Lesson Plan w/ Rubric

Unit/Subject: Structures of Nature Part 1, Science

Lesson Title Focus: Ecosystems, Food Chains/Webs, and Animal Adaptations

Grade: 3rd Grade

Date Taught: 02/14/2020 to 03/04/2020

PLANNING AND PREPARATION

Content Knowledge
This lesson was developed with keeping in mind the need for students to be engaged in
hands-on activities and connections to the real-world. In and around Virginia Beach,
many of the science concepts that are covered in this specific lesson will let students to
look at the environment outside of the classroom, making this topic more authentic to
them. Throughout this unit, there are plenty of different opportunities for students to
get creative with what they are learning about, along with the use of contemporary
(modern) and traditional instructional strategies to differentiate instruction and reach all
students.
Learner Differences
There are many different students in this class; the variety of abilities and personalities is
very wide in this class of 24 students. As mentioned previously, contemporary and
traditional pedagogies are used throughout the lesson in order to appeal to all different
learning styles. This is done by using a mix of technology, handmade drawings, and
whole/small group discussions to name a few. Also, frequent reinforcement and
formative assessments will prove to be successful in measuring the impact of their
learning.
Outcomes/Goals
As a result of this lesson, students are expected to know the differences between
adaptations, classifications of organisms, and ecosystems. Some of these learning targets
are included in the “Standards” section below, along with “I can…” statements and key
skills/processes. These targets and outcomes will be measured using different forms of
formative/summative assessments, as well as individual, small, or whole group
conversations with students.
 IMPORTANT NOTICE
Because this unit is very lengthy, the pre- and post-assessment are done during the
“Animal Adaptations” portion. All of the data and the narrative for this project will be
based on this portion, which is the last part of this ENTIRE unit. The justification for this
is because there are two summative assessments in this lesson; the first during
“Ecosystems” and “Food Chains and Food Webs,” which is the longer assessment, and
the other in “Animal Adaptations.” Also, the concepts from the first two parts of this unit
are needed in order to fully understand the third part, which is the shortest portion but
also the most cumulative portion of all of the parts. All assignments in this lesson will be
attached via PDF form.
Essential Questions
● What is the difference between physical and behavioral adaptations?
● How can you tell if an organism is a predator or prey?
● In our area, what are the names and the kinds of organisms you can find?
● Why is it important to conserve our resources?
● How are food chains and food webs similar and different?
● What kinds of instincts do you have? What about learned behavior?
● How are ecosystems different from each other?
● What kinds of ecosystems exist here?
Standards
VBO Standards:

Standards “I can…” Statements Key Skills and Processes

SCI.3.3.1 Distinguish between
and explain the purposes of
physical and behavioral
adaptations of animals.
(SOL 3.4 a, b)
I can explain the purpose of SCI.3.0.8 Draw conclusions
physical and behavioral and make inferences from a
adaptations. variety of sources. (SOL 3.1j)
I can explain the difference
between physical and
behavioral adaptations.

SCI.3.3.2 Compare and
contrast instinctive and
learned behavior.
(SOL 3.4a)
I can explain the difference
between instinct and learned
behavior.
SOL.3.0.9 Construct models
to clarify explanations and
experimental results.
(SOL 3.1l): Design a model of
a habitat for an animal with a
specific adaptation.

