Developed by CLACE- PI Marina La Grave, Dr. Barry Kluger-Bell and Kristine Johnson
UNIT:All
LESSON:Introduction
TITLE:Introduction to Nuestra Tierra Dinámica
Summary: / Children are introduced to the ideas of climate change and Earth systems. They learn that the planet’s primary components—its land, air, and water, and role of the Sun in providing us with energy and human use of energy—will be the focus of study in this program. Children connect with these topics by finding examples at school and at home. / Materials:Children will be introduced to their journals. Art materials, such as markers, colored pencils, crayons, scissors, glue, colored paper, old magazines (culturally relevant and/or related to the environment and/or science) should be available for personalizing the journal covers.
for scavenger hunt bingo
Item / Quantityper child
Scavenger hunt BINGO handout* / 1
*See last page of this lesson plan.
Take-home KIT per child:
Each child will receive:
1 halfsheet of paper with the following instructions:
- Wet your paintbrush (under a faucet or by dipping in a container of water).
- Use your paintbrush to paint different surfaces—a piece of paper, a piece of newspaper, the wall outside, the sidewalk.
- How do these surfaces look when you paint them with water?
- Watch your “paint” marks as they disappear. What happened? Can you relate it to what we did today?
- Please remember to bring in a show and tell object that makes you think about water or a drawing related to water for next week.
Include following words in discussion (in both English and Spanish), orally defined in understandable terms, and visibly displayed. If possible, project a large image of the words (and associated pictures) on the wall of the teaching area.
- Evaporation • Evaporación
- Climate • Clima
- Air • Aire
- Water • Agua
- Soil • Suelo
- Energy • Energia
NASA Source: / Adapted fromthe NASA “OUR MISSION TO PLANET EARTH: A Guide to Teaching Earth System Science”
Grade level: / K-5
Time: / Total time: 70 minutes
Snack & introduction: 20 minutes
Bingo: 20 minutes
Personalize journals:20 minutes
Summary and cleanup: 10 minutes
Children Learning Outcomes: / Children will learn that:
- Soil, air and water are primary components of the Earth system.
- The sun provides Earth with energy.
- People use many forms of energy.
- Observing examples of Earth’s components.
- Recording some of those observations.
- Relate overall science learning goals to the context of their schools, families, and community.
- Communicate ideas, collaborate with other children, and learn in a personally meaningful way.
Big Questions: / Which are thefour main spheres of the Earth System?
- Air—Atmosphere
- Water—Hydrosphere
- Soils—Pedosphere
- *Life—Biosphere
What is air?
What things make up the Earth?
Where does Earth’s energy come from?
What things do you need to live that your home (Planet Earth) gives you?
Lessonformat: / Hands-on activity and discussion.
National Standards Addressed: / This curriculum is closely related to the Earth System Science (ESS) strand from the Next Generation Science Standards:
ESS1.C.Some events on Earth occur very quickly; others can occur very slowly.
ESS2.A. Wind and water can change the shape of the land. Four major Earth systems interact. Rainfall helps to shape the land and affects the types of living things found in a region. Water, ice, wind, organisms, and gravity break rocks, soils, and sediments into smaller pieces and move them around.
ESS2.C.Water is found in many types of places and in different forms on Earth. Most of Earth’s water is in the ocean and much of the Earth’s fresh water is in glaciers or underground.
ESS2.D.Weather is the combination of sunlight, wind, snow or rain, and temperature in a particular region and time. People record weather patterns over time. Climate describes patterns of typical weather conditions over different scales and variations.
ESS2.E.Plants and animals can change their local environment. Living things can affect the physical characteristics of their environment.
ESS3.A.Living things need water, air, and resources from the land, and they live in places that have the things they need. Humans use natural resources for everything they do. Energy and fuels humans use are derived from natural sources and their use affects the environment. Some resources are renewable over time, others are not.
ESS3.C. Things people do can affect the environment but they can make choices to reduce their impacts. Societal activities have had major effects on the land, ocean, atmosphere, and even outer space. Children describe things society does to protect Earth’s resources and environments.
ESS3.D.Organisms will be affected in many different ways if Earth’s global mean temperature continues to rise.
DIRECTIONS:
Overview:This session involves four parts and one take-home activity:
1)Start with a discussion about where they think water goes when things dry out.
