Authentic Lessons for 21st Century Learning

Lesson 5E Lesson
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Trees in the Wind

Growth and Development of Organisms

Heather Shaffery, Heather Shaffery, Chelsea Archie | Published: November 17th, 2022 by K20 Center

  • Grade Level Grade Level 6th, 7th, 8th
  • Subject Subject Science
  • Course Course Life Science
  • Time Frame Time Frame 3-4 class period(s)
  • Duration More 180 minutes

Summary

In this lesson about the growth and development of organisms, students will gather evidence from research about specific plant phenomena, then use research and in-class investigations to explain the relationship between environmental conditions and plant growth. Activities throughout the lesson will emphasize the use of evidence to support scientific explanations and make predictions. This lesson addresses Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) standard MS-LS1-4. (Funding provided by USDA Project No. 2012-02355 through the National Institute for Food and Agriculture's Agriculture and Food Research Initiative, Regional Approaches for Adaptation to and Mitigation of Climate Variability and Change.)

Essential Question(s)

How does the environment influence plant growth and development?

Snapshot

Engage

Students observe and generate questions about the cause(s) of unique plant growth phenomena in several environments.

Explore

Students choose a plant phenomenon to investigate, construct an initial explanation about how the environment causes the observed phenomenon, and then find evidence through research to support or refine their explanation.

Explain

Students share their phenomena with the class and construct explanations for how the local environment influenced the patterns they observed.

Extend

Students collect data from an indoor plant investigation to use as further evidence of the impact of environment on plant growth.

Evaluate

Students use their own data to support a revised explanation of the phenomena they investigated. Then they make predictions about the role of genetics in the phenomena they observed.

Materials

  • Lesson Slides (attached)

  • How I Know It handout (attached, one per student)

  • I Notice, I Wonder handout (attached, one half-sheet per student)

  • I Used to Think, But Now I Know handout (attached, one per student)

  • Phenomenon Explanation handout (attached, one per student)

  • Plant Growth Observations handout (attached, one half-sheet per student)

  • Explore Research Notes handout (attached, one per student)

  • Internet-connected devices

  • Plant phenomena media

  • Fast-growing plants

  • Materials for growing plants in various conditions

Engage

Use that attached Lesson Slides to guide the lesson, beginning with slide 4. Distribute a copy of the I Notice, I Wonder handout to each student. (This document contains two copies of the handout per printed page. You may wish to prepare the handouts ahead of time or have students cut them as they are distributed.) Introduce the I Notice, I Wonder instructional strategy to have students make observations and ask questions about pictures of trees growing sideways rather than straight up as expected. "I notice" statements should be qualitative observations, not inferences. Use the information on slide 5 and work with students to distinguish between the two. "I wonder" questions may or may not be testable or scientific, which is acceptable at this point. Use this opportunity to help students practice asking scientific questions.

Trees growing sideways in Redondo Beach, CA. Photo credit: Chelsea Archie
Image Source: Ben. (2011, February 20). Slope Point. Retrieved from https://www.flickr.com/photos/55198242@N03/5460426633

Go to slide 6. A whole-class list of observations and questions should be developed and shared publicly in the space provided on slide six, on a poster, a whiteboard, or another format that you prefer. There are many ways to start this dialogue, including:

  • Students write each of their "notices" and "wonders" on individual sticky notes. Each student then shares at least one idea out loud and adds their sticky note to the class list.

  • In small groups, students come to a consensus on one to three observations and questions they think are most important. Each group should share out while a scribe (you or a student) records the ideas.

  • Facilitate a whole-class discussion for students to share and respond to one another's ideas while a scribe (you or a student) records them on the whiteboard or in the space provided in the lesson slides.

Explore

Go to slide 7. Following the group brainstorming activity, students will research answers to the questions they developed and attempt to explain a phenomenon. To facilitate this, students should be grouped as small as possible with pairs being ideal (if technology is available). Pairs should select a plant phenomena from a short list. For example, plants that turn red in sunlight, Impatiens capensis (exploding "touch-me-not"), or Mimosa pudica sensitive plants.

Go to slide 8. Using these phenomena as their starting place, students should investigate the life history of their plant of choice (e.g., how they grow and reproduce, where they are found, etc.). Before beginning research, give students the Phenomenon Explanation handout (half-sheet), and have them write down their phenomenon of choice and an initial explanation for how the environment contributes to it. Next, pass out the Explore Research Notes handout, which contains questions and note-taking prompts to guide students in their research of the chosen phenomena. From here, students can expand their research to gather information that will help them construct a more accurate explanation later.

