Indiana Wesleyan University

Elementary Education Lesson Plan Template

CAEP 2018 K-6 Elementary Teacher Preparation Standards

LESSON RATIONALE
This science lesson will be helpful for students in order for them to see the relationship that living things have with one
another and how they get their energy. As we talk more about producers, consumers, and decomposers, we will better
see how one affects the other, especially in the food chain, and why they are so essential for our ecosystems and world.

READINESS
I. Goals/Objectives/Standard(s)
A. Goal(s)— Upon completion of this science lesson, students will be able to explain how living things get energy
to survive.
B. Objective(s)— Upon completion of this science lesson, students will be able to explain the importance of
producers, consumers, and decomposers, and the affect they have on the food chain and our environments.
C. Standard(s):
5.LS.1: Develop a model to describe the movement of matter among plants, animals, decomposers, and the
environment.
5.LS.2: Observe and classify common Indiana organisms as producers, consumers, decomposers, or predator
and prey based on their relationships and interactions with other organisms in the ecosystem.
II. Management Plan-
 Time per lesson element:
o Anticipatory Set: 5 Minutes
o Lesson Presentation: 20 minutes
o Working in Groups: 10-15 minutes
o Food Web Activity (After Group Work): 10 minutes
o Closure: 10 minutes
o Flex time/Extra Time: 5 minutes
 Space: Students will be at their desks for this lesson
 Materials:
o Breakfast picture
o Hypothesis Worksheet
o Graphic Organizer Worksheet
o QR code cards
 Expectations and procedures: Students will remain in their seats during the anticipatory set and lesson
and a small part of the lesson presentation. Once they are released to work with their partner, they can
move to their partner’s desk to work together. I will keep record of the time as students are working and let
them know how much time they have left in their station before we come back together to talk about what
they learned. Once the timer goes off, I will have them go back to their seats and we will talk about their
research. If students are not working in their station or are off task, Dojo points will be taken.

III. Anticipatory Set:

“I want you to raise your hand if breakfast is your favorite meal of the day”
(Wait as students raise their hand)
“Now raise your hand if lunch is your favorite meal?”
(Wait as students raise their hand)
“Finally, how many of you choose dinner as your favorite meal?”
(Wait as students raise their hand)
“My favorite meal of the day is breakfast! Have you ever heard anyone say breakfast is the most important meal of the day?
It’s because this meal gives you the energy you need to get you through the rest of the day. Here is an example of a breakfast I
would typically eat to give me energy and fill me up so I can take on my day!” (Show picture of breakfast meal)
“Every living thing needs energy to survive, but where do these living things get their energy? That is what we are going to
discuss today!”

IV. Purpose: “Today, we are going to learn about how living things get their energy, and how they interact and rely on each
other in their environments in order to survive, because it this also affects how we survive in our environments!
PLAN FOR INSTRUCTION
V. Adaptation to Individual Differences and Diverse Learners— In order to best adapt this lesson and help my
diverse students, I will do my part in pairing students together in order to help them process through the lesson and
provide visuals for them to reference if needed. I do not have any students in my class with identified learning
disabilities or Individualized Education Plans (IEPs). Some students struggle with turning their work in on time, and
sometimes are kept inside at recess in order to finish. If the students need extra time or help to complete the stations
or lessons, I will help the students during recess time.

