Science Unit of Instruction

Each student will design a unit of instruction (of approximately ten lessons, five described in detail) based primarily upon the Massachusetts Frameworks of sciences or engineering, but may include learning of technical skills and other academic content.

The unit ( Due Week 7) will include:

• Unit summary and rationale

• Unit objectives for subject matter knowledge and skills

• Massachusetts Frameworks explored

• Unit Summary

• Materials, equipment, and educational technology required

• Daily plans for instruction demonstrating the use of various teaching methods (including technology)

• Formative and Unit assessments

• A bibliography, including textbooks, websites, simulations, software, and other resources

Additional Description

Teacher Candidates will develop a Science Education curriculum unit of instruction that forms part of a course. The total unit should comprise an outline at least 10 lesson plans( 5 in detail) and it must demonstrate a variety of pedagogical strategies. You will submit 1 lesson from your unit prior to Week 4 so that you can get feedback from the instructor before the final due date. Please specify the grade level that you are teaching, assume that you have a heterogeneous classroom of about 25 students, and assume that you have access to technology and photocopying. Make sure you specify the MA Science and Technology/Engineering Curriculum Frameworks /Core Content Standards to which you are teaching the unit.

Choose any topic that fits within these standards. You may organize your unit chronologically or thematically.

The Science Education Unit of Instruction plan should include the following (the following shall be considered grading rubric criteria):

A.Cover page: Write the name of the unit topic on the cover page, along with the student grade level(s) and your name/program name & level (i.e. John Doe/Secondary Biology/8-12).

B. Overview: Include a 2 page overview of your unit that provides a rationale for the unit (why did you choose this topic, why did you organize the lessons in this manner, what should students be able to know and understand with this material), the educational principles you used (how are methods used in class reflected in your unit plan), the essential question that frames your unit, and the MA Science and Technology/Engineering Curriculum Framework content standards to which your unit is tied. Finally, describe the way(s) in which you assembled the unit together within the unit topic area.

C. Blocking Plan: You will submit a Unit Plan Outline early in the course that we will call a “blocking plan”. The purpose of this plan is to help you conceptualize the order and organization of your lessons. The blocking plan should include the following:

• Title of the Unit.

• The MA Science and Technology/Engineering Curriculum Framework content standards addressed and unit objectives.

• A description of the essential question or main idea(s) the unit addresses.

• Developed objectives for the unit.

• A rationale for the unit.

• A day-by-day outline of your unit (10 lessons).

• A description of your formative assessments and end-of-unit summative assessment.

• A list of preliminary materials (bibliography)

D. Lessons: Include ten (10) lessons students(5 detailed) will take part in over the course of the unit--the 10th lesson should include some kind of culminating activity/assessment to the Unit, which could be a traditional exam, a student-made video, or other Presentation of Learning to the community.

Detailed lessons should include (1) an introductory lesson utilizing phenomena to spark student questioning (2) a skill-based lesson teaching a practical technical skill (3) a laboratory or design-challenge lesson and (4) an assessment assignment in which students create a media-based Presentation of Learning.

Each of these detailed lessons in the unit should be about 2-3 pages and should follow the guidelines in the AIC Lesson Plan template.

E. Make sure your lessons are clearly "tied together" - a unit should be cohesive and the connection between lessons should be evident. Begin each lesson with a review of previous content and ending each lesson with a review and tying new content to future lessons.

F. Include all sources/worksheets/hand-outs you would use in class. For example, if your procedure notes "hand- out the worksheet on climate zones," your unit plan must include that worksheet. If you plan to use PowerPoint, please include a copy of the PowerPoint presentation.

G. You will submit one blocking plan and one lesson plan prior to the 4th class for feedback and a grade. This will provide you with ongoing feedback on the shape of your unit plan - due week 8.

H. Bibliography: Include at the end of your unit that lists all the sources that you consulted in planning the unit and all sources that your students will use when you teach the unit. We will cover the concept of “quilting” and the necessity of citing curriculum you use within your unit.

I. Additional Unit Design Rubric criteria:

• Evidence that you have incorporated and applied different ideas/concepts discussed in the methods course.

• Evidence of high student involvement in each lesson and student engagement in appropriate inquiry-based activities for the discipline you are teaching

• Evidence that you use a wide variety of primary and secondary sources in your lessons appropriate to the discipline you are teaching and meaningful integration of technology.

• Clarity of thought and organization of unit plan, evidence that the unit "holds together" well under the overarching theme or essential question; that is, your lessons logically follow one another and develop rationally. I would suggest starting/ending each lesson with a review that helps you tie the lessons together and connects them clearly to your unit.

• Evidence of creativity and challenge in your lesson ideas

• Attention to proper punctuation, grammar, syntax, and spelling.

• Evidence that care and thought have gone into your work.

• The Science Education Unit of Instruction plan will be submitted electronically by the teacher candidate to their LiveText account as well as shared with the class via Google Drive.(Due class 7).

Google Drive/Google Classroom:

• As it is being created during this online course, the component documents will be posted to a course folder on Google Drive, where it will be shared with other members of the online course.

• Teacher candidates will also create a course folder on Google Classroom, where assignments to K12 students will be posted(utilizing documents from Google Drive), and student work collected.

Model lab report handout(NSTA):

http://static.nsta.org/connections/highschool/201201ModelLabReportHandout.pdf

Name:

Lab title:

Introduction:

In this section, you will outline the ideas you are going to explore through experimentation.

Do not use bullets; instead, discuss the concepts in question in a few paragraphs.

For your first lab report, I have provided some questions to guide you. Your first paragraph will answer the question: “What is a mealworm?” In your answer, tell me about the mealworm’s life and habits. From your readings, you know the characteristics of insects. Is a mealworm an insect? How do you know? Do some research and present facts about them. Use in-text citations for any information you get from another source.

Based on what you know about mealworms from your research, what sort of behavior would you expect them to exhibit? You can include some of your initial observations in your second paragraph. This is setting the stage for the research you conducted and why you selected the problem you did. For your last paragraph, write a hypothesis. You have already done this as part of the procedure. Now put your hypothesis in the correct form, which is the “If…then…” format. After you write the statement, explain why you think that will happen.

Materials and methods

For most labs, you will use the statement: “Refer to lab handout.” The exceptions to this statement are the times during which you write your own procedure. In those instances, you will write the steps that you followed in paragraph form, citing specific directions and materials within these paragraphs.

Data and analysis of results

All data charts go in this section, followed by the answered questions from the lab handout. Questions must be numbered and answered in complete, grammatically correct sentences. Any graphs should be drawn by hand and attached to this section.

Conclusion

This section is also in paragraph form. Here, you will discuss the entire experiment. Begin by summarizing the experiment and your results. Address your hypothesis, stating how the experiment proves or disproves your hypothesis. Weave your discussion around the scientific principles in question. As you discuss your results, cite potential sources of error and how that affected your experiment. Finally, propose other ways the data could be collected to avoid the sources of error you cited.