Amy Lesperance - ELA Susan Clark - Science
Over the course of the 2019-2020 school year, students will explore how birds impact our local environment. Students will be using observation and inquiry. During this unit, we will support our students as they plan and carry out an investigation that is generated by a quality question of their choosing.
SL8.1 Pose specific questions by making comments that contribute to the discussion.
SL 9-10.1: Posing and responding to questions that relate the current discussion to broader themes or larger ideas.
SL 11-12.1: Posing and responding to questions that probe reasoning and evidence.
SL.11-12.1: Determine what additional information or research is required to deepen the investigation or complete the task.
The students buying into the idea that having bird feeders placed around our school campus will bring more and varied birds to our community. Our lessons assume that concepts and terms such as claim and reasoning have been mastered at grade level. It is also assumed that students are comfortable with the norms of discussion and writing open ended questions.
In the fall of the 2019-2020 school year, teachers will place and maintain one bird feeder in a favorable place on our campus. The placement of the feeder will have no educational significance yet. The unit will begin in the spring of 2020.
Outline
Anchor Experience: In small groups, students will observe the environment in one of eight different campus locations. Students will journal and use their journal writing to visually represent their observations. These visual representations will be shared using a gallery walk. Students will then list similarities and differences between the groups. A reflective piece will be an exit ticket with the sentence stem, "I wonder."
One observation location will be, by design, near the previously placed bird feeder, allowing more evidence of bird activity to be observed.
Exit tickets from observation day will be discussed. Student will be given the topic: How do birds impact our local environment? Student will practice the Question Formulation Technique (QFT) with the given topic. Students will take ownership of one of their prioritized questions. Using this question, students will make a claim about "How do birds impact our local environment?".
Inquiry has begun!
As a class students will reach a consensus to determine criteria for future observations ( # of birds seen at site, time of day, type of bird, feathers found ect). Small groups will use this criteria at their original observation site to begin data collection. There will be multiple visits.
Formative
Summative
Extension Ideas for the future