VI. Lesson Presentation (Input/Output):

“Let’s talk about the terms producers, consumers, and decomposers. Have you all heard of these terms before? If we had
to guess, what do we think these words mean?”
(Wait for student responses)
“Those were some good thoughts! I think we’re on to something here, but let’s keep going. I have some pictures here, and
we’re going to do our best to sort them into the category we think they belong in – producer, consumer, or decomposer.
(Draw a three column chart on the white board and write producer, consumer, or decomposer on the top of each
column).
“I am going to hold up a card, and I want you to look and then decide which column you think it belongs in. Raise your
hand when you think you have the answer, and I will call on one of you to tell me where it goes and then explain why you
think it goes there. Does everyone understand what we’re doing? (Check for understanding)
Hold up pictures and have students categorize
“Great job everyone! Now as we look at these different producers, consumers, and decomposers, we have to wonder
where they get their energy…does anyone have any ideas as to where these living things get their energy?”
(Wait for student responses)
“Those were some good guesses! Let’s dive into this some more. Living things get their energy from the sun, and without
it, there would be no life on earth. The sun’s energy is transferred between living things – producers, consumers, and
decomposers.”
“Producers are the first ones in line to get their energy from the sun. Producers have an important job, because they
support a lot of other organisms in their ecosystems as well, like the consumers, which we will talk about next.”
“Producers pass their energy along to consumers, so the consumers really rely on those producers don’t they? Now where
do you think consumers get their energy from?”
(Wait for student responses)
“Great thinking everyone! Consumers are organisms that feed on other plants or animals in order to get their energy.
There are four types of consumers – herbivores who eat only plants, carnivores who eat only meat, omnivores who eat
plants and animals, and detritivores which is another word to describe decomposers.”
“Speaking of decomposers, do we have any idea what these are or where they get their energy from?”
(Wait for student responses)
“Decomposers are living things that eat waste, garbage, and dead animals, such as worms, mushrooms, insects, or tiny
bacteria. This may sound disgusting to you, but it is vital to our environment because these decomposers give soil the
nutrients it needs which is essential to helping plants grow, and helps everything else on earth in our environments
survive! They provide nutrients to the soil that plants will use to grow.”
(Hand out Hypothesis Worksheet)
“Now that we have talked more about how these organisms get their energy, I am going to ask you a question, and you
are going to form a hypothesis. Does anyone know what a hypothesis is?
(Wait for student responses)
“A hypothesis is like an educated guess on an answer to a question. So the question I am going to ask you today is, “How
do living things rely on each other in the ecosystem?” You will form a hypothesis based on what you think the answer
to this question is.”

“Let’s move into part of our activity for the day. You and a partner that I have already selected for you will be given the
task to research an organism on your chrome books. Your job is to find out if it is a producer, consumer, or decomposer,
find out where it gets its energy, and fill this out on your graphic organizer. I will put you and your partner in your
group, and then I will assign you your organism. You will have QR codes that you will scan with your computers which
will lead you to the website of your organism. All of the information you need to answer the questions on your website.
Does everyone understand the directions? Are there any questions?”
(Check for understanding; answer any student questions)
As students are working with their groups, I will be circulating around the room to answer any questions and check
on their progress.

After giving students time to work, we will come back together as a group
“Thank you all for working so hard on researching your organisms! Do you feel like you have a better understanding of
your organism and where they get their energy from?”
 (Check for understanding)
“Let’s look at the organisms you researched. I will call out an organism, and if I say your organism that you researched
with your partner, raise your hand and I will call on you to come put your organism on the board. Then, you will tell us if
it is a producer, consumer, or decomposer, and why it is considered that. If you have a producer you will put it in this
circle, if you have a consumer you will place it in this circle, and if you have a decomposer you will place it in this circle.
(Allow students to bring their organisms to the board. I will ask, “What category does your organism belong in, and
why?)
“Thank you for sharing everyone! It’s easy to see these organisms are very important to our environment.”

Check for understanding:

“Like we were talking about earlier, we know that all living things need food to provide materials in order to grow. We
know producers get their energy from the sun to do this. As we think about consumers, we know they eat plants to get
their energy. And finally, decomposers get their energy from breaking down the dead and decaying material – which
then can turn into nutrients in the soil that the plants use.”
“It sounds to me like producers, consumers, and decomposers all depend on each other in order to survive and thrive in
their environments, don’t you think?”

