Monday, 1 February 2010
Classifying pets
Using the Textease software and utilising the Branch application within it, I created a classification tree to help classify four distinct animals. An activity/tool like this would be very useful for providing opportunities for children to use a number of thinking skills, including sorting, counting and grouping items. This could be useful across a number of subjects, e.g. sorting shapes (in maths), sorting animals/plants (science). 
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I agree - classification has real potential to develop pupils' thinking skills. Did you encounter any situations in your recent school placement where a classification program might have helped leaarning?
ReplyDeleteI was working with a year 4 class in my recent school placement and recall a maths lesson where we were looking at the properties and nets of 3D shapes. I could have given the children just a few shapes each/in pairs, to compare and contrast and to then develop a classification table based on their findings. Before creating the classification table they could be further prompted to think about the differences and similarities between the shapes (if they haven't already), this may then help them create a classification tree using the Textease software. In the future I would definately consider bringing IT into other subjects more, especially now that I have a broader knowledge base of a range of software that may be found in primary schools.
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