Standing at the front of the room, senior Madison Thomas taught her Silver 3 Teaching as a Career class how to make homemade ice cream on Thursday, April 24.

As part of a culminating project for the year, students in the course developed lesson plans for a science or math experiment that could be used in a second, third or fourth grade classroom. The objective of the project was to capitalize on everything the students had covered over the course of the year, including developing classroom objectives, grouping students in strategic ways and asking questions at the conclusion of a lesson. The student in charge of the lesson plan posed as a teacher for the class period.

FACS teacher Rebecca Caves said the project was useful for her to evaluate how well her students could function as teachers.

“It really is a better assessment tool for me to see rather than a true/false, multiple choice [or] matching test, because they can answer questions all day long, but I don’t know whether they can actually do it,” Caves said. “[This project allows me to say] ‘Oh, OK, you can do this.’”

In Thomas’ lesson, all students got to make their own ice cream, per Thomas’ instructions. Senior Kellyne Weathers said she enjoyed being taught by Thomas.

“I thought the project was a really fun way to apply what we’ve been learning and to make sure that it could actually be used in a classroom,” Weathers said. “It’s not something that the kids would think was busy work. [It] was something that they could actually have fun with.”

According to Thomas, teaching the class was rewarding, for her and her peers.

“I chose the ice cream because I used to do it all the time as a kid and I just remember it being so much fun,” Thomas said. “When they told us that we had to do a science project, I was excited because it was something that I’ve always loved and it was something I wanted to share with everyone else. Everyone looks like they’re having a ton of fun, and that’s all I wanted out of the project, so I’m satisfied.”