Teacher Guide: UDL Plants



Teacher Guide: UDL Plants

Plants 3-4

What do plants eat?

This unit explores plants and how they make food.

Traditional approach: Students read about plants in textbooks; they may grow plants from seeds and document their growth in journals.

UDL approach: Students explore plants in multiple ways: from a fictional story to data collection with probes, and from hands-on inquiry experiments to testing conditions of computer models. Students are provided with scaffolded assistance to questions and offered choices for demonstrating what they’ve learned through text or drawings. Coaches offer prompts, hints, and models to engage students in the science content.

Additional UDL features: Students can choose the language of the text and have it read aloud. They can also change the font size.

Learning goals

Identify the structures of a plant (stem, roots, leaves) and their functions.

• Leaves take in sunlight and carbon dioxide.

• Roots take in water

• Stems transport water to the leaves and food (sugars) from the leaves to other parts of the plant.

Understand that plants don't eat as animals do. They make their own food for growth by the process of photosynthesis.

Plants need sunlight, water and carbon dioxide to make food.

Be able to read bar graphs to compare the growth of plants over time.

Pre-test

Note: the unit begins with a short pre-test. Students must complete this pre-test and press the “Submit” button before proceeding to any activity.

Once the pre-test is submitted, students cannot go back to change their responses.

Activities

A plant story Story

In “Chen and Maria Plant a Radish” two young friends plant radish seeds and watch them grow. And with the help of Elvira and her special magnifying glass and remote control, the children have an opportunity to observe carefully as the plants grow again in slow motion.

Time: 20-30 minutes (or read in chapters as time allows)

Materials: Your students can read this story online by clicking arrows to navigate from one page to the next, or they can print a PDF version of the story to read offline (8 pages).

Notes:

Parts of a plant Movie & computer model

Why do plants look the way they do?

In this activity, you will identify the structures found in plants and figure out how those structures help plants make food.

Time: 20-30 minutes

Materials: Movie and computer model (Flash)

Notes:

Leaves, stems, roots Hands-on (no sensor)

Why do plants have stems, roots, and leaves?

In this activity, your job is to figure out why plants have leaves, stems, and roots.

Time: two 20-30 minute sessions

Materials:

• newspaper to cover tables

• house plants

• hand lens (Leaves and Roots experts only)

• scissors (Stem experts only)

• celery stalk (optional for Stem experts only)

• 300 ml clear plastic cup or beaker (10 oz) (Root experts only)

• 240 ml water (8 oz) (Root experts only)

Notes:

Water and sunlight Hands-on, light sensor optional

Can plants survive without water and sunlight?

In this activity, you will explore what happens to plants if they don't get water or sunlight.

Time: long-term observation (several weeks)

Materials:

For each team of 4:

• 4 small potted house plants (preferably vines such as ivy)

• light sensor (optional for Elaborate section)

• tape measure or meter stick

• 250 ml beaker or measuring cups

• permanent marker to label plants

• scissors to cut off vine stems

• access to water

• access to sunlight

• dark place without light

Notes: If it is not possible to obtain a potted plant for every student, regroup the class so that students from different teams can observe the same plant under a given condition (e.g. sunlight, no water).

The Food-o-Meter Computer model

What do plants need to stay alive?

In this activity, you will use a computer model of a growing plant, called the Plant Food-o-Meter. lt will show the effect of water, sunlight, and carbon dioxide on the health of the plant.

Time: 20-30 minutes

Materials: computer model

Notes:

Graph it growing Math

In this activity, students interpret bar graphs depicting plant growth to determine which growing conditions are best.

Time: 20-30 minutes

Materials: none

Notes:

Wrapping up

When students have completed the activities, they will need to enter a password to proceed to the post-test.

The password is: plants

Once students submit this password to take the post-test, they will not be able to return to previous activities.

Post-test

The post-test is a copy of the pre-test, a short set of questions to gauge student learning.

Plants 5-6

What do plants eat?

This unit explores how the leaves of a plant produce sugar for growth, flowers, fruits, and seeds.

Traditional approach: Students read about photosynthesis in textbooks.

