Teach a plan that can change
Year 1 Science · Term 1 Weeks 9–10 · Days 41–50. Original proposal, 9 October 2026. Ten optional starts; use one, shorten it or spread it across sittings. This is a new fortnight, not a completed annual course or a classroom trial.
A useful little job
“Got a plan? Let's give it room to change.” Children use a weather clue to make a drawing, story, display or reading plan, then check what a later source actually says. A private spoken plan is a finished product. A forecast is a prediction; a report says what someone recorded. Neither gives a child permission to go outside or tells us every future result. The complete invented stories work indoors without a device, home log, photograph, purchase or outdoor access.
The preceding Days 31–40 already worked on living needs, views, shadow changes, longer plant changes and recurring fictional flower records. Days 21–30 already investigated paper/cloth forces. This sequence adds forecast purposes, source issue time versus forecast time, weather records with explicit location/feature/time, useful conditional changes to a small job, and choosing a comparison that answers a particular question. It does not rename the old flower sources or paper deliveries. The annual allocation is a draft; ask what the actual class has encountered before choosing a start.
Prepare once
Broad scrap paper, a pencil or usual communication tools are enough. The adult reads complete C01–C20 in ORDINARY. Dates, symbols and words are support, not a decoding test. Use no real weather measurement equipment, water collection, umbrellas, window opening/leaning, sun gazing, storm listening task or outing. Optional actual notices use an already suitable ordinary indoor position and current local adult decisions; access is never demonstrated to earn credit. A child can direct an adult, interpret an attributed description, use a complete paper scene, pause or pass. Actual perception, adult report, actual action, prediction and fiction are recorded separately.
Suggested planning length: 20–30 minutes, not a daily Science quota or measured usability claim. One way to begin is 3 minutes for the purpose, 5 for the complete source, 10 for a chosen route and 3 for a useful next question. Stop sooner. Offer one of three mechanisms; they are choices, not learner categories. Usual speech, sign, AAC, pointing with confirmed meaning, drawing, typing or faithful dictation can carry the same scientific idea. No neatness, reading speed, answer length, public performance or completed grid is a criterion. Offer a reduced visual field, one prompt at a time, predictable written sequence, quiet private start and a return route without choosing supports by diagnosis.
An own first idea precedes a worked example. A later result stays covered until the wanted first question/prediction has been offered and saved, or declined. Absence stays absent. An adult-supplied example cannot become the child's own earlier prediction. Source reasoning alone does not demonstrate followed physical procedures, measurement or a real peer investigation.
Ten complete starts
- Day 41: Forecast, report, plan
- Day 42: A plan with a spare door
- Day 43: Right place, right time
- Day 44: One small weather notice
- Day 45: A useful weather message
- Day 46: Earlier, later, and what changed
- Day 47: Put your records to work
- Day 48: A weather pattern is not every season
- Day 49: Compare for a reason
- Day 50: Your little weather desk
Assessment · Capture actual evidence · Whole curriculum · Source custody