungry Hounds.” Ms Wharton explained that the class used magnets to “send” a construction-paper cutout of a dog from its house to its bone. Other activities were “Floating Magnets,” in which students balanced magnets on pencil tips, and “Fish N’ Clips.” In “Fish N’ Clips,” teacher Karen Tomanio guides students into evaluating different levels of attraction through a magnet attached to the end of a pole. “The students see how a greater number of small paper clips will prove a stronger attraction than one or two larger clips,” she said. The information is used to construct charts and bar graphs.

The students’ data from all five activities are recorded into a single journal. “The activities are great,” noted math and science specialist Gail Maletz. “We use not only science, but math, too.”

“The Magnet Fair really integrates all of the lessons we’re teaching [the students] right now,” said Ms Blasko. “Every year we have a different theme. I think magnets was a great idea to use this year!”