Science Club

Live practical hands on experiences

Innovative Minds have teachers who have embraced and believe in the concept of providing the students the best hands-on learning experience when it comes to the subject science. It has already recognized that certain desirable outcomes are possible with our endorsement of student-centered instructional approaches.

Students involved in an experience which gives them a hands-on feel, helps them to understand the entire concept of science program material better and feel a sense of accomplishment when they are able to achieve desirable outcomes. Teachers with their experience will be able to transfer their share of knowledge easily across students with various learning situations. The biggest benefit of having the taking a hands on experience in class for students is that they can always stay engaged due to the technique of adapting more than one method of learning. This helps the students to learn better and store it in their memory for various useful purposes. Students with difficulties such as being slow learners or lack of concentration when in class for reasons such as ESL barriers, auditory deficiencies, or behavioral interference have been observed to follow well and catch up with the rest of the class. They don’t stand by as mere spectators, instead they become a part of the daily class activity and are able to achieve desirable results.

When students learning are restricted to memory and abstract thoughts in school, as a result the chances of growing knowledge base of children are limited. With hands on experience at Innovative Minds, students are assured not only of possessing a talent of brilliant retention power, but also build their creative, thoughtful and the thirst for knowledge will be enhanced to a great level. This will help them achieve techniques such as innovation and success. Students at Innovative Minds are better equipped to critically analyze and discover solutions which can help them to grow in the process.

If students are not doing hands-on science, they are not doing science. Science is a process and if students are not actively engaged in the process, they are not doing science. Most science classes in elementary school teach the vocabulary of science and nothing else.

Research has shown that the value of hands-on learning experience at Science lab helps students to motivate, learn more, and eventually develop leadership qualities in them and also better their reading skills.

• Well planned approach: Learning by well-planned activities and experiences in a well-engineered program is a quality instructional approach.
• Inculcate a sense of leadership quality: It causes students to rely on the evidence instead of upon authority (encyclopedia, minister, doctor, text, teacher and parent). Most children live in an authoritarian world with little or no opportunity to practice decision-making because nearly everyone tells students what to do and when to do it. We continually graduate students who do not yet have the ability to set up a simple experiment with controlled variables, collect and interpret evidence, or make correct interpretations based upon that evidence.
• A sense of equality among all students: Provides students with a similar set of experiences so everyone can participate in discussions on a level playing field regardless of their socio-economic status. In this way, special benefits are not awarded to those who, by virtue of their wealth or background, have a greater number of experiences under their belts.
• The practical experience in science lab: When a text or teacher tells students that plants need light to grow (an untruth) students simply memorize this without question and are hampered by the falsehood for a lifetime. However, when a student personally germinates seeds in the dark and finds that they grow taller than seeds grown in the light, it is a convincing evidence from a personal experience that plants do not need light to grow. Because they now have the evidence that light inhibits growth, students now have a chance of figuring out why plants in a house grow toward the light, thus causing the stem to grow in such a manner as towards the light which is necessary for growth aimed at the upper part of the plant for the stored food energy which is used up. This information seldom comes from texts or teachers, yet there is more logical interpretation of the concept from students who have conducted this experiments.
• Importance of hands on experiences: The importance of providing children with direct experiences with materials, objects, and phenomena is supported by experience and understanding of how learning takes place. While information can be remembered if taught through books and lectures, true understanding and the ability to use knowledge in new situations requires learning in which children study concepts in-depth, and over time and learning that is founded in direct experience. Therefore, the justification for hands-on learning is that it allows students to build understanding that is functional and to develop the ability to inquire themselves, in other words, to become independent learners.

How it works?

Innovative Minds is designed to train the students’ knowledge vocabulary and help them understand the importance of creativity and creative learning to achieve positive outcomes and ensure overall growth in the process. Innovative Minds also encourages students to support change and improvement of practice in promoting the process of creativity and creative learning. This has always helped them achieve success and stay on track for their goals.

Justifying why you would use hands-on science is based on all the research and methods studies that are current. They support the notion of multi-faceted bombardment of information and experiences so that the retention level is improved. Students who are involved in labs and activities are empowered in their own learning process.

Learning Benefits:

The benefits of hands-on-learning revolves around those children who are either not as academically “talented” or have not shown “interest” in school. This method tends to stimulate these type of students into participating and eventually absorbing information that we believe they would not get from “normal” show-me – tell-me methods.

The most important benefit to student is that although it requires a great deal of preparation time, once a system is developed, hands-on teaching makes teaching fun.

• I hear and I forget
• I see and I remember
• I do and I understand

By the end of this course students will enjoy some benefits which will help them achieve the desirable results:

• Understand the concepts of creativity and creative learning, and how these affect all aspects of young children’s learning and development.
• Be able to provide opportunities for young children to develop their creativity and creative learning.
• Be able to develop the environment to support young children’s creativity and creative learning.
• Be able to support the development of practice in promoting young children’s creativity and creative learning within the setting.

The concepts of creativity and creative learning, and how these affect all aspects of young children’s learning and development.

Innovative Minds vision lies in the importance of creativity and creative learning process for students in there early years of education. We emphasize the importance of creativity and critical thinking in all aspects of children’s experience, and pronounces creative development as an area of learning in its own right.

The differences between creative learning and creativity is it’s often thought that creativity is about the arts. This is true, but it is also possible to be creative in scientific ways, and in ways that are important for the human relationships and communities. When we talk about creative scientific ideas, we tend to describe these as problem-solving, developing a theory or having a hypothesis (that is, testing an idea to see if it works and if it is true).

Developing Learning Environment to support Children

When a child in their young years is at school, the most important concern for parents are if they are growing in the right direction. Parents are always curious about whether their child is destined for greatness and the ability to perform at the world stage. So the educational experience and the learning environment for a child has a crucial influence on his/her ability to develop the required skills of their area of interest. Students in the proper system of learning enjoy the environment of being creative and always have the thirst for creative learning. The approach of hands on experience in the field of science helps students to expand their motivational level and helps them to achieve their goals subsequently.

The learning environment for young children – the importance of people communication, skillful body movements, play, the use of cultural symbols, and creative and imaginative use of symbols are all important aspects of a child’s development during this period. Adults have a huge role in supporting children as these overarching aspects emerge and strengthen.

Children do not respond well to being judged and chided by adults. They do respond well to being helped to take responsible decisions. Children need to be able to experience materials at different levels of complexity, since at times they are operating at their highest levels of possibility, and at other times they need a quieter, less exhausting day. None of us, adults or children, are at our best all day and every day.