UDL approach: Students explore the science of photosynthesis in multiple ways: from a fictional story to data collection with probes, and from hands-on inquiry experiments to testing conditions of computer models. Students are provided with scaffolded assistance to questions and offered choices for demonstrating what they’ve learned through text or drawings. Coaches offer prompts, hints, and models to engage students in the science content.

Additional UDL features: Students can choose the language of the text and have it read aloud. They can also change the font size.

Learning goals

Understand that plants don't eat as animals do. They make their own food for growth by the process of photosynthesis, which takes place in their leaves.

Plants need sunlight, water and carbon dioxide to make food. A lack of any of these will diminish the health and growth of a plant.

Photosynthesis is a complex process that takes place in chloroplasts inside the green leaves of plants. It includes the following parts:

• The energy of sunlight is absorbed in the leaves and changes the chloroplasts into an excited state. During this process the leaves take up water from the roots and release oxygen into the air.

• The excited chloroplasts use their energy to make sugar. During this process the leaves take up carbon dioxide from the air and more water from the roots. They also release water vapor into the air.

• During photosynthesis, plants use water, sunlight, and carbon dioxide.

• During photosynthesis, plants produce sugar, oxygen, and water vapor.

The sugar produced by photosynthesis is used throughout the plant as food for making more leaves, stems, bark, roots, seeds, flowers, and fruit.

The release of water into the air during photosynthesis is called transpiration.

All animals depend on the oxgyen produced by plants for their own respiration. The source of energy for all animals is the food produced by plants.

Pre-test

Note: the unit begins with a short pre-test. Students must complete this pre-test and press the “Submit” button before proceeding to any activity.

Once the pre-test is submitted, students cannot go back to change their responses.

Activities

A plant story Story

In “A plant story,” siblings Marc and Natasha travel inside a plant—with the help of special instruments from their mother’s friend Elvira—to watch photosynthesis taking place.

Time: 20-30 minutes (or read in chapters as time allows)

Materials: Your students can read this story online by clicking arrows to navigate from one page to the next, or they can print a PDF version of the story to read offline (14 pages).

Notes:

The plant game Hands-on, no sensor

How do plants make food to grow?

In this activity, students make a plan for the growth of a plant’s leaves, roots, and flowers during a single growing season.

Time: 30-40 minutes

Materials:

Each Team:

• 0.5 liter plastic water bottle

• 1 straw or wooden splint

• 1 teaspoon (5 ml)

• 1 tablespoon (15 ml)

• 1 small funnel

• 1 measuring cup (250 ml) with metric scale

• 1 small beaker to act as water reservoir

• Weather Report chart

• score card

Each Class:

• 30 small paper clips (roots)

• 1 set of about 40 sugar tokens (laminated if possible)

• 1 set of about 30 green leaf cards (laminated if possible)

• 1 set of about 20 flower cards (laminated if possible)

• scissors

• one-hole punch

• 1 calculator or piece of scrap paper

• 2 standard dice

Notes:

Photosynthesis: the big picture Computer model

How do leaves make food for plants?

In this activity, students study a model of photosynthesis in a chloroplast inside a leaf.

Time: 30-40 minutes

Materials: Computer model (NetLogo)

Notes:

Photosynthesis: a closer look Computer model

What happens inside a leaf?

In this activity, students study a model of a leaf showing how plants make food from water, carbon dioxide, and sunlight.

Time: 30-40 minutes

Materials: Computer model (NetLogo)

Notes:

Monitoring a living plant Humidity sensor

Do plants breathe?

In this activity, students investigate the importance of breathing for a living plant.

Time:

Materials:

• small handheld mirror

• humidity sensor with GoLink

• green construction paper

• scissors

• pencil

• small potted plant with broad leaves

• two 0.5 L resealable bags

Notes:

Rates of growth Math

How fast will a plant grow under different conditions?

Study actual data of the growth of plants for nine days under different conditions of light and water.

Time: 20-30 minutes

Materials: none

Notes:

Wrapping up

When students have completed the activities, they will need to enter a password to proceed to the post-test.

The password is: plants

Once students submit this password to take the post-test, they will not be able to return to previous activities.

Post-test

The post-test is a copy of the pre-test, a short set of questions to gauge student learning.

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