Science Lesson Plan: Symbiosis Alyson Bass:
*Modified by Kandy Powers
Lesson Title / Symbiosis
Subject/course/grade level / Life Science
5th grade
Introduction / Why is it essential to ensure the life of all living things?
Lesson Length / 60 minutes
Materials / Science text (internet article), Anticipation Guide, Student Learning Logs, PowerPoint, Activity Worksheet, Activity Station Cards
Lesson Overview / 1. Tap prior knowledge, evoke questions, spark interest
2. Read for depth of understanding in the text.
3. Science text: scaffold information in 2-page article
4. Self-evaluation and further questions
Tennessee Standards Grade 5: Life Science / GLE 0507.2.1 Investigate different nutritional relationships among organisms within an ecosystem
GLE 0507.2.1 Evaluate producer/consumer, predator/prey, and parasite/host relationships
Language Arts sample Standards / 1. Extend science reading vocabulary.
2. Use comprehension strategies to enhance understanding, to make predictions, and to respond to text.
3. Improve comprehension by interpreting, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating written text.
4. Use cognitive strategies to evaluate text critically.
5. Develop skills in making inferences and recognizing unstated assumptions.
6. Interpret ideas, recognize logical relationships, and make judgments based on sufficient evidence.
7. Interact with text to form a personal interpretation.
8. Write to acquire knowledge, clarify thinking, synthesize information, improve study skills, gain confidence, and enhance lifelong communication.
Lesson Objectives / 1. Explain symbiosis among all living things.
2. Identify three types of symbiosis: commensalism, parasitism,
mutualism
Engagement / *Show pictures that illustrate three types of symbiosis: parasitism, commensalism, and mutualism (Use pictures from Symbiosis Activity Station on the projector, so they can see them in color, before they actually do the station activity. Have students predict the relationship. Record in Science Journal)
Quickwrite (Students write how familiar living things benefit or harm each other.)
Exploration / Anticipation Guide (Students respond true or false to five-six statements about the reading they will do.) They give rationale for their answers and prepare to read the text. Ask for volunteers to share answers and rationale.
Symbiosis Station Activity: Place students in groups, then allow each group to rotate through the stations.
Explanation / ReQuest (Use symbiosis article…supplement with science textbook, if you wish.) (Beginning with teacher, alternate asking questions about the reading, a paragraph at a time)
Next, watch:
*Brain Pop Video: Symbiosis
http://www.brainpop.com/search/search.weml?keyword=symbiosis
Elaboration / Vocabulary Self-Selection (Small groups of students return to the text and decide on 3-4 words they think are the most important for understanding the text. Each group gives the class a rationale for their choices. As a whole, the class selects a total of 6-7 vocabulary words to study.)
Evaluation / Science Notebook: (Students record their knowledge gain and further questions about Symbiosis.)
Homework: Activity Worksheet
SYMBIOSIS
different species. Two differentorganismslive together inclose association. Just living
in the same place is not enough.
By close association biologists mean that if they are separated, one (or both) of these
organisms will probablydie.
There are 3 types of symbiosis, Mutualism, Parisitism, and Commensalism.
+ denotes benefit to the species
0 denotes no positive or negative effect
- denotes an undesirable effect of the interaction.
/ Mutualism
+ +
Mutualismis any relationship between
individuals of differentspecieswhere
both individuals derive a benefit. Generally,
only lifelong interactions involving close
physical andbiochemicalcontact can
properly be considered symbiotic.
In this picture, ants are living in a young
acacia plant.
+
The ants have a home inside the hollow
stem of the acacia. They also get sugar
from the plant. The acacia produces small
spots of sugar at the base of each leaf.
+
The plant also needs to benefit, and if you
Try to munch on the acacia’s leaves, you
will know why! The ants attack anything
foolish enough to try to damage the
acacia’s leaves.
Parasitism
+ -
Aparasiticrelationship is one in which one member
of the association benefits while the other is harmed.
+
This strangler fig growing on another tree is an
example of parasitism. The fig is getting support so it can grow quickly and get more sunlight.
-
Although the fig doesn't really strangle the tree, it does make it harder for the tree to get water and
nutrients from the soil and also blocks some of the
sunlight from reaching the tree's leaves. /
/ Commensalism
+ o
Commensalism describes a relationship between two living organisms where one benefits and the other is not significantly harmed or helped.
+
Orchids are epiphytes (plants that grow on other plants). They grow high in the canopy of rainforests on the branches of trees. The orchids benefit in several ways. The main benefit is probably that they can get more sunlight. In addition, they may be more easily visited by the moths which pollinate them. Also, because they are up high, the wind can more easily catch and spread their tiny seeds.
o
Orchids do not harm the trees in which they grow. Their roots stay on the bark of the tree; they do not take water or nutrients from the tree.
QUICKWRITE
This term also may be referred to as exploratory writing or freewriting.
A quickwrite is a pre-reading strategy, the purpose of which is to activate students’ prior knowledge in a risk-free manner. Given a topic, each student writes freely and quickly about the topic. It is a form of freewriting, brainstorming on paper, or free-thinking. Students are encouraged to write anything that comes to mind without concern of punctuation, spelling, or other English language conventions. The results may be kept private or used to integrate with the ideas of others in small or large groups,
Quickwrites prepare students for reading or participating in a lesson discussion. Using the students’ responses, there is purpose set for the reading or discussion.
