Measuring Growth provides problem-solving activities at the museum. Students should be given the opportunity to work on these within the groups, as much as possible without adult direction. Please caution chaperones not to do the work for the students.

Allow students to:

• Think about and discuss solving the measurement problem with each other.
• Develop a strategy with their group.
• Choose the appropriate tools.
• Compare their answers with other groups.
• Reflect: "How reasonable is my answer?"

Group organization

Assign 3 to 4 students to each backpack. Each student should have the opportunity to work as a recorder of data (Recorder); choose appropriate materials from the backpack(Equipment Handler): and take the lead in deciding how to measure and leading the measurements (Measurement Master). There are task cards in each backpack. If there are 4 in a group, one person can act as the Location Expert/Navigator to locate the spot for the activity. The task assignments are LEADERS for the tasks, students do not accomplish the task alone.

For a classroom size group, divide the class into two sections. Start one section in the Collections Gallery with the tree ring activities and the other in the Dinosaur and Fossil Gallery.

Allow about 1/2 hour for each backpack gallery. Students may explore the gallery if they finish quickly.

	Group A	Group B	Group C	Group D
10-10:30am	Dinosaurs	Explore	Collections	Explore
10:30-11am	Explore	Collections	Explore	Dinosaurs
11-11:30am	Lunch
11:30-12:00pm	Collections	Explore	Dinosaurs	Explore
12:30-1pm	Explore	Dinosaurs	Explore	Collections

View backpack contents

Alignment with Minnesota Academic Math and Science Standards