Grades 3 and 4

MATH & SCIENCE

Math Strategy Party

Students learn to apply math strategies to a real-world situation in Super Kids Market. They work in small groups to plan a party using the math strategies of their choice. They watch for coupons and sales to help them stay within a budget. Groups share the math processes that led them to their final plans.
1 hour MST: 3 LA: 4 Health: 3
Available Tuesday through Friday

Meet the Butterfly Guy

Meet the museum's entomologists and discover the wonders inside Dancing Wings Butterfly Garden^®. Students will learn
about the garden's ecosystem, the importance of diversity in
nature, and the challenges of feeding more than 800 different
butterflies on a daily basis. The entomologists will provide guided
tours, answer questions, and allow students to closely observe
a variety of unique and beautiful insects and butterflies.
1 hour MST: 1, 4, 7
Available Wednesdays, November 3 and 10, 2010 and May 4 and 11, 2011.
9 and 10 a.m. only
Each session is limited to one class—call early to book this lesson!
Cost: $8.50 per student

My Smart Parts Are Working!

Brains think in many different ways. How do you like to use your brain? In TimeLab and DanceLab, each student learns how to turn his or her brain on, get it in gear, and use it to learn. Students learn how to talk about their strengths as learners.
1 1/2 hours MST: 4 LA: 1, 3, 4
Available Tuesday through Friday

Playing with Physics

This science-based experience is designed to help students put their knowledge of physics (and play!) into action. Students make observations and explain their thinking as they investigate the forces at work in the Field of Play exhibit. This experience allows students to work with and demonstrate their understanding of some of the basic concepts in physics.
1 1/2 hours MST: 1, 4, 5, 7 LA: 4
Available Tuesday through Friday

Predators and Protection: The Art of the Butterfly

Students enter the fabulous Dancing Wings Butterfly Garden® with a palette of colors, a keen eye for design, and a splash of curiosity, and return with some surprising discoveries! Students explore the ways that butterflies protect themselves by observing butterflies in action. Students then become predators and protectors themselves as they learn and play through a movement game that brings the colorful and amazing art of the butterfly world alive.
1 1/2 hours MST: 1 Arts: 1
Available Tuesday through Friday

Rainbow Reef: Exploring Aquatic Diversity

Rainbow Reef aquarium may look like just a home for a myriad of exotic fish, but there are over 65 different organisms living within this coral wonder. Using methods of scientific inquiry, students sort, observe, and analyze data to understand and appreciate the diversity of aquatic life in the museum’s salt-water aquaria. Students receive individual science kits and work in small focus groups.
1 1/2 hours MST: 1, 4
Available Tuesday through Friday

SOCIAL STUDIES

Updated! Coming to America: The Immigration Experience

What was it like to be an immigrant at the beginning of the 20th century? After participating in the Immigration Game—an interactive experience that teaches where immigrants came from, their challenges, and how it felt to be a newcomer in a strange land—students engage in a reenactment of Immigration Recognition Day, a historical event that took place in Rochester in the 1920s.
1 1/2 hour SS: 1, 3, 4, 5 LA: 1, 3, 4
Available Tuesday through Friday

Growing Up in 19th-Century America

How were values, traditions, and ideas transmitted to children at the turn of the 19th century? Using the museum’s collections, students role-play home life and life at school during this period. Costumes, games, toys, artifacts, and photographs illustrate the cultural, social, and educational values of the time.
1 1/2 hours SS: 1, 2 LA: 1, 3, 4
Available Tuesday through Friday

If Toys Could Talk About History

Toys provide an important way for children to learn about society. Students compare and contrast toys made in the late 19th and early 20th centuries with those made today. They learn about the skills, values, and information gained through toys, as well as how gender roles influence the nature of play.
1 1/2 hours SS: 1 LA: 1, 4
Available Tuesday through Friday

NEW! Map Trek 1: Way 2 Go!

Like real cartographers, students explore a territory before using mapping skills to design their own map. Students work in teams to decipher a map of an area within the museum and then create their own maps using symbols to illustrate where they have been. The expedition will begin and end in the highly educational and engaging National Geographic MAPS exhibit.
1 ½ hours SS: 3 LA: 1
Available Tuesday through Friday, through December 21, 2010

LANGUAGE ARTS

Caped Crusaders: Character Development and Comic-Book Heroes

What makes a character like Wonder Woman™ or Batman™ jump off the page? Students explore the American Comic Book Heroes: The Battle of Good vs. Evil exhibit and transform themselves from flat, blank-slate characters into round, fully-developed characters using details, story elements, and their imaginations. Choosing between good and evil, students pair up and discover the importance of conflict to character development.
1 hour LA: 2, 3 Arts: 1

Fractured Fairy Tales: Playing with Story Elements

In traditional fairy tales, readers learn that Hope + Heroes = Happiness. What happens to this formula when we fracture these tales? In Reading Adventureland’s Fairy-Tale section, students use a variety of literary landscapes to fracture favorite tales in unique and creative ways. Students retell favorite stories adding their own twists. They may tell the story from a new perspective, explore the impacts of cause and effect, or introduce a new character. Familiarity with fairy-tale themes and motifs is recommended.
Activities are adjusted to age.
1 1/2 hours LA: 1, 2, 3 Arts: 1, 2
Available Wednesday through Friday

R.S.V.P. to a Most Peculiar Invitation

Your students are cordially invited to a truly nonsensical housewarming party in Reading Adventureland’s Upside-Down Nonsense House. Bring your scarves and mittens to help “warm” the house and “shoot the breeze” while trying to make sense of a topsy-turvy world where Life - Logic = Laughs. Students learn that wordplay is the key to nonsense as they engage in activities that extend their understanding of homonyms and homographs, idioms and rhythms, verses and rhymes, and more.
1 1/2 hours LA: 1, 3 Arts: 1
Available Wednesday through Friday

Shipwrecked! The Adventure Game

Character development and story structure are just two of the many literary skills that take on life-size proportions in the Adventure section of Reading Adventureland. Working in small groups, students build their own adventure story based on the choices they make and the crew of characters they create. Using a ship’s log, they keep track of their adventure. Back at school they can write the full tale of the characters and settings they imagined.
1 1/2 hours LA: 1, 2, 4 Arts: 2
Available Wednesday through Friday

Sleuth School

Students attend a class in the Mystery Mansion School of Artful Sleuthing to learn and practice the skills literary detectives like Nancy Drew and Sherlock Holmes use to solve mysteries. Students need a sharp eye and a quick mind as they make careful observations, collect and interpret evidence, discover relationships, and draw conclusions.
1 1/2 hours LA: 1, 3, 4 MST: 1, 7
Available Wednesday through Friday

Spellbinders: The Wizardry of Words

Why do we call a captivating book “spellbinding?” Perhaps it’s because writers weave words in the same way that sorcerers cast spells. In this entrancing experience, students explore how great fantasy writers create worlds with words and use techniques that transport us to new places. Students use excerpts from classic fantasy literature to guide their exploration of the Fantasy section in Reading Adventureland. Then they try their hand at creating fantastic worlds of their own through the wizardry of words.
1 1/2 hours LA: 1, 2, 3 Arts: 3
Available Wednesday through Friday

A Writer’s Trek: Exploring the Writing Process

How does a writer gather ideas, find a voice, and choose words? Students explore the writing process in the highly stimulating environments of TimeLab and the museum’s collections. Bring your notebooks and some good walking shoes.
2 hours LA: 1, 2, 3
Available Tuesday through Friday