Lesson Plan 1 (Move)

Book: Energy Makes Things Happen

Standards:

 Standard - 3.2.K.B6 ENERGY recognize that light from the sun is an important

source of energy for living and nonliving systems and some source of energy

is needed for all organisms to stay alive and grow.

Objectives:

 The students will (TSW) apply the meaning of energy

 TSW recognize that some source of energy is needed for all things to move,

stay alive, and grow

Assessment:

 Students will explain how energy moves the windmill

Materials:

 Ruler

 Pen

 Pencil

 Map pin

 Square of cardstock paper

Procedures:

 Tell students that today we will be learning about energy.

 Ask students if they’ve ever heard the term “you’re full of energy”?

o What does it mean if someone tells you that you’re full of energy?
 o How do you get energy? (Food)

o Where does this energy come from? (Sun)

 Tell students what energy is

o Energy is the ability to do work – Everything requires energy in some

from

o Everything that moves uses energy

o Some things that use energy

 To break down and digest food (in our bodies)

 To heat houses and other buildings

 To illuminate lights

 To power televisions, radios, games, cars

 To run computers and appliances

o Tell students that energy is like a rock being pushed down a hill, it

only takes a little bit of energy to get it moving and then from there it

increases by itself

 Tell students that today we will be making windmills

o Ask students who has seen a windmill before?

 Tell them that windmills move because wind pushes the blades

and wind is caused by energy from the air

o Tell students that the wind energy pushes the blades causing them to

turn

 Just a little energy is all it takes to get them spinning

o Model for students how they are going to create the windmills
  Have students watch first and follow you step by step

 Tell students to pick up a pair of scissors and cut along the

dotted lines on the paper

 Have them fold the corners of the paper they just cut so that

the corners in each of the sections lines up along the middle

 Pass out the thumbtacks to students

 Remind them that the thumbtacks are sharp and that

they need to be careful when using them

 Push the pinhole through the center of the paper

 Take the folded corners of the paper and push the folds onto

the thumbtack sticking through

 Once all the corners are threaded through the thumbtack tell

the students to pinch all four corners

 Stick the thumbtack point through the eraser of the pencil

leaving enough space for the windmill to spin

 Blow on the blades and with a little air and watch the blades

spin rapidly

 Remind students that it only takes a energy to get the

“stone” rolling down the hill

 Allow students to decorate their windmills with any colors and

drawings they would like

 Ask students how the energy is enacted upon the windmill?

o Answer: By wind blowing on them

Extensions:

 For students that seem inquisitive offer further learning on why the wind

blows

o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBqohRu2RRk

Adaptations:

 If any students need it offer them a larger version of the paper

 Pre-cut the paper before if the students are not able to cut the paper
Lesson Plan 2 (Stay alive)
Books: The sun: Our nearest star

*If nice take outside

Standards:

 Standard - 3.2.K.B6 ENERGY recognize that light from the sun is an important

source of energy for living and nonliving systems and some source of energy

is needed for all organisms to stay alive and grow.

Objectives:

 TSW apply the meaning of light, heat, energy, and growth.

 TSW recognize that the light from the sun is an important source of energy

for living and non-living systems

Assessment:

 Observation

Materials:

 Dirt

 Containers (Soup cans)

 Beans

Procedures:

 Tell students that today we are talking about the sun

 Have students close their eyes and think back to a time they were in the sun

o Ask them to think of how the sun felt

 How they felt

  What it looked like

 Possible answers: Warm, hot, sweating, happy

 Tell them that the light the sun puts off is energy

o Some of this energy lands on the earth

o This energy gives us warmth, light, and energy

 Nearly all of our energy comes from the sun

 Everyone take a deep breath

o When you breath in you are breathing in oxygen

o When you breath out you are breathing out carbon dioxide

 Plants breath as well

 Plants use the energy from the sun to grow

o Plants use a process called photosynthesis that uses carbon dioxide,

sunlight, and water to grow

o Chlorophyll

 Say Chlorophyll

 Chlorophyll is what makes the plants green

 It is also used to trap the suns energy in the process

called photosynthesis

 The sun’s warmth makes sure that we are able to have liquid water on this

planet

o Every living thing on this planet needs water to survive

 Plants are the basis of all of life on this planet

o Animals eat plants

 o We eat plants and animals

o *Energy diagram

 Tell students that today we are going to capture some of this suns energy

o We are going to grow our own plants to watch them using the suns

energy to grow and change

 Going to plant two bean plants

o What do you think is going to happen

o What is your hypothesis

o Do you think one in light will grow

o One in dark will grow

o Both grow?

