Today, Year 6 began Case Study 2 by looking at the life of Charles Darwin whose book, ‘On the Origin of Species’ is considered by many to be the foundation of evolutionary biology.
To start with, the children were given a five minute starter where they were tasked with drawing a quick sketch of what comes into their heads when they think of a scientist. Having looked through the drawings, it was amazing to see how similar they all were despite being given no prompts or ideas beforehand. It was interesting to see how children imagined a scientist to be (i.e. The wacky hair style, glasses and large white lab coat) compared to what an everyday scientist actually is.
Once we had spent time discussing what a scientist does, we then began looking at the life of Charles Darwin by comparing two images; one at the start of his career and one from the end.
The children then created notices and wonders whilst also inferring what the images were trying to depict. In addition to this, they also made educated guesses as to what work Darwin may have carried out throughout his lifetime.
Here are some of the fantastic notices and wonders that were generated.
