Blended Learning Lesson Plan

Lesson Title: The Water Cycle! Each step of the cycle and what happens during it

Objectives:
Students will be able to list the stages of the water cycle in the correct order
Students will be able to define what each stage in the water cycle does
State Standards:
Standard 2. E.2: The student will demonstrate an understanding of the daily and seasonal weather
patterns
2.E.2.A.1: Analyze and interpret data from observations and measurements to describe local
weather conditions (including temperature, wind, and forms of precipitation)
Context:
This lesson will be taught to a second-grade science class. The water cycle is a very important
process that happens every day, all around us. The water cycle is what enables the availability of
water for all living organisms. The water cycle is shown in many ways that kids may start to
question at this age such as where the water goes when it rains, and why the outside of a cup gets
wet, or the grass in the morning is wet. We need to care about the water cycle and teach about it
because water is necessary for life. The students will have prior knowledge that when it rains, the
water does not stay on the earth. I will have told my students at the at the end of the last class
what we will be talking about today and gave them that thought to think about before coming to
this lesson. It is good to get their minds thinking about how and why. After this lesson, students
can start to navigate more weather patterns such as snow, hail, wind, and how temperatures
affect these acts. In this lesson, I will be teaching them the basic three steps to the water cycle to
give them the base understanding of the most common weather condition.
Data:
In this lesson, I will be making three groups, one group to discuss each stage of the water cycle.
These groups will be determined by random draw, as no particular grouping pattern is necessary.
Throughout the lesson, each station that each group is in will have a sort of physical or digital
task that they will turn in at the end of the lessons. I will also have a Kahoot game at the very end
for the whole class to play.
Materials: List all materials used (i.e. websites, apps, pencils, iPads, computers, worksheets,
diagrams, textbooks, etc.)
Part of lesson Material used link
Introduction Whiteboard, YouTube https://youtu.be/Oq8iCsV4woE
Video
Teacher Directed Ziplock bags, markers No links
Collaborative iPads, Water Cycle app https://edshelf.com/tool/water-cycle-hd/
^description of app, app available for iPad
use only
Independent Digital iPad, Edpuzzle, pencil, https://edpuzzle.com
notebook
Closure iPad, Kahoot https://kahoot.it/

Detailed paragraphs from here on down.

Procedures:
Introduction (15 minutes):
To start this lesson, I will ask my student about the questions I told them to think about at the end
of last class. I mentioned to them at the end of the last class that we would be learning about the
water cycle today and to hold all of their questions until next class. The only hint I gave them
was a statement to think about, “after it rains, the water does not stay on earth”. This allowed my
students to think about all the possibilities of how and why. I will first start off by asking my
students to raise their hands with their potential ideas for this. I will write them on the
whiteboard as they come. Once I have gotten several good responses, I will show my students a
video of a fun song about the water cycle to spark their brains and give them a base
understanding to go into their lesson with. Once the video is done playing, I will ask my students
to tell me what the names are to the three parts of the water cycle. Once they are confident giving
me the names of the stages, I can break them up into their groups. Once in their groups, I will
explain what each group will be doing in that station. Once groups are set, I will further explain
what will be happening in each group. Once the explanation is done, I will tell each group to go
to their designated workstation.
Teacher Directed (20 minutes):
During this station, this group of students will join me at a half circle table. Since the students are
with me for this part of the lesson, I am going to be explaining what each step of the water cycle
does and why. This is going to be where students have the most questions and may need the most
help. The three stages they should already be familiar with because of the introduction video. I
will start with evaporation, then condensation, and finish with precipitation. I will explain what
happens in each of these steps and how they affect the other. I will have a diagram that they can
look at to give a visual understanding of the cycle. Once the students are finished with that, they
will draw the water cycle that they have just learned on a Ziplock bag. They will show
condensation, evaporation, and precipitation all in the correct places and orders, along with
pictures to go along with the explanation. I will have plenty of colored markets for them to use.
Once the students are all done drawing their water cycle, I will make sure their names are on
their bags and fill the bag with some water. The water at the bottom of the bag will resemble the
ocean. I will then close the bag up and direct the student to tape their bag wherever they want on
the window. Within the next few days, students will be able to see the water cycle happen right
before their eyes. This is an example of the bag. I want to give this station and few extra minutes
than the other stations, in case of questions that they will be able to ask me.

