Chocolate Rocks-Interest Approach

This week in lab our mission was to come up with an interest approach to captivate students and get them excited to learn in the lessons ahead. For my Natural Resources and Ecology Class in our Cycles Unit, we were learning about the rock cycle. The objectives were to identify the three types of rocks, describe how they are formed, and demonstrate how they are formed. To do this we used chocolate chips, pretzels and marshmallows! We melted the chocolate down and let it cool, representing Igneous Rocks, added marshmallows an melted them together with the chocolate to represent Metamorphic Rock, and added crushed pretzels to represent Sedimentary Rock. This did get the students excited to learn and even more excited for the assessment where they were able to eat their "rocks" and correctly identify which rock each piece represented! I did rush for the sake of lab time and I thought it went well, but could have gone better. While making the rocks, I did ask a few thought provoking questions, but should have asked more. I also wish I would have allotted more time to go over the lesson in general. I think with everything together things would have made a little more sense to the students. I also need to work on my classroom management, I often run into situations I don't know how to handle in a split second scenario. I think with that practice and exposure to classroom situations will help.