RSTE student teacher gets creative with claymation

When Leah Feland had to come up with lessons on cell mitosis for the seventh-grade life science classes she was student teaching this fall, she thought about how she could

impart the material while keeping her students engaged. “I was looking for ideas for different projects that the kids could do for mitosis, to show their understanding of it.”

Leah is part of the ND EPSCoR Rural Student Teaching Experience program. She had recently come across the idea of teaching science concepts through claymation. Fortunately, her cooperating teacher had, too, and had an app called OSnap loaded on the students’ iPads that could help.

Leah developed instructions for the project, as well as a grading rubric, and ordered some Play-Doh. “I put them in groups of three or four, and I gave them three and a half class periods” to make their animations.

“They used their iPads to take a picture and then they moved the clay a little. At first I had to give them a lot of prompting, to show them how a stop motion works and that you have to move it a little at a time.”

Her assignment required the students to create 26 to 30 frames per mitosis phase. “A lot of them did more because then they would do intros and then an ending with their names. So I would say most of them are over 150 frames.”

How did it work out? “I was a little nervous right away when they started because they were asking me, ‘what happens in this phase?’ and then by the end of it, I would ask them questions and they could tell me everything because they had to model it themselves. I had to do a student engagement survey at the end of my student teaching, and most of them said they really enjoyed hands on projects, things that they could work with to learn the material. I think it helped them to understand it a lot better, too.”

Leah grew up in Mohall, about fifty miles northwest of Minot. She is a senior at NDSU and will graduate this winter with a double major in biology and science education. Being a part of the RSTE program helped her decide what she wants to do next.

“I think the RSTE program is really great. I came from a small town, so I kind of assumed that's where I wanted to end up. Being able to have our weekly discussions and learning about the benefits of being in a smaller community and the teaching aspect of it helped me to know that's what I want to do. And then additionally having the stipend money meant that I could really focus on student teaching, and that was super helpful.”

According to Ryan Summers, PhD, Associate Professor of Science Education at UND and

RSTE program coordinator, “RSTE participants receive mentorship along with a stipend to help offset the costs of living during their one-semester internship. This allows student teachers to focus on completing their undergraduate programs while planning and delivering creative lessons full-time.”

Leah expects to return to rural North Dakota to teach science after graduation this winter and some international travel next spring. “That's the plan. I love North Dakota.”

Mitosis claymation video