SCI.3.4.1 Differentiate I can explain the differences SOL.3.0.9 Construct models

between producer, consumer
and decomposer. (SOL 3.5a)
SCI.3.4.2 Classify organisms
as herbivores, carnivores,
omnivores or decomposers.
(SOL 3.5b)
SCI.3.4.3 Distinguish between I can explain how predator and
predator and prey. (SOL 3.5c) prey are different.
SCI.3.5.1 Describe aquatic
ecosystems and examples of
animals and plants that live in
each. (SOL 3.6a)
SCI.3.5.2 Describe terrestrial
ecosystems and examples of
animals and plants that live in
each. (SOL 3.6b)
between a producer, a
consumer and a decomposer.
I can classify organisms as
herbivores, carnivores,
omnivores and decomposers.
I can describe an aquatic
ecosystem.
I can explain how animals and
plants use resources in their
ecosystem.
I can describe a terrestrial
ecosystem.
I can explain how animals and
plants use resources in their
ecosystem.
to clarify explanations and
experimental results.
(SOL 3.1l)
● Create and interpret a
model of a food chain
showing producers and
consumers.
SCI.3.0.8 Draw conclusions
and make inferences from a
variety of sources. (SOL 3.1j)
● Analyze models or
diagrams of different
water-related
ecosystems in order to
describe the community
of organisms each
contains and interpret
how the organism uses
the resources in that
ecosystem.
SCI.3.0.8 Draw conclusions
and make inferences from a
variety of sources. (SOL 3.1j)
● Analyze models or
diagrams of different
dry-land ecosystems in
order to describe the
community of organisms
each contains and
interpret how the
organism uses the
resources in that
ecosystem.
SCI.3.5.3 Explain the
relationship between
population and community.
(SOL 3.6c)
I can describe the relationship
between population and
community.
I can explain what would
happen to an ecosystem if an
entire population became
extinct or approached
extinction.

SCI.3.5.4 Describe ways I can describe ways that SCI.3.0.10 Apply science
humans can help conserve humans can conserve concepts to current events
limited resources. resources. and applications. (SOL 3.1m)
(SOL 3.6d)

VA SOLs:

3.4 The student will investigate and understand that adaptations allow animals to
satisfy life needs and respond to the environment. Key concepts include
a) behavioral adaptations; and
b) physical adaptations.

3.5 The student will investigate and understand relationships among organisms in
aquatic and terrestrial food chains. Key concepts include
a) producer, consumer, decomposer;
b) herbivore, carnivore, omnivore; and
c) predator and prey.

3.6 The student will investigate and understand that ecosystems support a diversity of
plants and animals that share limited resources. Key concepts include
a) aquatic ecosystems;
b) terrestrial ecosystems;
c) populations and communities; and
d) the human role in conserving limited resources.
Resources and Materials
Please see the attached link for the various worksheets and assignments the students
are will work on for this lesson: http://alyanalara.weebly.com/impact-project.html
● ChromeBooks
● Pencils, Markers, Colored Pencils
Technology
The technology that the students are relying on is mostly their Chromebooks. They are
able to access different types of audiobooks and other resources so that they are given a
multimodal way of learning the content. Teachers are also using their assigned
Chromebooks to issue some of the assignments and content that the students need to
complete their assignments, as well as using a SmartBoard, Promethean Board, or a
ViewSonic screen to teach using various powerpoints, videos, etc.

INSTRUCTIONAL DELIVERY
Learning Environment
Students will be working on the activities in this lesson individually, in small groups, and
in whole groups so that students have a chance to work on their own and collaborate
with others in the classroom when appropriate.
Introduction/Activating Strategies
To engage learners, there will be several hands-on activities for them that will require
them to use different skills and make them think critically about how these lessons will
relate to the world outside of the classroom and the school.
To launch the lesson, the teacher can ask a wide array of questions from the essential
questions section of this lesson, or ask others that require students to think about their
surroundings at home. Doing this will also allow them to activate prior knowledge based
on their personal experiences.
Instructional Strategies
Ecosystems:

Day 1 1) To introduce ecosystems to the students, they will begin a BrainPop

video and quiz on the topic. After doing the BrainPop activities,
introduce the following words in a powerpoint:
● Population: A group of living organisms of the same kind living
in the same place
● Community: All the populations living in the same place
 These words and their definitions will be written into their content
(science) notebooks.
2) As the powerpoint progresses, TTW ask questions about the slides,
such as:
● What communities exist here in Virginia Beach? i.e., John B.
Dey, Third grade, neighborhoods
● What kinds of populations would you find in a forest? A
beach? The desert? A river?

Day 2 1) TTW ask the students to take out their content (science) journal from
their book bins and open it to the next clean page and take out their
crayons or colored pencils (optional).
2) After this, TTW create an anchor chart titled “Ecosystems” that the
students will copy in their journals, where they will compare aquatic
and terrestrial ecosystems. Throughout the modeling process, TTW
ask questions such as:
● What kind of ecosystems do you see around us, here in
Virginia Beach?
● How is ________ ecosystem similar or different to ___________
ecosystem?
● If _________ ecosystem was here, what kind of animals or
plants would you find?

