LESSON PLAN OUTLINE

JMU Elementary Education Program

A. TITLE/TYPE OF LESSON
Roller Coaster whole-group read aloud.

B. CONTEXT OF LESSON
At the beginning of this 1st grade lesson, I will ask the students if they have ever ridden a roller coaster
before. I may call on one or two people to talk about their experiences. Then, I will ask the whole
group to find a partner and tell them if they have or have not ridden a roller coaster before. Hopefully
this will help me gauge their interest in the subject. This book is simple, but will likely require at least
some of the students having experience with roller coasters in order to fully understand it. Seeing that
they have this experience will help me know they will understand the lesson fully. Throughout the
read aloud, I will make connections between roller coasters and the concepts of motion and force,
which is what the students are currently learning about. The book will be very simple to understand as
I read it, so I hope all of the students will be able to understand its contents.

C. LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Understand Students will Know Students will know that Do Students will be able to discuss
understand that motion is a when riding a roller coaster (or car, or times when they have felt motion or
phenomenon they experience on a bike, etc.), they experience motion. force (roller coasters, water slides, car
roller coaster. rides, etc.) and give examples.

D. ASSESSING LEARNING
At the end of the lesson, I will ask students to share examples of times when they have experienced
motion and force. I hope to receive a variety of answers to verify that they can connect the concept of
motion to various circumstances besides roller coasters.

E. RELATED VIRGINIA STANDARDS OF LEARNING (and NATIONAL STANDARDS if required)

1.2 The student will investigate and understand that moving objects exhibit different
kinds of motion.
a) objects may have straight, circular, and back-and-forth motions;

F. MATERIALS NEEDED
Roller Coaster by Marla Frazee

G. PROCEDURE
BEFORE
I will ask the students to gather on the rug in a circle so everybody can see me.
I will ask has anybody here ridden a roller coaster before? while displaying the cover of the
book (which has a roller coaster on it).
I will ask for 2-3 volunteers to share their experiences riding roller coasters, and will prompt
them: were you scared? did you feel sick? what did it feel like? With the last question, I
hope to get students thinking about the motion and force involved in riding roller coasters.
I will ask students to share with a partner if they have or have not ridden a roller coaster
before. After a minute, I will ask them to focus on me.
DURING
Next I will introduce the bookThis book is called Roller Coaster by Marla Frazee(point
to title and author) Why do you think its called Roller Coaster? (They may point out the
coaster on the cover).
Page 1: How long do you normally wait in line for a roller coaster?
 Page 2: read
Page 3: Raise your hands: who here has ridden lots of roller coasters? Who has ridden one or
two roller coasters? Who has never ridden a roller coaster ever?
Page 4: read
Page 5: Is this girl tall enough? Do you think this girl will change her mind about riding the
roller coaster?
Page 6: Will she decide she doesnt want to go after all?
Page 7: Did she change her mind? No, she didnt! Do you think shes going to have a good
time on the roller coaster?
Page 8: Can you predict or guess what is going to happen next? I will ask several students to
share their predictions.
Page 9: What happened? I will let students respond.
Page 10: read
Page 11: read
Page 12: read
Page 13: read
Page 14: Is the little girl having fun now?... Can anybody share some of the ways the roller
coaster is moving? What types of motion does it have? I will review pages 10-14 to show the
roller coaster going up, down, left, right, and in a circle. If they are still confused, we will define
motion (movimiento) as a whole class. Do you think that this roller coaster needs force
(fuerza) to move? Ask for several students opinions.
Page 15: The roller coaster stoppedis there still motion?
Page 16: Who do you think wants to ride again? Ask students to predict who will ride the
roller coaster again.
Page 17: Who is riding it again? Have them point or call out.
AFTER
After reading, I will show students the front cover again and say: When we ride roller
coasters, we feel the motion and force of the coaster. Can you think of another time you might
feel motion and force? I will pause to see if anybody has an idea. If not, or if their examples
arent quite what Im looking for, I will say: What about when youre riding in a car? Or
swinging on a swing set? Or riding your bike? Do you feel motion when you do these things?
I will let the students think for a few seconds, then will ask everyone to give an example of a
time they felt motion. Raise your hand when youve thought of an example! This will be my
assessmentstudents who thoroughly understand the concept of motion/force will give
appropriate feedback, while others may say things that do not actually reflect motion/force.
Finally, I will ask: Who wants to ride a roller coaster right now?

H. DIFFERENTIATION
Fortunately, this will be a group activity, so I do not have to worry about some students finishing first.
However, there are a variety of language levels in my classroom, with about half of the students
speaking Spanish as their first language. If necessary, I will provide a translation of movement
(movimiento) to help them understand what Im asking. The rest of the lesson will rely heavily on the
pictures in the book, so I think they will get it. If not, I will translate certain words, phrases, and
questions so that they comprehend the lesson.

