Project description:
Unit Plan:
As we have learned over the last five weeks, using literature in the classroom is a powerful tool for helping to meet your students developmental needs. For your Final Project, you will build upon the lesson that you created in Week Two of this course and develop it into a week-long unit. Your unit will need to include the following components:
1.A paragraph introducing your theme or concept for the entire week.
2.A rationale for your unit that clearly describes the stage of development the students you will be teaching are in.
3.A paragraph describing the work of a theorist whose beliefs help to support the use of this unit within this stage of development.
4.Create five different lesson plans that relate to the chosen theme/concept of your unit. One of these lessons should come from the Story Element Lesson Plan you created in Week Two. Remember to use the lesson plan template for creating your lessons.
5.At least one of your lesson plans should use a media source such as an audio book, book on video, or an online story (www.storylineonline.net ,www.magickeys.com/books, https://pbskids.org/lions/stories, https://storyplace.org/storyplace.asp)
6.Explain how the objectives for your lessons measure concepts discussed in class (phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle, character, setting, plot, theme, etc.).
7.Identify and discuss a different genre of literature for each lesson plan (poetry, nursery rhymes, tactile books multicultural books, picture books, non-fiction books, series books, etc.). Feel free to use some of the literature you included in your weekly discussions if they are appropriate to your theme and stage of development.
8.Create a plan for how you will share the literature that you are using with your students families so they can help to support literacy acquisition. You could create a newsletter, plan a family literacy night, or even choose some ideas from the Parent Literacy Presentation you created in Week Three.
9.At least one scholarly source in addition to your textbook.
You will submit your unit as an eight- to ten-page word document, not including the title and reference page. Make sure you properly format your Final Project according the APA guidelines as outlined in the Ashford Writing Center.
My Class Text Book:
Children’s Literature and the Developing Reader – Karen Coats
My lesson Plan from Week 2:
Subject: Science: Understanding a World We Do Not See
Grade: 1st Grade
Topic: Microscopic Things
Book: Horton Hears A Who! /By Dr. Suess
Duration: 90 minutes
Goals/Objectives:
My goals are to introduce children to the unseen world of living organism and to understand they have too can thrive in different environments.
Standards Covered:
I expect kids to be aware of a microscopic world around us such as germs, plant cells, mold spores and pollen.
Materials:
I will need a microscope, pre-made microscope slides, science book, paper, pencils, crayons, and Horton Hears A Who! By Dr. Suess.
Introduction:
I will start by asking the children to look around them. What if told you there are living things all around us in the air, on your desk and even on your hands right now. Or that apple you had for lunch is made of millions of living organism. You cannot see them with your naked eye, but they exist. Who believes that to be true? And who believe if you cannot see it does not exist? I have a great book to read to you all with exact same questions. Let us see what Horton discovers and everyone he knows ask these question.
At this point I will read the book, Horton Hears A Who!
Story Map
The setting: This story takes place in jungle. An outside setting gives the feeling of open exploration of the world around them. Each child can explore the things around while playing outside with friends. The time is during the day, which is when most children play outside.
Characters:
Horton is the main character. He is trying to prove to everyone that things we do not see do exist. He is trying to save the town of people on the speck on the flower by relocating the flower to safe place. He strikes the curiosity of science and imagination in the children. He is kind, dependable, trustworthy, compassionate and forgiving.
Kangaroo is does not believe in anything you cannot see. She wants to destroy the speck. She does not want the children to use their imagination or to be taught new things.
The Mayor is the mayor of the town of Whoville on the speck. He too has the dilemma of proving to the town people there are bigger things in their world that exist by they cannot see them. He depends of Horton to save his world.
Vlad Vlad-i-koff is the eagle that Kangaroo hires to destroy the speck that Horton has.
The Wickersham gang tried to tie up Horton to take the speck away from him and destroy it.
Problem:
The conflict was proving that tiny people lived on the speck. Horton has to prove that no one ever knew or thought existed. The mayor had the same conflict on the speck. Everyone in the jungle turned against Horton because what he believed. And they tried to crush the ideology by destroying the speck. But Horton was committed to saving the speck and the only way to do this were for all of the little people to come together to be heard.
Plot/Event:
Horton hears the voice on the speck and speaks with The Mayor of the town on the speck and learns about a whole new world he never knew existed. Kangaroo want him to stop talking about a tiny world she cannot see. She feels if you cannot see it, it does not exist.
Kangaroo hire Vlad-i-koff to take the speck from Horton and destroy it. He fails. She now persuades the Wickersham gang and the town to tie up Horton and take speck away from him so they all can destroy it. But this is when Horton tells the Mayor the people of Whoville has to come together and sing as loud as they can so everyone can hear them.
Resolution:
When Kangaroo and the town people hear the little people of Whoville they do not destroy the speck and Horton is a hero. Kangaroo will now help Horton to save the people on the speck.
Lesson Development:
After the class and I have a discussion about the book, I will then talk about microscopic germs, plant cells, mold spores and pollen around us. I will explain a microscope enables us to see thing tiny things. The microscope magnifies things thousands of times larger so we can see them. I will discuss the basic use of the microscope. I will them split the children into groups. And assign each group to a microscope. The parent volunteers and I will assist each group with looking through the microscope at the different slides. I will explain each slide they are looking at. For instance how we breathe in pollen every day in the air but it is invisible to the eye. Or how the plant cell is the build block of life for that apple.
Practice/ Checking for Understanding:
I will have each group pick something to observe under the microscope. This will increase the interest because they will be creating their own slide to observe. My volunteers and I will do the actual slicing and putting the slide together. Each child in the group will draw a picture of the cells they observed on their group slide and write about what they saw.
Closing:
I will close by stating every living thing around us has tiny living cells. I will encourage the children take an interest the none-seen world around them at the playground, at home, at the park, the foods we eat, germs and our own bodies.
Personal Reflection:
The book I chose certainly stimulate a childs imagination. It encourages a the child to look at the world around in a completely new way. They cannot see microscopic things, so this will cause them to want explore the world around them under a microscope to see if things really exist. They do not have supersonic ears like Horton, but we have the scientific tools that enable us to see things. This opens awareness of world and universe from a science prospective.