Collaborative (15 minutes):

In this station, I will have all the students in their group work together to navigate the app Water
Cycle HD. They will all get their individual iPads and open the app. Within this app, the students
are able to click through the different stages of the water cycle. When they click on a stage, it
will bring them to definitions, pictures, videos, etc. They can all click through the different
stages together and take turns reading the descriptions out loud. If students need help with the
reading, the app offers a read-along option. Within the app, it also has quiz questions that will
pop up throughout the experience. The students can work together to answer these questions
collaboratively. The students will continue to click through, read, watch, and answer the
questions until the time for this station is over. To make sure the students did what they were
supposed to, I will go around to each students iPad after the time is up and make sure they
answered questions and had clicked through at least a majority of the app.
 Independent Digital (15 minutes):
For this section of the stages, I will direct all students to get out their iPad and go to the app
Edpuzzle. Here, they should already be enrolled in our class using our class code. Clicking on
our class, there will be an assigned Edpuzzle. Student will be instructed to complete the
Edpuzzle on their own, using their individual headphones provided. Within the Edpuzzle, there
will be questions that pop up throughout the video, pertaining to the water cycle and what the
video talks about. These questions will be graded, and all the students’ scores will be sent back
to me. While the students are watching this video, I will encourage them to also take notes in
their notebooks as they go along. It will be a good way to look back at the information learned
for the day to review.
Closure (15 minutes):
Once all stations are complete and time has run out, I will instruct all of my students to clean up
whatever they need to and go back to their original desks. I will instruct all of my student to get
their iPads and go into the Kahoot app. I made a Kahoot and am going to have all of the students
play it as an end of the lesson review. For the students who place in first, second, and third place,
I will be giving out a homework pass to each, to be able to use once during the school year. I will
not tell the students this until the end, that way I will be able to see who was truly paying
attention to the lessons they were asked to learn today. Once complete, if time still allows, they
will be able to have free time to either finish work they need to or to have a mind break for
themselves for the remaining time.

Rationale: You must have at least two paragraphs (one for each mandatory piece of
multimedia)

Youtube Video:
For introducing the lesson, I thought a fun, catchy video would be a great way for the students to
get excited to engage in these activities they are about to do. This lesson is for second graders
and they may have a hard time staying focused for a long period of time. They also may not be
interested in the topic being taught, so it may be hard for their young minds to engage in the
lesson. Using a fun, upbeat, catchy song will catch the students attention and help them to get
excited about the upcoming stations. The video I chose goes along with exactly what I am trying
to teach the students in my lesson. This video is great to use because I can also turn on closed
captioning for those with hearing impairments, as well as throughout the video fun, engaging
visuals to go with the words.

Water Cycle HD App:

For the collaborative work section of the stations, I had the students all navigate the Water Cycle
HD app on their iPad’s. I thought this would be a great way for my students to learn
collaboration and be able to really talk through their thoughts with each other. I easily could have
used this app for the individual section; however, I wanted my students to learn how to
successfully navigate through a more challenging app with their peers. If they were stuck on any
word or portion of the app, they were able to ask each other for help, instead of coming straight
to me. This app was also great because throughout navigating, questions would come up about
the information they just looked at or read about. The students can deliberate on the answer
together. This app is also very inclusive. For the reading sections, there is an option to do a read-
along instead. If the reading got to be too challenging, the students can select this and the read-
along with read the words, highlighting them as it goes along.

Edpuzzle:
Edpuzzle is a great app to use when teachers want to assess their students. Assigning a video for
students to watch can be difficult, because the students may not actually watch the video. In
order to know that the students watched and understood the video, I can assign an Edpuzzle to
the class. I will be able to see the progress the students have made on their video, as well as the
questions they got right or wrong. This is great for listening comprehension skills. I am also able
to have my students watch a video completely of my choosing, as well as making all of the
questions that go along with the video myself. This way, I will know that my students can do
them and that they will meet all standards. This is also a great review tool to use at the end of a
lesson, or as a homework assignment. Edpuzzle has closed captions as well.

Kahoot:
Kahoot is one of the most used apps throughout all ages from elementary to even college level.
Kahoot is a great way to review the content you have learned by also making a game out of it. It
is great because I get to make the questions and answers myself, so I know they will all fit
exactly what my students should have learned throughout the lesson, as well as going along with
the standards and objectives. As much as this game is a review, it is also a great way for me as
the teacher to see who understood and really took in the content, and who struggled and needs
more help with the topic. Another benefit of Kahoot is the competitive nature it will bring out of
the students and encourage them to want to be on that leaderboard throughout the game and
especially at the end.