2)Children then investigate things that might affect the rate of evaporation.
3)Children share their results and the facilitator discusses evaporation and transpiration.
4)Instruction for Take-home Kit/activity.
Steps:
LESSON INTRODUCTION (20 minutes)
•Allow time for attendance.
•Introduce children to the program.
•Organize groups.
•During the snack, if provided, the team introduces all Facilitators and frames program for children.
•Tell children that over the year, they will be exploring ideas about all of the things that make up the Earth—the air, the water, the soil, and the energy that comes from the sun and that people use. Later today, they will hunt for examples of all of these things in the school and in their homes, observing and recording ways they use each of these elements in school and at home.
LESSON LEARNING TASKS (40 minutes)
Scavenger Hunt Bingo Activity (20 minutes)
Initiate scavenger hunt bingo activity and discussion to get children thinking about the “four spheres”.
Pass out the scavenger hunt bingo handout to each child and give them instructions on what they are to do:
- The goal of this game is to fill in every square with examples (drawings and/or words) of how we use each resource in the school.
- You will go around the school in pairs and draw or write the name of something that connects with the element (to the left)
Example: Water= Drinking Fountain - You have 10 minutes. Tell them how you will let them know when to return.
- Set limits as to where they can go.
- You will receive a sticker for each filled space.
Introduce Child Journals(20 minutes)
Give children time and materials to begin to personalize and decorate the cover of their journal.
LESSON Discussion and SUMMARY (10 minutes)
Review word wall words while discussing some examples of things that children identified as representing each element. Ask why they think their example fits with that element. Ask other children for agreement or disagreement.
With the energy element, get specific about what types of energy are being used (electricity vs. fossil fuels) and how that energy comes from the sun.
Discuss the importance of conserving these elements: using only what we need and not being wasteful.
Conduct an assessment and connect lesson to the big picture by having children draw a picture of earth and label the four spheres.
For advanced children extend this by introducing vocabulary words and labeling the atmosphere, hydrosphere, pedosphere and biosphere. Discuss connections between climate and these important components of our home, planet earth.
Remind children to complete this same exercise at home, this time playing “blackout bingo” by observing and recording examples of how they use each of the four spheres in their homes.
- Critical question: what elements do you use and where do they come from?
Clean up and put materials away.
From this lesson, children should have learned:
Earth’s primary components are land, air and water.
People use many forms of energy.
TAKE HOME
Children will take home a copy of the Scavenger Hunt Bingo to complete at home withfamily and/or friends. The Take Home will also remind them that they are invited to bring in a show and tell object or drawing related to today’s lesson the following week. As a reminder, include the Word Wall words of the week. Facilitator to find place for drawings to be displayed.
ASSESSMENT:
- Ongoing, through the discussion and activities: monitor children’s usage and understanding of words and ideas related to today’s lesson. Ask supporting questions to encourage children to make connections. Clarify misconceptions.
- Demonstrations of understanding: do any drawings, writing, theater, etc., display sophisticated, accurate understanding of today’s lesson? Were children able to make personal connections to the ideas? Were children able to make connections to prior lessons?
- Take-home work (assessed following week): did children follow through and discuss the lesson with their families, bring a related show and tell object, and/or make a drawing/other art project related to today’s lesson? Did discussion around these things show continuing understanding of the ideas, including making connections to prior lessons and to community?
- Do children’s understandings, as displayed by their demonstrations of understanding, questions, and discussion show connections between today’s topic, and the big picture of the unit topic?
- Photograph objects and save drawings brought in for sharing in individual child’s portfolio. Do the artifacts in the portfolio demonstrate an increasing trajectory of understanding about the elements of the Earth System over time? Do children show understanding of climate change? Do children show personal connections, including self, school, family, and community, to their understandings of climate change?
RELATED NASA ACTIVITIES AND RESOURCES:
The NASA Why Files: The Case of the Phenomenal Weather
A number of short, hands-on activities related to weather and climate. Topics include clouds, air pressure, water cycle and wind
S’COOL: Engaging students in authentic science
This flyer describes the S’COOL program, which engages students in gathering and reporting cloud observations for scientific research. The connected website contains many cloud and air related activities.
Our World: Going Green? What Does That Mean?
