Lesson Teaching Reflective Summary

Teacher Candidate for Science Endorsement: Janice Belcher

School: Dowell Elementary

Grade: Fourth

Lesson Topic: Ecosystems- Lesson 3

Write a brief summary or blog of your experiences teaching this lesson,
addressing the following questions:

What went well? What did not go well?

Overall, I found this to be a very effective lesson in my Ecosystem Unit.

Students were instantly engaged they loved looking at the pictures of
the different animals. The pictures I used were part of a collection that
contain factual information about that specific animal. My students
were so intrigued by this new information, however it was almost a
distraction. It was great that they were so engaged but I needed them
to focus more on enhance student understanding of the flow of energy
and the interdependence of life by focusing on food chains and food
webs.

How well were the lessons student performance objectives

attained?

I had to pull a small group of three students who were having difficulty
to place, in the correct sequence, their own food chain. I had to correct
misconceptions for these students. I started by using the animal
picture cards. They placed carnivorous animals instead of herbivorous
animals in the place there was supposed to be herbivorous animals.
After I modeled and explained one food chain for these students, they
were successful after this differentiation.

Did classroom activity center on science understanding, inquiry,

and sense-making by all students?

In this lesson, students were guided to think about how we can build a
food chain. Plants make their own food. All animals depend on plants.
Some animals eat plants for food. Other animals eat animals that eat
the plants. Basic relationships and connections between organisms in
food chains can be used to discover patterns within ecosystems. It was

not difficult for students to grasp the general notion that species
depend on one another and on the environment for survival.

Did your scientific content knowledge enable you to support

students construction of knowledge and understanding of
important scientific concepts and processes?

My students drawings show the interconnectedness of the diets of all

organisms and how energy and nutrients are transferred from
organism to organism. The placement of the arrows demonstrated that
they understood the flow of energy from one organism to another. My
students were able to explain thru their presentation that the arrow
points from an organism to the one that eats it and can be translated
into the words, "is eaten by". For example: wormbird means, A worm
is eaten by a bird. Additionally, my student were able to differentiate
between a food chain and a food web. For example, two different food
chains may have crickets in common.

When you have the opportunity to re-teach this lesson, what will
you do differently (strategies, teaching tools, assessments, etc.)
to improve student learning for all students?

Next time, I would hand out a new set of cards to be used. This would
ensure that each organism is represented and the focus would be more
on using the arrows to show the flow of energy moving through the
system. I would also have students highlight or color each food chain
within the web with different color. This would be a better visual of the
many food chains within the web. Then I would have the students pick
one of the food chains displayed in their food web and have them
visualize it happening in an ecosystem. They would write a small
narrative about it. This narrative would illustrate the movement of
energy in a system. It would include the sun shining down, for
example, on the trees (or any producer they have in the web) and
using it for photosynthesis. Having them construct a written piece
would help them process and synthesize the flow of energy through a
system. Furthermore, it would make concept more concrete.