ED 345 Calvin University Teacher Intern Lesson Plan Template

Teacher Intern: Mallory Hoatlin Date: October 22, 2019

Grade Level: 3rd Subject/ Topic: Science - Squirrels
Approx. time spent planning this lesson: 1 hour *The template will expand as text is added.*
DOMAIN 1: PLANNING & PREPARATION
Main Focus/Essential Questions: What were past environments like?
Brief Context: In order to learn more about why we see more squirrels than stegosauruses today, we need to take a look
at what the environment of a stegosaurus was like and why is wasn’t able to survive.
Prerequisite Knowledge/Skills:
Lesson Objectives/Learning Targets Aligned Assessments
Consider formative & summative tools
Please number objectives and the aligned assessment measures.
The learner will: I will assess learning by:
1. Determine what past time periods were like. 1. Students will be writing their claims in their
science notebooks to check their own
understanding.
Standards Addressed in Lesson: (Include full standard.)
3-LS4-1. Analyze and interpret data from fossils to provide evidence of the organisms and the environments in which
they lived long ago.

3-ESS2-2. Obtain and combine information to describe climates in different regions of the world.

Instructional Resources: Lucas Education Research, Sprocket

Consideration of Learners:
How have you responded to your diverse learners? Consider UDL (Multiple means of Engagement, Representation,
Action & Expression) & principles of differentiation. If appropriate, identify individual accommodations you will make
in response to needs or interests of students.
Students will be able to contribute to the discussion in several ways, they can participate in turn and talks with a partner
and also make whole group contributions. For the closure activity, students will be able to either write sentences or
draw pictures in their science notebooks to share their initial claims.

DOMAIN 2: THE CLASSROOM ENVIRONMENT

BUILDING RESPECTFUL RELATIONSHIPS: (Note any specific ways in which you plan to establish rapport, build mutual
trust, monitor & maintain relationships. Consider student-teacher & student-student relationships.)
Students will be working as a large group to determine the order in which the posters should go. When disagreements
arise, students will be encouraged to use partner talk to state why they respectfully disagree with their peer.
ORGANIZATIONAL ROUTINES: (Identify ways that you have intentionally organized time, space, materials, & students
to minimize disruptions and maximize learning.)
Students will all be seated at the front meeting area for the discussion portion of the lesson and will be dismissed back
to their seats in small groups to minimize the amount of traffic.
SPECIFYING & REINFORCING PRODUCTIVE BEHAVIOR: (Note how expectations are specified, productive behavior is
reinforced, and disruptive behavior is redirected.)
Expectations for disagreements will be clearly stated and students will be redirected to the partner talk poster to remind
themselves of the language they should be using. Students being disruptive during discussion portion will be asked to go
back to their seats and listen from there.
DOMAIN 3: INSTRUCTION
CONTENT MANAGEMENT: YOUR INSTRUCTION
Motivation/Opening/Intro: [Think creatively about how to recruit learning.]
 1. Review timeline activity from lesson 1. In a turn and talk, ask students to review their observations from the
activity and think about where the stegosaurus was on the timeline and what they know about the stegosaurus
and the time when stegosauruses lived.
2. Take responses from several student groups.
3. When we were studying squirrels, we learned that the squirrel behaviors had a lot to do with their structures
and the organisms around them. In these next few lessons, we’re going to work backwards. We’re going to
figure out behaviors of prehistoric organisms by using what we can tell about organisms’ structures, from fossils
and from what we know about the organisms around them. We will soon be able to answer the question, What
were past environments like?
Development: [It may help to number your steps with corresponding times.]
1. Display posters that represent different time periods. For each poster, have students turn and talk to share what
they notice about the poster. After each turn and talk, have several students share out what they talked about.
2. Ask students to share what they notice about similarities and differences between posters.
3. Using what they learned from the timeline activity, have students try to put the posters in order from longest
ago to most recent.
4. Students can state whether they agree or disagree for the placement of the posters, and a discussion can be had
about each poster.
Closure: (Be creative and consider authentic audiences for the work. Think beyond giving an assignment or
independent practice.)
1. Once students agree on the placement of the posters, they will head back to their seats to work on their initial
claims based on evidence from the posters and timeline when the stegosaurus and Juramaia most likely lived.
2. Students will be writing their claims in their science notebooks until the end of science time.

DOMAIN #4: PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES

REFLECTION AFTER TEACHING THE LESSON: The discussion part of this lesson was, in my opinion, the most beneficial
for the students and their reasoning. They took what they had learned from the timeline activity and combined that
knowledge with what they saw in the prehistoric video to develop their own ideas of how the posters should go.
There was minimal disagreement among the students and when there was any sort of disagreement, students were
encouraged to use their partner talk strategies to state why they respectfully disagreed with their peer.