Safaa Ismail
Jenise Banks
Miranda Ross
Table 2. One Example of Culturally-Responsive Science Activity
| Grade 4 | |
| Topic Question How do plants and animals reproduce? And how does their hereditary information transfer? | |
| TEKS 4.10.B The student can acknowledge that some traits such as eye color, hair color, and skin color are inherited through genes. 4.10.C The student can explore, compare, and illustrate life cycles. | |
| Objectives 1. Students will be able to identify the process of plant and animal reproduction. 2. Students will be able to create Punnett Squares and predict probabilities and outcomes of traits inherited through reproduction. | |
| Materials Orchids, Pictures of Brazilian animals, worksheets, scissors, YouTube, document camera, whiteboard and markers, Sticky notes, iPads | |
| Phases of the 5E model | Questions |
| Engage. Ask questions about objects, organisms, and event in the environment. | What kind of animals do you see around the area or in your environment? What kind of plants do you see around you? Students will answer these questions on a sticky note and pass them to the front of the class. Those who wish to share may also share to the whole class. Students can use the inaturalist app from http://sciencenetlinks.com/collections/science-apps/ to look at observations or even create their own. |
| Explore. Ask questions to gather evidence to answer the question posed. | What is different about this flower in comparison to the ones you usually see in your environment? What is the same between these two flowers? What is different between the two? What kind of traits do you notice about animals in your area? What kind of traits do you notice about animals in South America, Africa, etc? The teacher will ask the students the following questions. They can raises their hand to be called upon to share their answer aloud to the class. Students can use the app GeneIndexHD from https://www.teachthought.com/technology/40-ipad-apps-for-science-by-category/ to explore genes. This can be an extension or just an exploration to open their minds more. |
| Explain. Ask questions to use new knowledge and observable evidence to construct scientific explanations and answer initiating questions. | What do you think would happen if we mixed the traits of a white flower and a purple flower? What would happen if a green tree frog and a brown tree frog mixed their traits? Students answer the questions. After the questions are presented the teacher will explain what a Punnett square is and how it works. The teacher will show an example on the board for the class to see and work out together as a class to determine the outcomes of traits inherited through reproduction. |
| Elaborate. Ask questions to apply new understandings to new problems. | What causes the differences in outcomes when two flowers are mixed? Or these two Tree Frogs? Actual plastic flowers will be shown, and their mixed counterpart. Tree Frogs will be shown on the ppt. Multicultural Activity Addition The animals available in South America. What are differences of animals and plants in South America? Ex: tree frogs vs. tree frogs Lizards vs. lizards Orchids vs. orchids |
| Evaluate. Ask questions to assess developing understandings and inquiry skills. | What will happen if we mix this white and purple orchid together? And why? If the trait is dominant, what would most likely happen? After these questions are asked, students will have competitions filling out punnett squares on the board. This can be done with the whole class being divided into teams. One player from each team will go up to the board and play against the other players. The team with the most points at the end are the winners. Students will also be asked to create their own questions as an exit ticket to turn in on a sticky note at the end of class with their name, as a sort of assessment. |
Director: Miranda Ross
Material Manager: Safaa Ismail
Recorder: Jenise
Helper: All three of us were helpers if one of us was absent. Speaker: Miranda ( we all presented a part
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