1

Title of
Reading
Enrichment
Unit
Curriculum
Area
Grade Level
Developed By
Time Frame
Content
Standards

With Ideas and Creativity, You Can Be

an Engineer!
English Language Arts and Technology
Kindergarten (ESOL)
Ms. Kimberly Ragghianti
One hour for each lesson over three days, three hours
total
ELAGSEKRL1: With prompting and support, ask and
answer questions about key details in a text.
ELAGSEKRL7: With prompting and support, describe the
relationship between illustrations and the story (how
illustrations support the text).
ELAGSEKSL1: Participate in collaborative conversations
with diverse partners about kindergarten topics and
texts with peers and adults in small and larger groups.
ELAGSEKRL10: Actively engage in group reading
activities with purpose and understanding.

Focus
Questions
Objectives

What is an engineer?
Why are the characters in the books engineers?
How do ideas and creativity help engineers?
How can we be engineers?
Students will be able to ask and answer questions about
key details in a book.
Students will be able to describe the relationship
between illustrations and the story.
Students will participate in collaborative conversations
with their classmates and teachers about the books and
maker space activities.

Resources
Needed

Students will engage in group reading

activities/connected maker space activities with
purpose.
Books: Rosie Revere Engineer by Andrea Beaty, The
Most Magnificent Thing by Ashley Spires, and Journey by
Aaron Becker
Maker Space Materials: Q-Ba-Maze 2.0, Keva

Day One
Lesson/Activiti
es

Contraptions Kit, Bee Bot Programmable Robot, Bee Bot

Mat
Other Materials: Student Bee Bot Mat Map papers (class
set), crayons or color pencils, iPads (class set), Bee Bot
App
This is a Reading Enrichment Unit which
incorporates literature and technology/maker
space materials.
The first day the media specialist (in this case the
media specialist in training) gathers the class
together to read aloud the childrens book Rosie
Revere Engineer.
It is about a little girl named Rosie who likes to
build things out of what others consider trash.
Someone laughs at one of her inventions. This
makes her nervous about sharing her ideas, but
her favorite aunt has a dream to fly. Rosie wants to
help her and engineers a new flying invention.
Throughout reading the story the teacher will
pause to ask/answer questions, discuss they story
with the students, and make connections.
The students that will complete this reading
enrichment unit are ESOL (English as a second
language) kindergarten students, so the media
specialist made key word vocabulary flash cards to
point out and explain key words. She will also be
making connections to experiences the students
can relate to based on age and background.
After reading and discussing the book the students
became engineers!
The media specialist breaks students up into small
groups to build a marble maze using maker space
materials. For this first lesson they will use the QBa-Maze 2.0 materials. The goal was for the
marble to hit at least five different cubes.
Hint: The floor is best for a flat, open building area.
One responsible student in each group should be
in charge of the tiny, metal marbles because those
things move fast!
Students are given time to work with the materials
and try new ways to accomplish their goal. Trial
and error is a good way for students to learn what
works and what doesnt.
The media specialist and teachers walk around to
the groups and help as needed. Encouraging

Day Two
Lesson/Activiti
es

Day Three
Lesson/Activiti

students to communicate positively with their

peers and try to focus on the goal while having
fun.
When the groups have completed their maze they
will share it with their classmates. Teachers can
take pictures or video throughout the process to
document and assess their work.
Students should clean up the Q-Ba-Maze 2.0
materials before leaving the media center.
The second day we read The Most Magnificent
Thing.
The book is about a girl who wants to build the
most magnificent thing and her dog. She has a
creative mind, yet her creations never seem quite
right. It is frustrating, but she does not give up.
After reading and discussing the story the students
break up into their small groups again and
expanded the idea of building/engineering using
the Keva Contraptions Kit.
With these maker space materials students could
create more complex and personalized designs
with thin wooden blocks to make towers, ramps,
tunnels, and blockages for a ping-pong ball to
travel through their creation from a starting point
to an end point.
The goal was for the students to work together
with their group to create a structure with a good
pathway for their ping-pong ball to travel from a
starting point to an end point.
Again the media specialist and teachers walk
around to the groups and help as needed.
Encouraging students to communicate positively
with their peers and try to focus on the goal while
having fun.
When the groups have completed their wooden
structure they will share it with their classmates.
Teachers can take pictures or video throughout the
process to document and assess their work.
Students should clean up the Keva Contraptions
Kit materials before leaving the media center.
The third day we read the picture book Journey. It
has beautiful illustrations, yet no words, so

4
es

Assessments

students had to use the pictures to understand the

story.
In this story a girl is ignored by her father, so she
takes a magical crayon and draws a doorway to
another world. In this world she goes on an epic
journey where her ideas and creativity help her.
The media specialist and students discuss the
story, connections, and the relationship between
illustrations and the story.
The media specialist will give an introduction
about Bee-Bot the Programmable Robot. It is a
small robot on wheels that has buttons you press
to program movements in a sequence. You can
place the Bee-Bot on a mat, program in a
sequence, press start, and it will move the
sequence you created. The media
specialist/teacher will program Bee-Bot to show
the students how and why it moves the way it
does.
Then the students will go to the library tables to
use a student Bee-Bot paper mat (copy attached)
and crayon of their choice to draw a world/map
they create/engineer (like the main character in
the story did) with elements to pass by, turn at, or
move around (such as a tree or river.)
Then the students will plan Bee-Bots route. They
will each get a turn to program Bee-Bot and see if
it follows their path.
Hint: Waiting for their turn can be difficult for
young children. If too many students finish at the
same time they can watch their peers program
Bee-Bot, make a more detailed map/route for BeeBot to follow, create a story to go along with their
map, or play the Bee-Bot app on a library iPad
while waiting for their turn with the Bee-Bot Robot.
Students should turn in their Bee-Bot Mat map
papers. Teachers can take pictures or video
throughout the process to document and assess
their work along with the Bee-Bot papers and class
discussion.
Pictures or video of the maker space projects
Class discussion and students sharing/answering
questions
Bee-Bot Mat map papers

Relevant
Resources

Q-Ba-Maze 2.0 = http://www.q-bamaze.com/products.php?p=bbx

Keva Contraptions Kit =
http://www.kevaplanks.com/keva-contraptions/
Bee Bot Programmable Robot = https://www.bee-bot.us
Bee Bot Programming Game App =
https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/bee-bot/id500131639?
mt=8

Name: ___________________________ Date:

_______
Student Bee-Bot Mat Map
Bee-Bot
Starts
Here