Explain

After students conduct their research, the class should engage in some independent/small-group and whole-group processing activities. Go to slide 9. An example "How I Know It" graphic organizer is shown to help students organize their ideas. The following numbered boxes detail these activities, beginning with the "How I Know It" strategy.

Go to slide 12. After the share-out, provide additional content details students might need that they did not discover on their own. These details will depend on the phenomena students are researching but should highlight the environmental factors involved. This is also the time to address students' misconceptions, either through direct instruction or guided questioning of the class. Revisit the class "wonders" from the Engage, and have the students answer any questions the class has uncovered in their research.

The suggested readings from Newslea (see bullet list below) emphasize general environmental impacts (e.g., climate, light, water) which students can use as additional data to support their explanations. Additionally, the reading level of each article can be adjusted to accommodate differences in students' English language and reading skills.

Extend

Go to slide 16. Provide students with an opportunity to develop investigations that explore the effects of environmental factors on actual plants. Student investigations should involve either growing their own plants or working with plants that are already established (e.g., from a nursery or garden center). Investigating with real plants for themselves provides all students with a shared concrete experience to which they can apply their understanding and collect further data. Depending on the class composition, resources available, and collection of environmental factors the students developed, the structure of these investigations will vary. Allow students to self-select their environmental factors for investigation and provide the scaffolding and boundaries appropriate for your classroom.

Some potential scaffolds and the considerations they address include:

  1. limiting the number of environmental factors available for investigation—resource limitations

  2. having each class period choose a different environmental factor and share plants for observations across all classes—class size, resource limitations

  3. having students work in pairs or in teams with assigned roles—class size, level of on-task behavior, resource availability

  4. developing a class consensus for investigation setup—level of on-task behavior, prior investigation experience

  5. sharing all plants for observations across all classes—class size

Go to slide 17. Students should record their plant growth observations on the Plant Growth Observations handout. After the investigations have concluded, students should revisit their ongoing "How I Know It" graphic organizers. This time, students will add final ideas from their own plant growing experiences. Go to slide 18. Before moving onto the Evaluate, give students time to reflect upon the content of their graphic organizers and ask any clarifying questions they still have. Student reflection should be on determining the most important ideas captured during the lesson that explain how the environment affects plant growth. These ideas will serve as the basis of their final explanations. This reflective time could be structured in many ways, including the following possibilities:

Go to slide 20. Depending on how much time is devoted to this activity or the need for an explicit summary activity, a strategy such as "I Used to Think ... But Now I Know" could be used at this point in the lesson. Adding it here would allow students to reflect explicitly on what they see as the most important ways their ideas have changed since the Engage. A handout for this activity can be found in the attachments.

Evaluate

Go to slide 21. Revisit class questions from the Engage "wonder" statements, and try to answer any that are still left.

Go to slide 22. Have students revisit their initial phenomenon explanations. On their Phenomenon Explanation handouts, they should revise their original explanations or write new explanations based on their understanding of how the environment affects plant growth. The revised or new explanations should include the evidence students selected from their "How I Know It" graphic organizers in addition to the scientific details.

Go to slide 23. If the class will be continuing into genetic impacts on plant growth and development at some point following this lesson, they should also take a moment to predict how genes might play a role in explaining these phenomena. If they have sufficient background knowledge to do so, this might be extended further to predict how genes and the environment might interact to produce the phenomena.

Resources

Publisher

K20 Center

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Downloads

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Standards

Next Generation Science Standards (Grades 6, 7, 8)
MS-LS1-4: Use argument based on empirical evidence and scientific reasoning to support an explanation for how characteristic animal behaviors and specialized plant structures affect the probability of successful reproduction of animals and plants respectively.
Oklahoma Academic Standards (8th Grade)
8.LS1.4 : Use arguments based on empirical evidence and scientific reasoning to support an explanation for how characteristic animal behaviors and specialized plant structures affect the probability of successful reproduction of animals and plants respectively.

Facilitator Resources

Click on a file type icon to download an attachment.

  • Lesson-Slides-Trees-in-the-Wind

Learner Handouts

Click on a file type icon to download an attachment.

  • Explore Research Notes—Trees in the Wind
  • How I Know It—Trees in the Wind
  • I Notice, I Wonder—Trees in the Wind
  • I Used to Think ... But Now I Know—Trees in the Wind
  • Phenomenon-Explanation-Trees-in-the-Wind
  • Plant-Growth-Observations-Trees-in-the-Wind

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