 Pass out two containers to each table

 Pass out dirt in bins and have them take turns filling up the containers

halfway

 Have students put one bean in each container and then cover it with dirt

o Be sure to tell them not to cover the bean too tightly

 Tell students that to test if the plants use the suns energy or not we are going

to put one in the sun and one in the dark

o When the one in the sun grows students will see that the sun gives the

earth energy

 Tell students we are going to be watching these plants over the next few

weeks to watch the suns energy changing the plants

Enrichment:
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FB0rDsR_rc

 YouTube video on how the suns energy is created and how it gets here
Lesson 3 Painting

Standards:

 3.2.K.B6 recognize that light from the sun is an important source of energy
for living and nonliving systems and some source of energy is needed for all
organisms to stay alive and grow.

Objectives:

 Objective 1: TSW apply the meaning of light, heat, energy, and growth.

 Objective 2: TSW recognize that the light from the sun is an important source

of energy for living and non-living systems

Assessment:

 Observation

 Pictures

Materials:

 Calculator

 Paper

 Paint supplies

 YouTube video

Procedures:

 Tell students that today we are going to be talking about the sun

 Have them think about the light that comes down from the sun

o Ask them how far away they think the sun is

 Listen to their answers

o Have them think about the farthest distance they’ve ever travelled
  Take the furthest distance and multiply it to show them how

many times they would have to drive there to get to the sun

 Tell them it would take 64,583 days and 8 hours driving 64

MPH to get to the sun

 Tell them that is 177 years of driving non-stop

o Ask them how long they think it takes for the suns light to reach earth

 Tell them it takes 8 minutes for the light to reach the earth

from the sun

o Ask them if anyone has heard the term “the speed of light”

 Sit them in the classroom and turn the lights on

 Tell them to try and see how fast the lights go on

 That is how fast that light travels

 Show students a video of the sun and the suns energy

o Tell students about the sun and describe what happened in the video

 The sun is very big

 1,000,000 earths could fit inside

 5 billion years old

 Tell students that heat is warmth that we feel

 Temperature is a way to measure this warmth so we can see

what heat something is

 Tell students that the sun is very hot

 Have students think about their temperature and write

them on the board

 o Tell them that their temperature is 98.1 degrees

 If that goes up just 2 degrees they get a

fever and sick

o Hottest in PA: 111 F

o Oven: 450 °F

o Fire: 1,100 °F

o Lava: 2,120 F

o The suns outer layer: 10,000 F

o The suns core: 27,000,000 F

 Without sun earth would be cold and barren

 Ask them how fast the energy takes to get from the sun to earth

 8 minutes

 Tell them that even through the energy gets here fast it

takes 100,000 years to get from the core to the surface

of the sun

 Tell students that today we are going to be making our own suns

 Tell them we are going to use different colors to represent the

different heat levels

 Tell them the core is the hottest so we will color it red

 The middle is not as hot so we will color it orange

 The outside is the coolest but still extremely hot so we will

color it orange

Enrichment:
 If students finish early have them write a sentence and draw a picture of

something they learned about the sun

Lesson Plan 4 (Grow)
Book: Living Sunlight

Standards:

 3.2.K.B3 describe how temperature can affect the body.

 3.2.K.B6 recognize that light from the sun is an important source of energy

for living and nonliving systems and some source of energy is needed for all

organisms to stay alive and grow.

Objectives:

 Objective 1: TSW recognize that the lights from the sun is an important

source of energy for living and non-living systems

 Objective 2: TSW recognize that some source of energy is needed for all

organisms to stay alive and grow

Assessment:

 Observation

Materials:

Procedures:

 Tell students to think about all of the plants they see growing outside and ask

them to name a few

 Tell them every single plant growing on earth needs 3 things to grow

o Ask them what they think a plant needs to grow

 After they guess tell them sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide

 Some need soil

 Have students think back to when we talked about photosynthesis

 o Show students the chart on photosynthesis

 Water, sun, carbon dioxide, chlorophyll

o Remind them that this is the process that plants use to get their food

o Remind them that chlorophyll is the thing inside plants that helps

them catch the sunlight and turns the plants green

 Tell them that the process plants use to collect the suns energy and grow is

called photosynthesis

o Show them a video on photosynthesis

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1Ymc311XS8

o Pause the video and explain the key points to students

 Tell them that today we are going to be seeing photosynthesis in action by

growing an alfalfa plant

o Tell the students that we will be using alfalfa to see the plants

capturing the energy

o Tell them we are using alfalfa because it grows quickly

o Tell them that after the plant is grown that we will be able to eat the

suns energy that the alfalfa captured

Lesson 5 Suns heat

Standards

 3.2.K.B3 describe how temperature can affect the body.

 3.2.K.B6 recognize that light from the sun is an important source of energy

for living and nonliving systems and some source of energy is needed for all

organisms to stay alive and grow.