See image below for example of anchor chart:

See images below for student made anchor charts:

Food Chains and Food Webs:

Day 3 1) To close out the previous lesson on ecosystems, students will be

asked to write about one ecosystem from their anchor chart using
one verb, one noun, and one adjective during morning meeting to
refresh their memory on different ecosystems.
2) To introduce food chains and webs, TSW work on another BrainPop
video and quiz. Once this is completed, TTW ask the students to flip
to a clean page in their content (science) notebook and take out any
coloring materials (optional).
3) Next, the teacher will begin to model another anchor chart; half of it
with the title “Food Chain” and the other half with “Food Web.” For
this day, TTW only do the “Food Chain” side of the chart. During this
part of the lesson, TTW write the following words and definitions on
the chart:
○ Producers: Green plants that make food
○ Consumers: Animals that get energy by eating plants or other
animals
○ Decomposers: Breaks down dead organisms
See image below for example of anchor chart:
 4) Once the students complete the chart in their notebook, TSW cut out
the squares on the left side from their food chain worksheet and glue
them in order on a strip of paper. TTW check that the students have
all of them in the correct order.
5) After glueing the squares to the strip, TSW cut the squares on the
right side and glue them into their content book on the next page
after their anchor chart. TTW double check the students’ work before
they glue it into their book.

Day 4 1) TTW continue the anchor chart, this time completing the “Food
Web” side of the chart with students following the teacher’s model.
See images below for examples of anchor charts:

2) When the students finish, TTW call on small groups and pass out two
worksheets with various organisms on them. In their groups, TSW
draw arrows in between the organisms to demonstrate how a food
web works. As the students are working on both of these sheets,
 TTW review the students’ work and answer any questions they have
or make any corrections.

Day 5 1) TSW be making their third and final anchor chart in their content
(science) journals on “Types of Consumers,” which includes:
○ Herbivores: Animals that only eat plants
○ Carnivores: Animals that eat only other animals
○ Omnivores: Animals that eat both plants and animals
○ Decomposers: Organisms that feed on and breaks down dead
organisms
TTW model this anchor chart like the previous ones and include at
least two examples of each consumer.
See images below for examples of anchor charts:

Day 6 1) TTW review some of the concepts and definitions that the students
have done for the past couple of days in preparation for their
summative assessment. This includes reviewing the anchor charts,
looking at the different food webs and food chains made, and using
online resources like BrainPop.
2) TTW assign the first summative assessment in this unit.

Animal Adaptations:

Day 7 1) TTW issue the pre-assessment called “Animal Adaptations” as

morning work for the students as they come in (this will be the same
sheet they use for the post-assessment). When they finish, TSW turn
 it in to the kidney table for the teacher to review what they know.
2) On Schoology, TSW watch a video in their “Instinct vs Learned
Behavior Assignment” and complete the T Chart where they sort
some of the instincts and learned behaviors that they saw.
3) After completing the assignment, TSW move on to the “Instinct vs
Learned Behavior Assessment” done through Google Forms. This is a
formative assessment that is 6 questions long.

Day 8 1) The first concepts of Animal Adaptations that TTW introduce as a

whole group is Camouflage vs. Mimicry. This will be done in whole
group using a powerpoint presentation showcasing different types of
organisms where the students have to justify whether the organisms
are using camouflage or mimicry to survive. Throughout the
powerpoint, TSW write down the definitions of camouflage and
mimicry in their content (science) notebook.
2) After the powerpoint, TSW be given a butterfly to try to camouflage
in the classroom. They must use at least two different colors and tape
it onto the object or on a place in the room. When they finish, TSW
look around the room to find their classmates camouflaged
butterflies.