I. WHAT COULD GO WRONG WITH THIS LESSON AND WHAT WILL YOU DO ABOUT IT?
My first worry is that the book will be too boring. I struggled to find one incorporating motion
(surprisingly!) and this one is a bit lacking in the excitement department. However, the illustrations
are great, and I think the concept of roller coasters will get the students engaged. If I notice that they
are not into the story, I may ask for a few more people to share their experiences on a roller coaster, or
ask if they felt like the characters in the book do when riding.
Another issue is that the students might not be able to connect the concept of motion with the roller
coaster in the story. I am not entirely sure how deeply they have explored this concept. If they have
only explored motion in small toy cars, they might not understand that larger objects also have motion.
If necessary, I will try to gauge while reading to see if they can make this connection. If not, I will
explicitly state: roller coasters have motion and use force, which is why you feel like youre moving
very fast while on a roller coaster. What do roller coasters have?

Useful Spanish words:

La montaa rusa (roller coaster)
Movimiento (motion)
Fuerza (force)
 Lesson Implementation Reflection
As soon as possible after teaching your lesson, think about the experience. Use the questions/prompts below to
guide your thinking. Be thorough in your reflection and use specific examples to support your insights.

I. How did your actual teaching of the lesson differ from your plans? Describe the changes and explain
why you made them.
My lesson plan was surprisingly smooth and effective, but I did make some subtle changes throughout
the course of the lesson. First of all, even though I had written the entire lesson plan out and taped it
to the back of the book, there were a few small things I completely forgot to do. For example, while I
had three students share their experiences riding roller coasters with the class, I forgot to have all of
the students share with a partner. I cut out some questions that werent super important, because I
realized that I didnt want to interrupt the flow of the story by asking a question after every single
page. I didnt ask my first question until page 3. I also decided only to discuss motion, not force,
during the read aloud. Mrs. Briggs informed me they had only learned about force as pushes and
pulls, and I didnt want to risk confusing them during the read aloud. Finally, I didnt end up getting
feedback from every student. While I tried to make sure they had all responded, I realized after
finishing that about 5 students had not raised their hands and shared. I decided that was okay, because
my read aloud had already gone on for 15 minutes, and my teacher still had a lesson to do!

II. Based on the assessment you created, what can you conclude about your impact on student
learning? Did they learn? Who learned? What did they learn? What evidence can you offer that
your conclusions are valid?
My assessment was good for those who responded, but I regret not hearing from everybody. I was
very impressed at their abilities to draw connections between the motion on a roller coaster and other
types of motions. Many of them shared motion found on the playground, like swinging, going down
the slide, and spinning on the monkey bars. A few of them gave examples of other roller coasters they
had ridden, which wasnt exactly what I was looking for. Even for those who didnt end up sharing, I
think that hearing their peers ideas may have helped them better understand the different ways we
experience motion in daily life. Overall, the students learned that the motion we feel on a roller
coaster is the same motion that we feel when walking, riding a bike, or playing on the playground. No
student gave an answer that was completely incorrect, which leads me to think they all have a better
understanding of the concept of motion.

III. Describe at least one way you could incorporate developmentally appropriate practice in a better or
more thorough way if you were to teach this lesson again.
If I were to teach this lesson again, especially if I had more time, I would incorporate an activity
for the students to complete. As I was planning this lesson, I really wanted the students to create
something that displayed the different types of motion. I even looked up crafts/activities related to
roller coasters. I would have loved to have the students create their own roller coasters using
marbles and other supplies. I would have had them incorporate 3 different types of motion (e.g.,
circular, upwards, downwards). I think this would have made them think more critically about these
different types of motion, and it also would have been more memorable than simply reading a story
and answering questions.

IV. Based on the assessment data you collected, what would you do/teach next if you were the classroom
teacher?
Funnily, the lesson the students did immediately after my read aloud was a lesson reviewing the
different types of motion! The students were experimenting with different toys, like tops and toy cars,
to determine what types of motion they had. This is exactly what I would have done if I were the
classroom teacher, so it kind of worked out. For the students who didnt fully understand the concepts,
they would have another chance to review the types of motion.

V. As a result of planning and teaching this lesson, what have you learned or had reinforced about
young children as learners?
 I was extremely surprised at how excited the children got over the story Id picked out. After reading
it, Id found the whole thing a bit boring, but I couldnt find any other books related to motion in the
reading center. I decided to go with it anyway, hoping I would be able to keep their attention
throughout the read aloud. In fact, I never once had to remind students to pay attention, and the few
times I caught them talking to each other, it was about roller coasters! They were all willing to discuss
roller coasters and the types of motion associated with them, which led to a great experience for me
and hopefully for them as well.

VI. As a result of planning and teaching this lesson, what have you learned or had reinforced about
teaching?
I definitely learned that things wont always go exactly according to plan. In fact, I have a feeling I
got lucky with how well my plan did go! Regardless, there were some things I forgot to do and some
things I changed at the last minute. Teachers have to be flexible and ready for anything, including
dealing with their own mistakes.

VII. As a result of planning and teaching this lesson, what have you learned or had reinforced about
yourself?
I learned that I love reading to little kids. Ive really never had the opportunity to read to a large group
of children before, and it was really exciting (and honestly, a little bit intimidating). I found myself
getting nervous in the last few seconds before I sat down to read. I was thinking, what if they arent
interested, or what if they dont want to hear the random student teacher read a story? However, the
kids were just happy to be read to, and it was a relief when they were active and engaged listeners.
Ive always been positive that I want to work with older students, but this experience was really
interesting. I didnt expect to enjoy it as much as I did!