TITLE OF UNIT: Plants and Habitats

YEAR LEVEL: One CLASS NAME: Gronholt/Lamberton DURATION: 3 Weeks KEY LEARNING AREAS: Science & SOSE
This unit of work is based on Studies of Society and Environment, Science and includes English and Literacy curriculum components and learning
outcomes. Through listening, discussing, observing, investigating, applying, analysing, evaluating and creating the children will explore a rainforest
habitat and their animals. Finally the students will apply their knowledge and understanding of how creatures adapt to survive in their unique
environments by creating a creature of their own that could survive the dark world of the deep sea.
LEARNER CONTEXT
Why the students need to know this.
During this unit the students will extend their understanding and knowledge of a rainforest habitat. By incorporating Blooms taxonomy into the
planning phase and teaching practices, students will have the opportunity to extend their learning from simple remembering and recalling
information and facts to embed more complex cognitive structures. This will include analysing, evaluating and creating that allows for critical
thinking and develops a deeper understanding. Students will have the opportunity to extend their knowledge and comprehension through
application of information and skills, analysis, evaluation and creation.
The literacy component will be scaffolded learning with a gradual release of responsibility. To begin there will be targeted questions to foster
thinking and discussion. Through guidance and modelling students will begin to explore factual descriptions and text as a class together. Students
are then to apply their knowledge as a class with guides, templates then finally create an independant factual description of their own.
LEARNING OUTCOMES - Through the integrated curriculum, students will further develop the following skills & understandings:
LMQ2- Where do my learners need/want to be?
Outcomes to be demonstrated from Australian Curriculum Year 1- Science

Science: (Australian Curriculum)

Biological Sciences Year 1
Living things live in different places where their needs are met

Human Endeavour Year 1
Nature and development of science
Science involves asking questions about, and describing changes in, objects and events
Use and influence of science
People use science in their daily lives, including when caring for their environment and living things
Science Enquiry Skills Year 1
Questioning and predicting
Respond to and pose questions, and make predictions about familiar objects and events
Processing and analysing data and information
Through discussion, compare observations with predictions
Outcomes to be demonstrated from NTCF - Studies of Society and Environment Band 1:
Env 1.1 Place, Landforms and Features
describe the relationship between people and natural/built environments

Env 1.3 Natural Systems
explain the ways elements of simple natural systems are connected and identify themselves as part of a natural system.
English : Australian Curriculum Year 1
*Literacy
The literacy component revolves around introducing factual descriptions. Students will compare similarities and difference in text types. Through,
modelling, scaffolding and gradual release of responsibility students will create their own factual description related to unit work.
Texts in context:
Respond to texts drawn from a range of cultures and experiences (ACELY1655)
Interpreting, analysing, evaluating.
Describe some differences between imaginative, informative and persuasive texts (ACELY1658)
Use comprehension strategies to build literal and inferred meaning about key events, ideas and information in texts that they listen to, view and
read by drawing on growing knowledge of context, text structures and language features (ACELY1660)

Creating texts
Create short imaginative and informative texts that show emerging use of appropriate text structure, sentence-level grammar, word choice,
spelling, punctuation and appropriate multimodal elements, for example illustrations and diagrams (ACELY1661)

GENERAL CAPABILITIES & CROSS-CURRICULUM PRIORITIES
Students will have opportunities to:
Compose texts through speaking, writing and creating
Use language to interact with others (Level 2)
use pair, group and class discussions as learning tools to explore learning area topics, to represent ideas and relationships, and to prepare for creating texts .

Comprehending texts through listening, reading and viewing
Listen and respond to learning area texts (Level 1)
listen and respond to brief questions and one and two step instructions, listen for information in simple spoken texts and respond to audio texts, including audio-visual texts, and texts read
aloud
*ICT capability
Students will have opportunities in:
Creating with ICT
experiment with ICT as a creative tool to generate simple solutions, modifications or data representations for particular audiences or purposes
*Critical and creative thinking
Students will be developing the skills of:
Inquiring identifying, exploring and organising information and ideas
Pose questions (Level 2)
pose questions to identify and clarify issues, and compare information in their world
Identify and clarify information and ideas (Level 2)
identify and explore information and ideas from source materials
Organise and process information (Level 1)
gather similar information or depictions from given sources