Day 9 1) TTW introduce the concepts of hibernation and dormancy in another

powerpoint to the whole class. TSW be responsible for writing the
definitions of the words in their content (science) journals.
Throughout the powerpoint, TTW show different organisms and ask
 the students if they go through hibernation or dormancy and justify
why they think so.
2) After the powerpoint, TSW work on a sheet called “Physical vs.
Behavioral Adaptations,” where they have to cut squares and sort out
where each square goes based on the descriptions that are listed in
them. These will be done in small group with the teacher so that one-
on-one feedback can be given to the students.

Day 10 1) TSW work on a sheet named “Animal Migration” and complete the
questions that follow it. This worksheet will be done in partners, and
it’s closely integrated with Language Arts.
2) After the students complete the worksheet, TTW go over the
answers with the whole group.

Day 11 1) Before taking the assessment, TTW review different concepts with
the students from the Animal Adaptations section of the unit by
asking various questions of the students and asking them to provide
examples of each.
2) TTW issue the “Animal Adaptations” summative assessment to the
students.

Closure
Once the students complete the assessment, TTW give an exit ticket for them to
complete to let the teacher know how well they did in teaching the lesson and what they
could do better in the future. They will also make sentences about their favorite
ecosystem and animals using the different vocabulary from the entire unit, and in each
sentence they must use at least one adjective, one verb, one noun, and one conjunction.

Differentiation
In order to reach the needs of all learners in the classroom, different ways of teaching
the content will be done (individual, small, and whole group lessons), as well as giving the
students plenty of opportunities to use their Chromebooks to look up information
throughout the unit.
Small groups are differentiated based on what they already know and what
misconceptions they might have about the subject. Since this whole unit has many
language arts integrations, the small groups that are called were formed by what their
DRA levels are for guided reading. Doing this allows the teacher to differentiate similarly
to science like it’s already done in guided reading groups.

Assessment:
Throughout the unit, there are multiple formative assessments that can determine if the
students understand the content that show in their content journals, through different
Google Forms/Docs, as well as personal communication with them regarding the topics
that they’re learning. For each of the summative assessments, a rubric is included to see
how well they performed in specific concepts and standards given by VBO. Each concept
is graded individually for the gradebook, but for the purposes of this project, the grades
and results will be recorded as percentages.

PROFESSIONAL LEARNING
Reflection
To evaluate my practice, I will constantly ask for verbal feedback from my clinical faculty
as well as referring back to the weekly feedback guides that are completed by the clinical
faculty. Along with referring to those pieces, student evaluations will be given out at the
end of the unit so that the students can “grade” how the teacher taught the lesson.
Some learners struggled with different vocabulary words within this unit, and usually it
was because they would confuse the definitions between some of the words that are
closely related. For example, some of the students confused the names of different types
of consumers with the definitions, or would mix up closely aligned adaptations such as
dormancy and hibernation.
To strengthen this lesson, the teacher can have the students complete a performance
task where they have to research a local animal and the ecosystem that they live in. They
can also look up different statistics to determine the population, and they can write
about what their adaptations are and what types of consumers they are.
In order to make this lesson culturally sustaining, students were constantly asked
throughout the lesson to connect what they learned to the environment around them
and across the world. For example, students were asked to connect the different types
of consumers that they find around Virginia Beach and the rest of the Hampton Roads
area to the ecosystems that they are in, then they would compare those consumers and
ecosystems to other consumers and ecosystems around the world.
Data
*To access the full data sheet, please click here.*
Both the pre and post-assessments were the same in order to more accurately measure
the progress of the students’ learning. The graphic below shows their scores for the pre-
assessment, some of the different activities that they did in-between, and the post-
assessment at the end.

To preface the following statements, the highest score that any student can receive on
both assessments is a 13/13. As seen in the data table above, students greatly improved
their scores from the pre-assessment to the post-assessment. In the image below, the
top row of numbers show the amount of points students can earn and the bottom row
shows the average the class reached. Rounding up the numbers, the students' averages
jumped by 6 points when comparing both of the assessments, roughly about a 45% to an
82% in their scores.

The food chain strip, the anchors, and the sort assignments were all checked for
correctness and completion, with verbal communication and reflection given to the
students so that they can make corrections, clear any misconceptions, and for the
teacher to determine what skills and concepts need to be revisited.