Objectives

 TSW be able to describe how temperature can affect the body

 TSW recognize that light from the sun is an important source of energy for

living and non-living systems

Assessment

 Observation

Materials

 Grapes, Raisins, Poster

Procedures

 Tell students that today we will be exploring how the sun affects humans,

plants, and animals

 Have students think about how being in the sun makes them feel

o Happy, good, warm

 Tell students that being in the sun has many positive health benefits

o Enhances your mood

 Releases serotonin which is a happy hormone

  Relives stress

 Helps you sleep

 Vitamin D

 Have the students think about a time that they have gotten sunburn

o How it felt

o What it did to their skin

o How they got it

 Tell students that the sun is good for many things but being in the sun for too

long can be bad

 Too much sun can lead to:

o Cataracts

o Heat stroke/exhaustion

o Sun burns

o Heat rash

o Skin cancer

o Ages skin

 The sun does this to plants to

o Prunes

o Raisins

o Apples

o Bananas

 The sun evaporates the moisture out of plants causing them to shrivel up and

looks like a raisin

 o The sun will do this to skin too

 Tell students that today we are going to be observing a grape before and

after its dried

o Give students instructions that we are not eating or squishing these

objects

 Tell students that if they can’t follow these instructions that

they will not be able to participate

o Pass out one raisin and one grape to each student

o Pull of the shared writing raisin versus grape

o Ask students questions about the objects one then the other

 What do they look like

 Color

 Texture

 What do they feel like

 Texture

 Firmness

 What do they smell like

 What do they taste like

 Anything else they noticed?

Enrichment

 If there is extra time place a couple grapes in a mason jar to be turned into

raisins

 Watch a video of grapes being turned into raisins

o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNO-VmIlnEM

o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uD_vhbv05aw
Lesson Plan 6 (Energy cycle)
Standards:

 Standard - 3.2.K.B6 recognize that light from the sun is an important source

of energy for living and nonliving systems and some source of energy is

needed for all organisms to stay alive and grow.

 Standard - 3.1.K.A3 observe, compare, and describe stages of life cycles for

plants and/or animals.

Objectives:

 TSW recognize that light from the sun is an important source of energy for

living and non-living systems

 TSW recognize that some sort of energy is needed for all organisms to stay

alive and grow

Assessment:

 Observation

 Completed worksheets

Materials:

 Scissors

 Glue

 Crayons

Procedures:

 Remind students of everything they’ve learned so far

o The sun gives us energy

 o The plants catch the energy

o The humans and animals eat the energy

o The sun warms the earth creating liquid water

 Tell students that everything they learned about the sun so far is part of a

cycle

o A cycle is when things go around and usually repeat themselves in the

same order

o Show students a prezi of the suns energy

 The sun shines down

 When the sun shines down energy and heat is coming

down

o Remind them that temperature is a way that we

measure this heat

 The energy is caught by plants and warms the planet

 The animals and humans eat the plants

 Some animals produce goods that we can eat/drink

 When we die a soil bacterium, fungus, or invertebrate

decomposes organic material

 Decomposes means that things are broken down into

smaller pieces

 It is one big energy cycle

 Tell students that today we are going to be making a diagram of this cycle

o Tell them that a diagram is a way to show information

Gym Activity (Move, Stay Alive, and grow)

Standards:

 10.4.K.B1 exhibit balance, strength, stamina, and agility.

Objectives:

 Students will be up and moving around physically

Assessment:

 Observation

Materials:

 Dixie cups

 Water

 Snack

 Timer

 Alfalfa

Procedures:

 Tell students that today we are going to be transferring some energy

o Tell the students that we will be expanding some energy by moving

around in the gym

o Tell students that we will then be gaining some energy by eating the

alfalfa we have grown, along with a snack

 Tell students that today we are going to be moving around the gym for 8

whole minutes to represent the time that it takes for sunlight to get to the

earth
o Students will preform different activities while going in circles around

the gym

o Tell students that they can go as slow or as fast as they would like to

as long as they are preforming the activity

 Remind students to keep their bodies to themselves and to

watch where they are going

 They need to preform what is directed of them or they will sit

out

o Have students start out by walking a lap around the gym

 If they start to get tired have them walk another lap around the

gym

o Progress into other activities such as

 Walking

 Hopping

 Skipping

 One footed hopping

 Bear Crawling

 Crab walking

 Walking backwards

 Cha Cha line

 Army crawling

 Tip toeing

 Side stepping
  Balancing tight rope walking

 Going at the speed of light

 After the 8 minutes is up tell students that we just expanded some energy

from the sun and now we are going back to the classroom to put some energy

back into our systems

o Remind students that we get energy from plants and animals

o The plants only need sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide to grow but

humans need more

 As they are eating their snack and drinking their water remind them of:

o The energy cycle

 Sun to plants to animals to humans

o How we grew the alfalfa and it captured the suns energy

 Suns energy, water, carbon dioxide

o What the sun gives us

 Energy (light, heat), Plants, Humans/animals

o What it would be like if there was no sun

 Cold, dark, nothing alive