DIFFERENTIATION Students are provided the opportunity to engage in a variety of learning experiences appropriate to their learning
needs, ability and learning styles.
Children will be required to complete activities and set tasks to the best of their abilities with differing expectations for students with different
levels of ability. Confident students will expected to provide ideas and written work showing a higher degree of understanding and quantity than
their peers. Students with difficulties with learning will be supported through pairing with more able partners, scaffolds, templates, lower
expectations for quantity and quality of written work as well as scribing where required so that true understanding can be clearly documented.
Tasks are differentiated through: LMQ6- Who will do what?
Varying levels and complexities of set tasks
Different degrees of modelling, scaffolding given
Different degrees of independence expected
Additional visual and oral cues for some students
Peer Support
Early release to tasks
Extension tasks
The teaching model used: LMQ3- How do my learners best learn? LMQ6- Who will do what?
The teaching approach used throughout this unit is the revised Blooms Taxonomy. Incorporating Blooms taxonomy will ensure that learning objectives and skills
in the cognitive domain revolve around developing students knowledge, comprehension and critical thinking when investigating a Rainforest Habitat and its
associated flora and fauna.
The lesson sequence over the three weeks of this unit of work will provide opportunities for students to reach a higher order of thinking gaining a deeper
understanding of the learning objectives that will assist in long term retention of information.
Apply Blooms taxonomy when planning and implementing group teaching strategies, with sufficient time allocations, building on knowledge, comprehension,
application, analysis, creation and evaluation for all students to reach the desired level of mastery.
PRIOR KNOWLEDGE LMQ1- What does my learner already know?
Students would have already investigated:-
What do plants need and how they grow.
What is a habitat?
Investigate a marine habitat and their animals.
At the beginning of each focus within the unit the teacher will facilitate a class discussion on what the students already know about the subjects.
Ideas from these discussions will be used as a launching pad for learning and also determine any areas that may require more/less focus as a class
or with individuals.
SEQUENCED LEARNING ACTIVITIES- to achieve the above outcomes here is a suggested learning journey.
LMQ5- What will constitute the learning journey?
Focus: Rainforest Habitats and their Animals
Week 1
Read Jeannie Bakers book, Where the Forest Meets the Sea. Discuss that rainforests are a unique habitat that can be found in
warm, rainy places around the world. Observe and discuss the pictures in the book. What physical features/plants does a
rainforest have? What animals did the girl in the story see? Where they all in the same part of the rainforest? What physical
features/plants does a rainforest have? What do they think the last page means where she wonders if the rainforest will be
there when she gets back?
Create and construct a mind map showing all the different things we have learnt about the rainforest from discussions on the
book and students sharing prior knowledge.
In pairs, have students access and investigate a range of texts about the rainforests. Students are required to write down
animals, plants and interesting facts that they have discovered in the texts and share with the class things/animals/ features of
interest..
Read imaginary story then a simple factual description about same a Dragonfly. Create a class list on poster paper comparing the
differences in purpose and features between the two text types.
Review elements of a factual description. Read a simple book about Dragonflies. As a class create a factual description of a
rainforest animal as a class together.
Use the class description and create a big factual description book to share what we have learnt about animals too.

Week 2
Jointly investigate the Rainforest Layers and Animals Smartboard Powerpoint Presentention with hyperlink to related website
Use to explore the different layers of rainforests and the creatures that can be found in each.
Build on animals and their relationship with their particular part of the rainforest.
In silent reading members of class can read the Class Big Book to other classes sharing the text with others so they can learn
too.
Have students begin their own factual description with guides/ template (scaffolding knowledge structure of factual texts.)
In art, have students draw and colour wash a detailed picture of a rainforest including the different layers and natural features.
In following lesson, have students cut and paste on labels for the different parts of a rainforest onto their picture as well as
clipart of animals found in each layer. Have students draw a creature that can be found in each part on the diagram.
IT Task Complete Rainforest Layers.pub by moving labels of each rainforest layer to the correct place then inserting a picture
of an animal that can be found in each layer.
Week 3
Review the different creatures that can be found in a Rainforest habitat. Brainstorm a Food chain of a rainforest discovering
how the plant and animals in a habitat rely on each other for food they eat. Complete a rainforest food chain to show the
Blooms Taxonomy of
cognitive ability.


Remembering
Understanding




Applying , Analsying ,
Evaluating


Applying, Analysing,

Creating








Understanding, Applying,
Analysing, Evaluating


Assessment Task
Applying, evaluating,
Creating

Assessment Task


Understanding, applying,
connectivity between the plants and animals of this habitat rainforest creating a round cycle food chain for display
Further investigate how creatures adapt to survive in their unique habitats. Relate this to foreign habitat of the deep dark sea.
Have the student explore the dark world of the deep sea using the Deep Sea Creatures SMARTboard resource. Discuss what
creatures might need to live in where no plants grow and no light reaches from the surface. Brainstorm ideas to find out about
some the creatures in that environment. Students to design their own creature.
Art Students to create a display copy of their Deep sea creature.
Students to independently create a factual description of their deep sea creature.
Go on an excursion to The Botanical Gardens Rainforest Walk and Lake Alexanders Beach to view the habitats we have been
learning about up close. What physical features and animals can they see?
Students to compare and contrast two habitats. Students have to apply their knowledge, make evaluations to complete an
observation sheet of what they saw and how it all fits together.
Write a recount about our excursion to the rainforest and sea.
evaluating, creating
Assessment Task
Applying, evaluating,

Creating
Assessment Piece Applying
knowledge of adaptations to
meet needs

Applying, Analysing
Evaluating.
Understanding
RESOURCES LMQ4- What resources do I have at my disposal?

