Is copper coin attract to magnet?

Description
Today I managed to observe the class of year 3B for science subject. The class was conducted by Cikgu Rohayah, the science subject teacher. The class was having an activity today which was continued the previous topic in identify the materials that magnets attract.
Before the activity was started, students were divided into 4 groups. The teacher provided the different types of magnets to every group. Students had to find out which objects will be attract by the magnets and all the objects were brought by the students from their home, for example: copper coin, straw, leaf, tin, aluminum can, stapler, pin, eraser, flower etc.
Students were been told to test every object with different types of magnets. I went around to every group to observe how they were done their activity and how they conducted their discussion by themselves. The teacher also went around to every group to give a little guidance and asked some questions to the students.
By the end of an activity, the teacher made a closure by asking questions to the students and showed demonstrations, for example: Is the flower attract by the magnet? Is the stapler attracting by the magnet?
Teacher wrote some questions and draws a table on the blackboard and made a conclusion. By the end of the class, teacher gave the worksheets to the students for revision and as an assessment for the topic.

Feelings
During the activity, every students included me were very excited. I felt that the students were enjoyed the activity. The students were surprised and excited when they found that the 1 cent copper coin can be attract by the magnets while the 20 cents silver coin can not be attract by the magnets and also the stem of plastic flower can be attract by the magnets. They shared their discoveries to me and asked for the reasons. I felt that the activity was a core for the whole topic which they had learned and discussed in the previous lesson.

Evaluation
The activity conducted by the teacher was very benefit to the students apart from the theories that had learned and watched from the audio CD. Students had found their own new discoveries and constructed to be a new knowledge to them. For example: from the previous lesson, students were been taught that the copper coin can not be attracting by the magnet. But during the activity, students found that the copper coin can be attracting by the magnet. Although it had a controversy between that, but the students believed the truth that they had done from the activity which was the copper coin can be attracting by the magnet.
Along the activity, the students were discussed their observation using Malay language while the science subject is teaching in English. But the students joined actively during their discussion when communicated with each others. I wondered at that moment and asked myself, how it would be if the activity was conducted in English only? I think the activity will not be so lively like now what they had done because the students are not proficiency in English although they had learned 2 years English language before that. What is important is that the students could know the concept that they are learning right now.

Analysis
By the end of the activity, teacher wrote 3 questions and draws a table on the blackboard as below:
1. What is to keep the same?
2. What is to change?
3. What is to measure?

List all the objects which attracted or not attracted to a magnet.
Objects Attracted to a magnet
Iron screw √
Straw X

and made a conclusion as below:
All objects made of iron will be attracting to a magnet.

From the activity, I observed that the teacher was followed the stages of a lesson:
1. Set induction – introduce the activity, instructions
2. Development – discussion of the activity
3. Closure – conclusion of the activity
4. Evaluation – questions for the activity
5. Reinforcement – worksheets given by teacher

Well, so far the students were gained the knowledge especially the external knowledge which physical and social knowledge when they had found the discoveries from the activity and also when they were communicate to the other students.
At the same time, I found that the teacher was not emphasized about the opinion or view from the students which they had found the new discoveries from the activity. For example, teacher did not ask why the copper coin can be attracting by the magnet.

Conclusion
As a conclusion for the observation, this kind of activity should be always encourage during the lesson. It is also important that to have a well planning by following the stages of a lesson are effective for teaching and learning of science. I realized that science will be meaningless if the teaching have no any activity at all.

Action plan
Unfortunately, the class activity was conducted in half an hour only. I realized that this kind of activity should be done in longer period due to have more objects for testing with the magnet and also to have more discussion with the students.