ANTICIPATION GUIDE
An anticipation guide consists of a list of statements that are related to the topic of the text your students will be reading. While some of the statements may be clearly true or false, a good anticipation guide includes statements that provoke disagreement and challenge students’ beliefs about the topic. Before reading the text, students indicate for each statement whether they agree or disagree with it.
Anticipation guides serve two primary purposes:
- Elicit students’ prior knowledge of the topic of the text.
- Set a purpose for reading. (Students read to gather evidence that will either confirm their initial beliefs or cause them to rethink those beliefs.)
Procedure:
1. Choose a text. (This strategy works well with most expository texts. It works particularly well with texts that present ideas that are somewhat controversial to the readers.)
2. Write several statements that focus on the topic of the text. Next to each statement, provide a place for students to indicate whether they agree or disagree with the statements. Following are tips for writing statements:
- Write statements that focus on the information in the text that you want your students to think about.
- Write statements that students can react to without having read the text.
- Write statements for which information can be identified in the text that supports and/or opposes each statement.
- Write statements that challenge students’ beliefs
- Write statements that are general rather than specific
- Have students complete the anticipation guide before reading. The guide can be completed by students individually, or in small groups. Remind students that they should be prepared to discuss their reactions to the statements on the anticipation guide after they have completed it.
- Have a class discussion before reading. Encourage students who have differing viewpoints to debate and defend their positions.
- Have students read the text. Encourage students to write down ideas from the text that either support their initial reaction to each statement, or cause them to rethink those reactions.
- Have a class discussion after reading. Ask students if any of them changed their minds about their positions on each statement. Ask them to explain why. Encourage them to use information from the text to support their positions.
SYMBIOSIS
Anticipation Guide
Directions:
· Before we read this passage, put a check next to those statements that you agree with in the BEFORE column.
· Discuss your opinions with a partner’s opinions and state your reasons for checking or not checking each statement. You may write notes to record your thoughts.
· After reading about Symbiosis, please go back and check those statements you now agree with under the AFTER column.
BEFORE AFTER
______Symbiosis indicates a necessary close relationship between two organisms of the same species.
______By definition, parasitic relationships are always harmful.
______Commensalism means two organisms live together, but neither is actually affected by the other.
______When two organisms live in a relationship called mutualism, it is a lifetime situation.
______In symbiosis, there are some situations in which one organism is not affected by the other one at all.
RECIPROCAL QUESTIONING (ReQUEST)
Recently some middle school and high school students have re-named this strategy:
Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? or
Stump the Teacher!
ReQuest is an abbreviation of reciprocal questioning. This helps students
- Formulate their own questions about the text they are reading
- Develop an active inquiring attitude toward reading
- Acquire purposes for their reading, and
- Develop independent comprehension abilities.
This requires that students and teacher silently read portions of text and take turns asking and answering questions concerning that material. It is this reciprocal nature of questioning sequence that differentiates ReQuest from teacher-directed questioning strategies and provides the format for students’ active involvement.
1. Both the teacher and the students read the first paragraph.
2. Students turn over their texts.
3. The teacher asks them a question about the text, and they respond.
4. All read the second paragraph.
5. The teacher turns over his/her text.
6. The students ask the teacher question(s), and the teacher responds.
7. Students are much more engaged in the reading because 1) they are being asked questions about the text, one paragraph at a time, and 2) they are eager to read deeply in order to ask a question that will stump the teacher.
In preparing, be sure that the difficulty level of the text is suitable for the students and decide how much material will be read at one time (one sentence, paragraph, page, etc.). The ability and maturity levels of the students dictate the amount of text to be read. Finally, identify appropriate points in the text where predictions will be elicited.
Vocabulary Self-Selection (VSS)
1. Student teams identify a word they think is most important for learning content information. They give the rest of the class their reasons for selecting the word.
2. The teacher writes the words on the board as teams give definitions according to the context in textbook.
3. Class members add any information they can to each definition.
4. Teacher and students consult external references, e.g., glossary, index, and dictionary, for definitions that are incomplete or unclear.
5. Students and teacher discuss, vote on the words, and then narrow the list to a predetermined number of words for a final class list.
6. Students record the class list with agreed-upon definitions in individual notebooks, vocabulary journals, or on note cards.
NOTE: This strategy should first be introduced as a Post-Reading Activity.
Vocabulary Self-Selection is taken from the following source:
Readance, J.E., & Bean, T.W., & Baldwin, R.S. (2004). Content area literacy: An integrated approach (8th ed., pp. 158-160). Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt.
LEARNING LOGS or LEARNING JOURNALS
C:\My Documents\A-Learning\LEARNING LOG or LEARNING JOURNALS.rtf
Fundamentally, a learning log is a record or journal of one’s own learning and is not necessarily a formal academic piece of work. It is a personal learning record. As such, it is a document which is unique to an individual and cannot be right or wrong as far as responses are concerned. It can be used as an individual reflection and assessment of a student’s progress—what has been learned, what misconceptions have arisen, what additional information should be learned. A Learning Log helps to record, structure, think about, reflect upon, plan, develop, and have evidence of one’s own learning.
Possible Questions and Reactions
What new information have I learned?
How does this information connect to something I already know?
What questions do I have?
Words that are interesting to me.
What did I do?
How do I think/feel about this?
What did I think about but not say (or what did I want to say but did not)?
How well (or badly) did it go?
What will I do differently next time?
How will I do it differently next time?
What have I achieved?
New things I have learned about myself.
How have I put any theory into practice?
How does what I have been doing lead to me becoming better at a skill
How can I use this to plan for the future?
How can I use this to plan new learning experiences?