This activity blends scientific vocabulary, collaboration, creativity and artistic skills. Students are introduced to Ada’s adventures and how to convey ideas and information with a comic book. The students create their own comic strip to tell a science story using given themes and words.
Primary school activity (90-120 mins)
Resources
- Introducing My Adventure in Science Presentation
- A digital projector or you can use the copies of the comic book with all the students
- Science vocabulary list
- Scenario list
- Comic strip template
- Copies of Ada’s Adventures in Science
Evaluation
We want to see if the perception of the students has changed. Before the activity ask the kids some short questions:
- I am excited to learn about science;
- Science is boring;
- I would like to be a scientist;
- I believe that I could be a scientist
After the activity ask them similar questions to the start:
- This comic book made me like science more,
- This comic book makes science look boring,
- I am not interested in being a scientist like Ada,
- I would like to be a scientist Ada,
- I do not think I could be a scientist,
- I think I could be a scientist
We want to see if the students are using scientific vocabulary or science methodology - Ask the groups what was the science content of their ending or allow the students to ask each other questions about their endings
Peer review
If time allows you can ask the student to peer review each other’s comic books.
When each group presents their comic strip, they state the Scenario and Science Words they were given before introducing their story. Guided by the teacher, the students should award marks out of 5 for:
- Was the story interesting, funny and creative?
- Did the comic strip convey the ideas (science words, scenario and the students’ story) effectively?
- How well was the scenario resolved using science?
Marks should not be given for how well the comic strip is draw but how they use their story telling and artistic skills in creative ways.
Activity
Introduce Ada’s Adventures in Science using the powerpoint presentation. The aim of the introduction is to show how to communicate scientific, and potentially complex, ideas using comic books.
- Split students into groups of around 2-3 (if they are already in groups, then you can just use those)
- Give each group 6 words from Science Word List.
- Give each group 1 Scenario from the Scenario List
- Give each student a “My Adventure in Science” Comic Strip template
- Ask the students to make a story with this scenario. Ask them to think about:
- who the characters are,
- how do they cope with their scenario,
- what do they do to fix it (if they can),
- why is it interesting
- will it have a good or bad effect on people
- They have to use at least 3 of the words in the selection of 6, and the theme.
- [optional] For higher ability students you might ask them to use more than 3 out of 6 words or give them more words to start with.
- Give students books/laptops/tablets to help them research their scenario.
- Once they have decided on their story as a group, they can individually draw their own comic, or stay in their group.
- The students can draw one large picture or divide the space up into panels to tell the story.
- Encourage the students to create their story in their group, as not all student may be confident in their drawing ability.
- Students do not have to create the story they discuss in the group
- Each group selects 1 comic and tells their story to the rest of the class.
- [optional] The students peer review each comic book.
- Each student gets a copy of Ada’s Adventures in Science comic book at the end of the activity