A link to a 5 minute video that talks about how "going green" is beneficial to Earth and helps children discover ways they can help keep the environment safe.
Too Many Blankets
Several activities on global warming and climate change.
The Impact of Climate Change on the Mountain Pine Beetle and Westerns Forests
Information and activity on the effect climate change and possible mitigations. For 5-8 grade.
To Seek or Not to Seek?
Introduction to the tools of scientific inquiry.
Is Air Something: Lesson 1 – Matter
A KWL about matter. (What do I know about, What do I want to know about, What did I learn about.)
Is Air Something: Lesson 2 – States of Matter
Students identify examples of each state of matter.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
“Scientists have high confidence that global temperatures will continue to rise for decades to come, largely due to greenhouse gasses produced by human activities. Global climate change has already had observable effects on the environment. Glaciers have shrunk, ice on rivers and lakes is breaking up earlier, plant and animal ranges have shifted and trees are flowering sooner.[1]”
In order to understand the evidence concerning climate change and causes and effects of climate change, children need to understand the Earth system and its components, its land, air, and water, and role of the Sun in providing us with energy and human use of energy.
Study of these components and how they interact will be the focus of the units that follow this introductory session.
CULTURAL BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
Air, Comets and NASA
The term comet comes from the Greek “komee”, that means hair. The origin of kites has several legends; one talks about a bamboo hat of a peasant that was carried by the wind, and the sail of a ship, or perhaps the work of an ancient philosopher who built a bird-shaped kite that flew for three entire days with the birds.
A kite is an aerodyne, a flying machine heavier than air and volume moved that are held in the air by the force of wind, or the forces of wind pressure on the kite. This force is called lift. The elevation is exerted in an upward direction so that it opposes the pull of gravity on the kite. Kites may be flat or three-dimensional structure, all are made of lightweight material like bamboo or tweak, lined with silk and/or light paper. They need to have a thread, cord or rope fastened to the end to give it balance. Nowadays, these lightweight materials can be easily found in most homes and/or recycle bins.
Communities around the world have also used kites for different purposes other than leisure. For instance, Chinese flew kites as a meditation exercise. Other countries used them for military purposes by tying a kite to a hook to show signs of battlefield or to measure a camp.
Kites scientific potential was discovered early in the eighteenth century by Isaac Newton when he made studies regarding geometrical aspects of the shapes of the kites. But on a stormy day in June 1752, Benjamin Franklin was performing electrical tests when he raised his famous "electric comet" with a key tied to the rope, he found that shock occurred, which allowed him to demonstrate the nature of lightning and subsequently invented the lightning rod.
Scientists William A. Eddy (1891) and Lawrence Hargrave (1894) also discovered kites’ scientific potential in the study of the atmosphere. They made a conventional kite with bar arched to form a dihedral angle, allowing it to fly without a tail; second was a three-dimensional structure consisting of two interconnected boxes with open ends.
In the first decade of the twentieth century, Alexander Graham Bell experimented with kites to develop a flying machine that could be manned. By mid-nineteenth century, the American engineer Francis Rogallo build a kite known as “semiflexible”, wherein acquiring its shape by the wind with six strings. NASA was interested in the idea of Rogallo, who intended to use as a parachute in the space capsule reentry.
In 1963, Domina C. Jalbert from the U.S. was inspired by the wing of his plane to design a kite Flexible (parafoil) that had all the advantages of aerodynamic principles of rigid wings, as the kite needed no rod, and got their shape and stiffness of flight through internal pouches swelled with the wind, which gave him a large wing shape stability and high lift.
Nowadays, kites are popular worldwide. Communities around the world celebrate kite festivals during windy months. During these colorful worldwide festivals, people of all ages get to demonstrate their skills when flying acrobatic kites of two, three or four threads.
Go make and fly your kite, and make sure to participate in your local kite festival while you enjoy playing with air!
LESSON CONNECTIONS
This lesson is tied to ideas in all units:
Air Unit- Children learn about air and the atmosphere.
Water Unit - Children learn about water and the hydrosphere.
Soils Unit - Children learn about soil and the pedosphere.
Energy Unit - Children learn about the sun as a source of energy.
1
Needs cultural connection
1
[1] Global Climate Change: Earth Science Communications Team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory/California Institute of Technology.