Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Lesson Plan
A: Informational Components
Content Standard
Students will observe how density affects the ability of an object to sink or float.
Lesson Purpose: Students will be able to observe the world around them and make hypotheses.
Materials:
“Will It Float” by ….
Materials to put in water (ping pong balls, golf balls, rocks, nails, Styrofoam, paper,
utensils, unpeeled orange, peeled orange…)
Plastic tubs (two for each table)
Water source (to fill tubs)
Prediction Sheet
Pencil
B: Instructional Procedures
Engage and Launch (5 min): Gather students on the carpet because the supplies will already be
out on their desks. Introduce vocabulary words. Read the book “Will It Float” and stop to ask for
volunteers to guess if the object in the book will float or sink. Talk about each objects density
and why that affects the results. Introduce the activity. Model making a prediction, writing it
down, conducting the experiment, and writing the results. Review expectations for behavior.
Teacher Role: Pose problems, ask questions, model, assess prior knowledge, and provide
information for next phase.
Student Role: Has an interest, develops a need to know, calls up prior knowledge, and
identifies problem to solve.
Explore (20 min): Students will sit in their table groups and participate in an experiment to see
what objects, when placed in water, will sink and which ones will float. Each table will have a
tub of water and a variety of objects to place into the tubs. It is their job write down their
prediction on the organizer given to them before they place the object in the water. Once
everybody in the group has made a prediction, one student will gently place the object in the
water. Everyone will record the results on their individual paper. The same process will be
followed with each new object, making sure each student gets a fair amount of turns.
Teacher Role: Questions and probes, provides feedback, assesses processes and
understandings, walks around the room, and makes open suggestions.
Student Role: Explores resources and materials, plans, predicts, observes, and
participates.
Explain/Summarize (5 min): Call students to the carpet. Have table leaders or volunteers explain
what they observed during the experiment. Ask why this is important information to know.
Teacher Role: Ask for evidence and clarification from students, enhances or clarifies
students’ explanations, reviews vocabulary, evaluates students’ explanations, and ask questions
to produce critical thinking.
Elaborate/Extend (At home): Have students go home and find other objects that float or sink
with parental assistance. Have them come to class the next day and talk about their findings.
Teacher Role: Ask questions, evaluates explanations, provides feedback, and offers
solutions to posed questions.
Student Role: Communicates understandings using discussion and carries out new
project.
Teacher Role: Evaluate students’ process skills and understanding of concepts, formative
and summative.
Adaptations for Gifted/Talented: Students write down items that were in their tub that are
pollutants, ask to be table leaders, call on them to explain what they observed…
Adaptations for ELL: Put pictures on smartboard, enlarge pictures and text, place with students
who work well with them, give them the ability to work fully hands on, model each step, give
one-on-one directions with added detail, give more time to explain what they have learned…
Adaptations for Special Education: Put pictures on smartboard, enlarge text, group students who
need more assistance with peers who grasp the assignment, give more time, model each step…