"...when you hold out your hands like Star Wars."

This past week I brought out an empty poster board to show the children.  I then put up some headers and asked if anyone knew what the words were.  

Our Schema

Force and Motion

Our Learning

Misconceptions

I explained to the children that we were going to start a new science topic.  The poster board was going to help us organize our thinking.  That's what the word schema was all about.  I started asking the children what they knew about force and motion.  I wrote each idea on a post-it note and placed it on the board.  Those post-its showed what the children knew on the first day.  I explained to the children that as we explored these ideas and learned new things, we would put them under the header "New Learning."  

I can say that after our first meeting, the children showed me that they had a lot of prior knowledge!  

"Force is if someone wants something and they snatch it away from you."

"Force means a thing is floating up and then it goes toward you."

"Force means you're strong, like you're pulling something heavy away from the ground."

"Motion means you or other things are moving."

"Motion means you can see it happen."

"If something is moving, you can't see it.  It's a blur."

Our poster is in the meeting time area so we can reference it as time goes on.  We haven't added anything officially yet, but we will as soon as we all agree on some new learning.  Right now we are thinking of how things can move and what can start something moving or stop it.