K-8 Science at Burke's
Burke's students are encouraged to ask deep questions about the world around them.
Instead of rote memorization, our teachers focus on facilitating students' ability to observe, wonder, hypothesize, and explore phenomena through experimentation and iteration. We believe that the study of science “requires creativity and imagination,” and students who graduate from Burke’s are ready to be conscientious citizens who possess the skills to know how to learn.
Lower School Science
As our 17-year veteran Lower School science teacher, Ms. McDonald, shares in this podcast episode, her goal in K-4 science is for students to “come to view themselves as scientists, empowered to satisfy their curiosity through inquiry and experimentation.” Walk into our K-4 science classrooms, and you’ll see our students developing the skills and dispositions of scientists, as illustrated in these three examples from kindergarten, first grade, and third grade.
- Our kindergarteners investigate the life cycle and anatomy of the tiny creatures that live in our gardens, including worms, ladybugs, roly-polies, and crickets. Using careful observation, students learn the basics of scientific drawing to create visuals of their chosen creature accurately enough to teach someone about what they observed.
- In first grade, students learn about force and motion by designing their own “fair test” experiments with balls and ramps that involve planning, making predictions, recording and organizing data, interpreting data to draw conclusions, and showing results with diagrams and graphs - not to mention a lot of teamwork.
- Our third-grade interdisciplinary electricity unit culminates in the Circuit Circus. Student creations have included electric quiz games, a conveyor belt, and a fan-powered zipline. The Circuit Circus helps students apply their electrical knowledge and gives many opportunities to practice prototyping, flexible thinking, and perseverance.
Upper School Science
In Upper School, our students are asked to think big and take risks in their learning. They are inspired to be excited to build, design, re-design, and engineer and prompted to try and try again.
Students progress from life science in fifth grade to earth science in sixth grade. In grades seven and eight, students participate in a physical science course emphasizing an exploration of chemistry in seventh grade and physics in eighth grade. They learn lab safety skills, build upon their collaborative skills, and continuously add to their critical thinking toolkit. Moreover, they also explore the interrelated nature of the concepts and ideas covered.
For example, while students in seventh grade may focus on chemical reactions, in eighth grade, they will explore these same ideas through the lens of energy to understand them as a change of energetic state. Whether using graduated cylinders and Bunsen burners in a lab, dreaming up ideas for the Toshiba Exploravision competition, or creating Rube Goldberg machines, students dash excitedly through the Upper School hallway to the science labs for class.
“I am a Scientist.”
Our teachers aim to equip each Burke’s student with an expansive idea of their possible selves - with one of those pathways leading towards science! Burke’s students do not merely learn about science; our girls DO science. In the classroom, in our nearby environs, and through our multi-day Outdoor Education trips, students develop the habits of mind and dispositions of scientific inquiry. Our science teachers believe it’s a privilege to help students engage in “good struggle” as they develop critical and creative thinking every day through our science classes.
Burke's mission is to educate, encourage and empower girls. Our school combines academic excellence with an appreciation for childhood so that students thrive as learners, develop a strong sense of self, contribute to community, and fulfill their potential, now and throughout life.
Burke's admits students of any race, color, national and ethnic origin to all the rights, privileges, programs, and activities generally accorded or made available to students at the school. It does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national and ethnic origin in administration of its educational policies, admissions policies, scholarship and loan programs, and athletic and other school-administered programs.