Various fiction and non-fiction books about Rainforests & The Sea
SMARTBoard file, Plants by K. Gronholt
SMARTBoard file, Deep Sea Creatures by K. Gronholt
Habitat Picture Cards
Rainforest Layer Labels - Created by K. Gronholt/R. Harrington
Environmental Action Worksheet - Created by K. Gronholt
Rainforest Layers IT Task Created by K. Gronholt
http://www.thinkingfountain.org/s/strata/strata.html
(Website for showing animals found in the different layers of rainforests.)
SMARTBoard file, Rainforest Layers and animals Created by S. Lamberton
Where the Rainforest Meets the Sea & Window by Jeannie Baker.
www.enchantedlearning.com/subjects/rainforest.map
Botanical Gardens Rainforest Walk
Fannie Bay Beach & Mangrove Boardwalk

ASSESSMENT
LMQ7- How will I check to see if my learner has succeeded?
LMQ8- How will I inform the learner of their process?

See assessment tasks noted in learning sequence.
Ongoing observations
Checklists
Class discussions
Ongoing feedback
POST UNIT REFLECTION:
Throughout the unit of work, I would reflect on the lesson and the students work and would make changes regarding the sequence or
lesson content for the following weeks lesson.
An example of this was when I evaluated the website the class was going to jointly view that did not correctly reflect the lesson content
that I wanted to achieve. The website had slightly different terminology to what had been taught. I did not want to confuse the
students, so in conference and help from my mentor, I created a Powerpoint Presentation that suited the lesson content. The Powerpoint
was also linked to another useful website that assisted in making an important visual connection referring to the Layers and the Wildlife
of a Rainforest.
I also made changes to the lesson in week 3 when considering how to have the students apply, evaluate and create the connectivity
between the plants and animals of the rainforest. I thought the outcome for the lesson would be best achieved having the students create
one of the food chains within a Rainforest.

Literacy Component: Factual Description

Language Conventions
Writing Moderation Task
Name:
Grade: Year 1
Date: Text Type:
Text Level:
Cohesion
Text follows a logical sequence
* Text shows consistent genre structure throughout
Title
What does it look like?
Where does it live?
What is its special features to help it survive
and explains why.


Sentence Level:
Sentence Structure
Writes in simple sentences that make sense
* Some use of connecting words

Punctuation
Sentences show some emerging use of capital
letters and full stops
* Attempts punctuation of proper nouns / other less
common punctuation














A B C D E
Outstanding High Sound Limited Very Limited
The student has extensive
knowledge of a Rainforest
Habitat and the animals. The
student independently
demonstrates precision in
detail about the habitat, flora
and fauna and the
connectivity of the features
and wildlife.
The student demonstrates a
thorough understanding of a
rainforest habitat and the
connectivity of its features
and wildlife, The student
consistently demonstrates
accuracy with detail.
The student demonstrates an
accurate knowledge of the
Rainforest habitat and can
identify relative fauna and
flora of that habitat. The
student consistently
demonstrates accuracy.
The student has an
incomplete knowledge of a
rainforest habitat and shows
inaccuracy and lack of detail
in required task. Student
requires constant assistance
to complete task.
The student has
misconceptions in the
features of a Rainforest and
is unable to identify the
fauna and flora of a
Rainforest habitat. The
student is unable to complete
task independently.




Word Level
Spelling Feature
Spelling attempts includes all main sounds in a word
and shows use of regular spelling patterns e.g. ch, oo
* Some correctly spelt high frequency words.

Vocabulary
Uses some subject specific words
* Word choice supports the subject of the text

General Notes:
Unit Assessment
Name:



ASSESSMENT
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Rainforest Art
Including
labels for
different
layers and
related
animals
c c c c c c c c ab c c c ab c c c c c c c c c
IT Task
Rainforest
Layer and
related picture
c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c
Deep sea
Creature
applying
knowledge of
adaptions and
needs.
C C C C+ C C C C ab C+ C C C C C C C+ C+ C+ C+ C C
Independent
factual
description of
their Deep
Sea Creature
C+ C C C D C C+ C ab D+ C+ C C C C+ C C+ D+ C+ C+ C C




Overall Unit Assessment
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Science
Achievement
c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c
SOSE
Achievement
c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c
Literacy
Achievement
C+ C C C D C C+ C ab D+ C+ C C C C+ C C+ D+ C C+ C C