“What do you think would happen if I removed an organism from this chain? (Remove picture of the deer from the
board). We know other organisms rely on this deer in the ecosystem right? So how does removing this deer affect the
rest of the food chain and the way these organisms get their energy? Talk about this at your table”
(Allow students time to think/talk at their tables)
“Who has an idea of what would happen?”
(Call on 2-3 students for response)
“Those are some good guesses class, thank you for thinking and hypothesizing! We know that when one part of the food
chain is removed, the rest of the organisms are affected. For example, if we removed the plants because they were not
able to grow properly, then our consumers will have no food source to give them energy. Does this make sense to
everyone?
(Check for understanding)

VII. Review learning outcomes / Closure: Exit slip

“Thank you all for thinking hard and working with your group so well. This is a big topic with lots of components to
remember, and you all did wonderful”
“Let’s revisit our hypotheses. Our question we asked says, “How do living things rely on each other?” I want you to look at your
worksheet and answer the question that says, “Was your hypothesis correct or not? Explain.” After you have filled this page
out, raise your hand and I will come around and hand you an exit slip that will ask you one more question about what we
have learned today to make sure we’ve got it. Does everyone understand?” (Check for understanding).

PLAN FOR ASSESSMENT:

Formative: I will walk around the class as students are working in their groups and answer any questions they might
have. I will ask them throughout the lesson if they think their hypothesis is correct or not, or if they think it needs to be
changed.
Summative: I will use the hypothesis worksheet and exit slips as a way to assess my students and observe if they
understood the lesson today. If not, I will conference with them or the groups of them to reinforce the topics if needed. As
they get closer to being tested on this material, I will ask my cooperating teacher if there are ways I can help them review
before their unit test.

REFLECTION AND POST-LESSON ANALYSIS

How many students achieved the lesson objective(s)? For those who did not, why not?
1. What were my strengths and weaknesses?
I felt confident in the materials I had provided and the ways we went about using the information to guide our activities
throughout the lesson. However, I am very hard on myself and felt like I could have done better at explaining the content
and informing myself more on the content, since I wasn’t very confident in myself.
2. How should I alter this lesson?
To alter this lesson, I would have allotted more time for students to research and maybe even do an expansion activity
based on the organisms they had to research. Having the students create a poster or a presentation about their organism
while finding more facts about their topic would have been a fun way for students to express what they have learned.
3. How would I pace it differently?
I think adding a timer on the SmartBoard that students could reference to see how much time they had left to research
would have been helpful, even though I was reminding my class “You have 3-4 minutes left,” or “In 1 minute we are going
to come back together.”
 4. Were all students actively participating? If not, why not?
For the most part, all students were actively participating in the lesson. I know a few of my boys got caught up in the
“camera” scanner for the QR code activity, but once I told them they needed to get back on task and research, they went
right back to work. Other than that, I do believe all students were actively engaged in the learning experience.
5. What adjustments did I make to reach varied learning styles and ability levels?
I was able to pair students together based on their learning styles and difficulty of content matter when it came to
researching the websites, which I think was helpful. I paired students based on if I knew they needed to have a website
with less information/less overwhelming, or if they could have handled a more difficult website with more information.
6. Were students able to come up with a hypothesis and prove it correct/incorrect?
Students were able to come up with a hypothesis for the activity, and find answers as well! They talked about this at their
tables, which I think helped their thinking process. For the most part, each student was able to prove their hypothesis and
support it.
7. Were students successful in their research?
Yes! Students were able to find all of the required information on the website to fill out their graphic organizer, and even
add a few more fun facts. I think 10-12 minutes was a perfect amount of time for this activity.
8. Were students engaged and active? If not, how could I improve this?
Yes! All students were engaged in asking questions, writing down information, and offering their input while they were
learning, which was so encouraging to me!
9. Did exit slips provide an effective assessment for me to see if my students understood the content?
Yes! Many of the students’ answers varied based off of their hypotheses, but for the most part they were able to prove
what they believe and why they believed that. I enjoyed being able to look through their answers. It made me feel better
about my lesson as a whole.