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Arts Integrated Lesson Plan: Singing in the Rain

Objective(S): The students will use their Actors Toolbox to physically and vocally demonstrate how the water cycle
functions.
TEKS: 2nd Grade: Science-112.13.b.8.C - explore the processes in the water cycle, including evaporation, condensation,
and precipitation, as connected to weather conditions
STAAR: 4th Grade: Science-4.8B - describe and illustrate the continuous movement of water above and on the surface of
Earth through the water cycle and explain the role of the Sun as a major source of energy in this process
Materials needed:
None
Engagement/Hook: Singin In the Rain
Have the students stand in a circle
Tell them to repeat after you, and line by line sing:
Singin in the rain
-They will repeat
Im singin in the rain
-Repeat
What a glorious feelin, Im-
-Repeat
Then do a silly sound and gesture (like WOOOOO! while making your arms roll up and then back down)
Next try singing it all together, so the students get a feel for the song
Continue singing this section of the song, each time adding in a silly element:
-Say thumbs up and proceed to sing with everyones thumbs sticking up, out in front of them
Autumn Simpson September 4, 2013
Lesson Title: Singing in the Rain Content Areas: Theatre & Science
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-Then add elbows in, so that the thumbs are still out, but the elbows are also tucked into the body
-Next add knees bent
-Then tongue out
-Then spin around so that everyone slowly turns around in their place in the cirlce
Still in the circle, ask the students where they think rain comes from (answers may include the sky or the clouds)
Activity Instructions:
Actors Toolbox:
Have all of the students sitting, facing one side of the room, like they are an audience
Bring up a student and ask them to pretend to be a character
(Using animals usually works well, because it is easily recognizable and it is in their comfort zone)
-Examples: lion, dog, cat, bird, horse, snake, etc.
For older groups, it may be beneficial to whisper the character to the student and have the rest guess what it is
-With younger students may need to say the character out loud to the whole class
Bring up one or two more students and have them do the same thing, with different characters
Ask the students how they could tell that student-x was the character that they were
(Students should identify things involving what sounds they made or how they moved their bodies)
Use their responses to guide them to the three tools of the Actors Toolbox:
-Voice
-Body
-Imagination (Students will often be thinking more about what they see and hear, so this response may
have to be prompted more by the instructor)
Suggest new characters, and ask the students how they could use one (or multiple) of these tools to help them show
this character
Water Cycle:
Keep the class sitting, facing the same direction, with the area in front of them to be used as performing space
Read the attached story of The Water Cycle, and at each * have a student (or multiple students, depending on class
size) step into the performing area, and become whatever underlined character was just mentioned
Autumn Simpson September 4, 2013
Lesson Title: Singing in the Rain Content Areas: Theatre & Science
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Really encourage students to use all three aspects of their Actors Toolbox to show their character
(Even a Sun can make sounds, like the ahhh! we think of when we see rays of light shining through the
clouds, or a hissing ssssss like food sizzling in a hot pan --- Whatever sound the student chooses is fine, as
long as it lets them come alive as their character)
After each new character is added, read back through the whole story up to that spot, and when you get to each
characters name in the story, point to them have have them come alive in their character, making big sounds and
movements while you are pointing to them
Special note: Clouds and condensation can be the same character, the cloud is just a character to get the idea of
condensation in their minds. The same goes for precipitation and the rain and snow.
Read the completed story with all characters in place once, and then have the students sit in a circle
Ask them what happened with the evaporation, then the condensation, and then precipitation
Vestures: VESTURES = Vocabulary gEstures.
(They are body shapes and/or movements that help students remember vocabulary words in a way that makes sense to
them, and are not just words on paper)
Have the students stand up in their circle
Ask them to all try to come up with one movement (with sound) that makes them think of evaporation
Then work as a group to agree on one that everyone can do
Repeat this process with condensation and then precipitation
Be sure they know these Vestures, as they will be used in the assessment game
Assessment/Questions:
Quizzle:
Have the students walk freely around the room (at a slow enough pace so that they do not run into each other)
Whenever you call out a command, the students will stop and do that command
-Stop: students stop walking and stand still
-Go: students resume walking
-Clap: students clap once
-Hop: students hop once in place
Autumn Simpson September 4, 2013
Lesson Title: Singing in the Rain Content Areas: Theatre & Science
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-Twinkle: students hold their hands above them, and quickly open and close their fists, like flashing lights
-Quizzle: students jump up and spin around in place, once
For older students, sets of commands (stop-go, clap-hop, twinkle-quizzle) can be switched, so that Stop means Go
and Go means Stop, etc.
Then add in the Vestures the students created
Make sure to call out the Vestures often enough to assess if the students remember which vocabulary word is which
You can also add in Water Cycle, and have the students do the evaporation, condensation, and precipitation
vestures all in a row, in that order
Citations:
Vasquez, Jo Anne, Cary Sneider, and Michael Comer.STEM Lesson Essentials: Integrating Science, Technology,
Engineering, and Mathematics. Portsmouth: Heinemann, 2013. Print.
Moomaw, Sally. Teaching STEM in the Early Years: Activities for Integrating Science, Technology, Engineering, and
Mathematics. St. Paul: Redleaf Press, 2013. Print.
Sutton, Mary. Personal Interview. 14 Jun 2013.
Autumn Simpson September 4, 2013
Lesson Title: Singing in the Rain Content Areas: Theatre & Science
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The Water Cycle
There were once a group of water droplets floating down a river. * Slowly, the sun began to rise in the sky, and as it did,
the earth and the river became very hot. * Because the sun made it so hot, the water droplets started to feel very light, and
began to rise with evaporation. * However, way up high in the sky, it began to get colder, so the poor water droplets
huddled together to get warm, creating clouds with their condensation. * But, huddled together the droplets were not
so light, anymore. All of their weight together made them very heavy, so they began to fall back to the earth as
precipitation. Where it was hot, they fell down as rain, and where it was cold, they fell down as snow. * And the water
droplets were able to join the river, once again.
Autumn Simpson September 4, 2013
Lesson Title: Singing in the Rain Content Areas: Theatre & Science