Clark University Master of Arts in Teaching Program Learning Activity Plan. Forces, Motion, and Simple Machines: LAP 5

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1 Forces, Motion, and Simple Machines: LAP 5 I. Content: Describe what it is you will teach. What is the content? Sarah McNamara April 8, 2014 Teaching and Learning Holly Dolan In this lesson, students will explore how inclined planes make work easier. They will see how increasing the distance that an object is moving results in a decrease in the amount of force required to move it. II. Learning Goal(s): Describe what specifically students will know and be able to do after the experience of this class. Students will understand that an inclined plane is a simple machine that makes work easier. Students will understand that increasing the distance that an object is moving over an inclined plane results in a decrease in the amount of force required to move it. Students will be able to hypothesize about an experiment using their understanding of inclined planes. III. Rationale: Explain how the content and learning goal(s) relate to your Curriculum Unit Plan learning goals. Students have a thorough understanding of the term work in a scientific sense. They also have seen that simple machines make work easier through making ice cream in a bag and exploring levers. This lesson will allow students to discover another simple machine, the inclined plane. They will be able to see how inclined planes can increase the distance that an object is being moved, which in turn results in a decrease in the amount of force. Seeing another example of a simple machine in action will strengthen their understanding of how simple machines make work easier, the essential question that is guiding this unit. IV. Assessment: Describe how you and your students will know they have reached your learning goals. I will assess students understanding in a variety of ways. To start, I will ask students to remind me what work is. Their responses will show me how much they remember about the concept. I will also ask one volunteer to come to the front of the room to show us an example of work. The other students will have to put a thumb up if the activity is work and a thumb down if it is not. This will give me a more thorough understanding of which students understand the term, and which may need more practice with it. During our inclined plane experiments, I

2 will ask students to hypothesize about the amount of force that will be needed to lift the box of textbooks during each stage of the experiment. Students hypotheses will show me whether they grasp the concept that the greater the distance that an object is moving over an inclined plane, the less force required to move it. Additionally, students will respond to the prompt, The Magnificent Movers moving crew needs your help. They have some heavy boxes that they need to move into their moving truck, but they re too heavy for them to lift. Using what you know about inclined planes, design a ramp that will help them move the boxes from the ground to the truck. Be sure to explain why this ramp will help them. Their responses will show me how well they are able to apply their knowledge of inclined planes to solve a real-world problem. V. Personalization and equity: Describe how you will provide for individual student strengths and needs. How will you and your lesson consider the needs of each student and scaffold learning? How specifically will ELL students and students with learning disabilities gain access and be supported? This lesson will support the needs of all types of students. By reviewing the term work at the beginning of the lesson, I will ensure that all students are beginning the lesson on the same page. I will build turn-and-talks into each discussion. This will allow students to formulate their ideas in a low-risk context before sharing out with the whole group. It will also give students who may not feel comfortable speaking up in whole group discussions that chance to voice their ideas. Additionally, there will be multiple avenues for students to access the material discussions, two demonstrations, a video, and a creative activity to support the varied learning styles in my classroom. VI. Activity description and agenda a. Describe the activities that will help your students understand the content of your class lesson by creating an agenda with time frames for your class. Be prepared to explain why you think each activity will help students on the path toward understanding. Time Student Activity Teacher Activity Materials 8:45-8:50 Participate in discussion about work. Review the term work. Ask a student to come to the front of the room to perform some kind of work. Ask the rest of the class to say whether he/she did work or not, and 8:50-8:55 Share prior knowledge of why. Remind students that simple

3 inclined planes. 8:55-9:10 Pay attention to demonstration. Share observations, hypotheses, and conclusions in discussions. machines make work easier. Explain that we will be exploring inclined planes. Ask students what they remember about them, and then define. Ask for a volunteer to pick up a heavy box of textbooks, and rate how hard the work is on a scale from one to ten. Have students hypothesize beforehand. Chart student s rating. Make inclined plane using shorter board. Explain that volunteer will move the box up the inclined plane to see how much force it requires. Ask students to hypothesize. Chart student s rating. Make a new inclined plane with the longer board. Have students talk about how it is different from first inclined plane, and then hypothesize about how much force it will take to move the box. Have volunteer move box, and then chart rating. Guide students toward the conclusion that the greater the distance Box filled with textbooks, two different length wooden boards, chart paper, markers

4 9:10-9:20 Pay attention to demonstration. Share observations, hypotheses, and conclusions in discussions. 9:20-9:25 Watch BrainPop video. the object is traveling, the less force required to move it. Explain that inclined planes can also be used to move fragile objects downward without breaking them. Introduce egg experiment. Ask students to hypothesize about what will happen when we drop an egg from the jelly bean table. Have a volunteer drop the egg into a foil pan. Create short inclined plane. Have students hypothesize about whether or not the egg will break, and then have a volunteer test it. Create longer inclined plane. Have students talk about how it is different from the first inclined plane, and then hypothesize about whether or not the egg will break. Guide students toward the conclusion that the greater the distance, the less force that the egg is hitting the floor with. Show BrainPop video about inclined planes. Pass out Two different length inclined planes, eggs, foil pans Elmo, ipad

