Date: Mar.

05/20
Title Lesson 4: Shoe Sorting Grade Level 6

Subject Science Time Frame 48 Minutes

8:13-9:02
Developed by Thyra Mathews

Stage 1: Desired Results

GLOs: ●
6–8 Apply observation and inference skills to recognize and interpret patterns
and to distinguish a specific pattern from a group of similar patterns.
● 6–9 Apply knowledge of the properties and interactions of materials to the
investigation and identification of a material sample.
SLOs: ● SLE 3: Recognize that evidence found at the scene of an activity may have
unique characteristics that allow an investigator to make inferences about the
participants and the nature of the activity, and give examples of how specific
evidence may be used.
● SLE 4: Investigate evidence and link it to a possible source, e.g., by:
○ classifying footprints, tire prints and soil samples from a variety of
locations
Learning Students will:
Objectives ● Categorize a sample set of shoes by physical characteristics.
● Create a dichotomous key to use when sorting shoes.

Stage 2: Assessment Evidence

Summative ● N/A Formative ● Shoe Sorting Worksheet
Assessment Assessment

Stage 3: Learning Experience

Prior to ● Observation and Resources to ● Shoe Sorting Worksheet
Lesson: Inference Bring/Tech: ● Labeled Shoes
● Shoe Prints
Time: Content/Description Notes
10 minutes Introduction
Attention Grabber: “Grade 6’s I have a mystery I need you to help me solve.”
● Last night, one of my roommates borrowed my jacket without asking.
○ Is this a crime? Maybe not? But I still want to find out who did
it.
● They will not get away with it because they left tracks going out the
door.
○ Being a good investigator, I documented the tracks so that I
could get you guys to help me find out who it was.
■ Put shoe prints up on the board.
● Early this morning, I grabbed all of the shoes from the front door. The
owner of one of these pairs of shoes is the jacket thief.
● I don’t know if any of you guys have roommates or siblings, but before
I accuse her I must be absolutely sure I have matched the right shoes
to the prints.
○ It is not good enough for me to just guess which pair of shoes
made the prints, I have to rule out all of the other shoes.
○ Will you guys help me?
30 minutes Body
Dichotomous Key Explanation: (5 min)
● Write Dichotomy on the board
○ Does anyone know what this means?
■ It is the division of something into two parts.
● If we were to divide the class into two how would we do it?
○ Boys/girls
○ People with glasses/people without
○ Black shirt/coloured shirt
● Example on the board
○ Criteria and names of students
○ Goal is to be able to trace it down
● So separating shoes by only looking at the print, what are some
factors we could use?
○ Tread/no tread
○ Round toe/pointed toe
○ heels/flats
○ Could we use boots/flats?
■ No because you cannot tell that from just the shoeprint

Activity: (25 min)

● Group 1 → Right Side
● Group 2 → Left Side
● In your groups, you guys have to come up with a dichotomous key
that leads you to the shoe print
● Number students 1&2
● Move the desks aside
● Hand out dichotomous keys
● Write on board
○ Record your dividing criteria and which shoes fall into that
category on the board.
○ Row A - Shoes - ABCDEFGH
● Students will create their keys
○ Put on a 20 minute timer

Extension:
● Finish bingo from yesterday
8 minutes Conclusion
● Have the students find a partner in the other group and switch
dichotomous keys
● They will then find the correct shoe using the other person’s key