This teacher resource contains:

• lesson plan

• student materials

• assessment rubrics

By:  Nancy Zawisza

Time Required:  Five 60 minute classes

 Instructional Strategies:

• Possible sentences 
• Cooperative learning
• Brainstorming
• Inside/outside circle
• Internet Lessons and practices
• Presentations

 Procedure:

• Begin with an activity called Possible Sentences. This will motivate the students to choose a topic to survey that they’re interested in. The topics are: surveys/pictographs/bar graphs.

Possible Sentences

Purpose: To activate and evaluate student knowledge of a topic.

Description: Possible Sentences takes what students know of a topic and their familiarity with the English language sentence structure to activate prior knowledge of a topic.  After new information is introduced through the use of cognitive teaching strategies, possible sentences are re-evaluated for accuracy.

Procedure: 

1.     Generate a list of 10 words related to your lesson.  These words should
   represent concepts that are both familiar and unfamiliar to students.

2.     Have students create 5 possible sentences by using two words in each sentence until all
  words are gone.

3.     Teach your lesson on the topic.

4.     After the main instruction is over, have students go back and evaluate the accuracy of    t
  heir possible sentences by placing a + (for correct), - (for incorrect), or a ? (for cannot
  determine) beside each sentence.  

5.     For sentences marked incorrect, students should write a corrected sentence.  Sentences
  whose accuracy cannot be determined can be researched by utilizing outside resources.

Sample Words for a Possible Sentences Activity on graphing:

Using the Internet “Study Zone” site, http://www.studyzone.org/testprep/,  students will read, with a partner, the lesson on frequency tables and complete the practice that goes with it.  
Study Zone Lesson and Practice =  http://www.studyzone.org/testprep/math4/e/frequencytable3l.cfm

Then in cooperative groups brainstorm all the topics that they could graph. Have each group choose one topic.

Collect data using Inside Outside Circle.                  
Students from two circles and face each other. They ask each other the survey question and tally. 

Each group will make a frequency table about their topic from the data collected.. 

Then students, with a partner, will read the lesson and complete the practice on Study Zone about pictographs and bar graphs. http://www.studyzone.org/testprep/topic3.cfm?TopicID=427

From the data, each group will construct a pictograph and a bar graph.

When their graphs are complete, each student in each group will write one observation about their graphs. The whole group will write two questions using terms “How much more”  or  ”how many altogether” for the other groups to answer. 

Groups will present their graphs to the class. Students will make observations and record the answers to their questions on a sheet of paper.

Assessment:

Key Vocabulary:

Materials:

Internet

Tally and frequency charts 

Bar Graph Sheet

Pictograph Sheet

Question sheets

Bar Graph Rubric

Pictograph Rubric