5 9:25-9:40 Listen to teacher. Work independently on assignment. worksheets. Explain worksheets. Give students about fifteen minutes to work on them. Worksheets b. What particular challenges, in terms of student learning or implementing planned activity, do you anticipate and how will you address them? One thing that concerns me about this lesson is that the egg experiment may not turn out the way I m expecting. I tested the experiment a couple of times, and the egg broke during the first two scenarios, which is the outcome that I am hoping for. The egg stayed intact about half of the times I sent it down the longer inclined plane. I think that I will hard boil one of the eggs just in case it doesn t survive the trip down the longer inclined plane. VII. List the Massachusetts Learning Standards this lesson addresses. Technology/Engineering 2.1: Identify tools and simple machines used for a specific purpose, e.g., ramp, wheel, pulley, lever. VIII. Reflection a. In light of all areas of planning, but especially in terms of your stated purpose and learning goals, in what ways was the activity(ies) successful? How do you know? In what ways was it not successful? How might the activity be planned differently another time? Overall, this lesson went pretty well. We started by reviewing what the term work means. It turned out that this was very necessary because students had trouble recalling the definition. One student started our conversation by explaining that it means to move an object. I prompted students by asking, What do we use to move objects? It took students a few attempts before recalling that we use force to move objects. Something that I think my students did particularly well in this lesson was backing up their hypotheses with logical reasoning. Rather than just stating what they thought would happen, they explained why they predicted what they predicted. For example, when Christopher explained that it would be more difficult to lift the books over the inclined plane, he stated that the bowl that I had put them in would make the load heavier. His comment showed me that he had really thought through his idea. I was also quite satisfied with the way students engaged in thoughtful dialogue with one another. Accountable talk is something that Josh and I have been really pushing in the last few weeks, so they have had some practice with it. The way their comments built on one another s ideas showed me that they were

6 really listening to each other. For example, after Christopher had explained that he thought the books would be more difficult to lift using the inclined plane because of the extra weight of the bowl, two other students elaborated on this same idea. Although the bowl was not what I had expected them to focus on, they clearly were listening to their peers and reflecting on what they had said. I also found that the accountable talk was helpful in moving students toward the ability to explain what they had seen. They have had much practice with verbalizing their hypotheses and observations, but far less with explaining their conclusions. I think that this skill is particularly challenging for English Language Learners because it often requires a comfort with academic language. During this lesson, I found that a student s initial idea would act as the planting of a seed. Other students were able to take their idea and clarify it, as well as elaborate on it. One thing that I will need to work with students on is making sure to give everyone a chance to share. It can be hard to give up control of calling on students because I want to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to have their voice heard. It can be frustrating when a student who doesn t often speak up in discussions has their hand up, and a student calls on somebody else who is always an active participant. Josh and I have reminded students that this format requires them to act as teachers, and if they see someone who doesn t generally share with their hand up, they should call on them. I think that this is something that we will have to constantly reinforce. I also am considering a rule that disallows students from calling on people sitting right next to them (often their friends). Students did an excellent job with the assessment. They were required to respond in writing to the prompt, The Magnificent Movers moving crew needs your help. They have some heavy boxes that they need to move into their moving truck, but they re too heavy for them to lift. Using what you know about inclined planes, design a ramp that will help them move the boxes from the ground to the truck. Be sure to explain why this ramp will help them. Students were very focused while writing. Throughout this unit, I have been making a priority of giving students assessments that show them the real-world applications of the content that they are learning. I have found that they are far more motivated to put the time and energy into these worksheets, versus generic exit slips. These assessments have been particularly helpful for students who are often very resistant to writing, such as Nazen. For example, on this assignment, he wrote, You need a long ramp because the longer it is the less force you need and gravity doesn t pull it down (Work Sample 1). This made me so proud of Nazen for a couple of reasons. For him, this is a lot of writing. It required a lot of focus for him to accomplish this. Additionally, his reasoning draws upon what we had discovered during the experiment, and he even incorporates the scientific terms that we had talked about. b. What did you learn from the experience of this lesson that will inform your next LAP? This lesson has showed me how useful accountable talk is for science lessons, particularly in explaining the why s and how s about an occurrence. This

7 is definitely something that I plan on further pushing. I also would like to encourage students to incorporate the scientific terms that we have learned about (force, motion, work, gravity, friction, etc.) into their explanations. I will do this by complimenting students when they use these terms, as well as by rewording what they have said using these terms. Work Sample 1