Handouts for the Unit Plan:
Introduction: This unit plan is about dinosaurs and dinosaur fossils.
The students should be around seven years old and in second grade. The students should already know how to count to 100 and should be familiar with the Internet. Students will be using the Internet often, and will be taught certain techniques.
West Virginia Content and Standard Objectives (CSO’s)
v SC.2.4.2- Identify the structures of physical characteristics of living things and explain their functions.
v SC.2.4.19- Describe how fossils are formed
v SC2.4.20-Match a fossil or a picture with a picture of its organism
v MA.2.1.12-Use rounding to determine the reasonableness of a sum or difference.
v RLA.2.2.4- Use a variety of sources to gather information to communicate with others (e.g. dictionary, information books, pictures, etc).
III. Select Media and Material
The following is a list of the materials I will use for this unit:
v Handouts from the Dinosaur Web quest page
v Internet Access
v Printer
v Computer
v Pictures and Videos of Dinosaurs
v Gardening tools
v Writing and drawing materials (various crayons, markers, pencils, etc)
v Dirt
v Cement
v Small and Plastic Insects, Animals, etc
v Books, such as Dinosaurs (A Magic Tree House Research Guide, by Mary Pope Osborne, Dinotopia: First Flight, by James Gurney, Dinosaurs and How They Lived, by Steve Parker, American Museum of Natural History: On the Trail of Incredible Dinosaurs, by William Lindsay, and Digging Up Dinosaurs, by Aliki.
The Following are Wonderful Websites:
v Dinosaur Web quest
o Teachers will use the following link, Overview for Teachers. Students will this website: Dino Webquest This website contains the web quest that the students will do, it is simple and the students should be able to do it with little help. It has a great online math activity that we can do as a class and it gives teachers a way to introduce dinosaurs into the classroom. It contains wonderful vocabulary words, and a link to another great website, which involves the web quest.
v National Geographic Website on Dinosaurs
o National Geographic Dino Eggs This website gives students a wealth of information about dinosaur eggs. They can look at the pictures and see what baby dinosaurs looked like, as well as they can read to understand the message the website is trying to convey. As a class, we will go over any key words the students don’t understand. It is great for teachers because it gives extra information for background knowledge.
v Great Website for Dinosaur Books
o Great Books!. This website gives a comprehensive list of excellent dinosaur books. This is great because it cuts down on trying to find dinosaur books, while most books don’t excite students.
v American Museum of Natural History
o American Muesum of Natural History This website is great to teach about dinosaurs. There are several games, even a game that involve matching a fossil to the description of the dinosaur. It also gives wonderful illustrations of dinosaurs and great facts.
v Dinosaur Game Website
o Dino Games, this website is great because it is full of wonderful dinosaur games that the kids can play in free time. It is easy to access, so the students should be able to use it freely.
IV. Utilize Media and Materials
This unit will be taught over a period of 8 Days.
Day 1: I will begin by asking the students what they know about dinosaurs. We will discuss their responses. We will then watch a short dinosaur video and read the book, Digging up Dinosaurs, by Aliki. After those two activities, I will find out what they learned from the story. I will give them various facts about dinosaurs to tie up the day. (Approx. 40 minutes)
Day 2: The students will be working on the dinosaur web quest for 30 minutes, what they do not have finished will be completed the next day. They will navigate the Zoom website to fill in their worksheets.
Day 3: Student will finish the worksheet and compare answers. They are allowed to read various dinosaur books around the classroom or do a word search for dinosaur terms that I will hand out. We will discuss the final results as a class, when everyone is finished (approx. 25 minutes).
Day 4: We will compare the sums and differences (using rounding) of the weights and other aspects of dinosaurs, using various dinosaurs. The students then will work by themselves on the dinomath worksheet passed out in class. We will discuss answers tomorrow, so if the student doesn’t finish it, it will be homework. (Approx. 30 minutes)
Day 5: We will discuss the answers of the dinomath worksheet first. After, we will discuss various body parts of dinosaurs and compare them to a horse. As a class we will discuss what their body parts are used for and the student will draw their own dinosaur. When finished, they can play on the dinosaur playground site, until everyone is finished. (Approx. 40 minutes)
Day 6: Students will use computers to access various dinosaur websites, such as the American Museum of Natural History to learn about fossils. We will discuss what they learned as a class. They can use the activity to match the fossil to the dinosaur descriptions. (Approx. 40 minutes)
Day 7: We will dig up fossils that I have created. The students will go outside and use gardening tools to dig up fossils. They have to find out what was fossilized in the egg, by looking at various plastic animals or pictures. (Approx 45 minutes)
Day 8: We will discuss how fossils are formed, do fun dinosaur activities, such as crosswords and fill in the blanks, and watch a dinosaur video to wrap up the unit. (Approx. 40 minutes)
V. Require Learner Participation
I will keep the students engaged in the lesson by requiring them to use the internet to do a lot of their work. This will keep them on task and I will go over their work to make sure they are on task. If they are constantly participating, I will reward them with a snack. The lesson is very exciting, and the children have the dinosaur fossil dig at the end of the lesson to look forward too.
I will evaluate my students through observation and through a dinosaur labeling exercise, which is on the ZOOM website. Observation will be used to evaluate SC.2.4.2, as we discuss it as a class, as well as observe the student at the computer, for CSO TEC.2.5.1. The digging up a fossil activity will be used to evaluate the student matching a fossil to the organism, CSO SC.2.4.20. Discussion will be used to describe how fossils are formed, CSO, SC.2.4.19. Class participation and the dinomath worksheet will be used for evaluating MA.2.1.12. As children pick up different books around the classroom, used different types of media, and watched movies, I evaluated them by observing and asking questions throughout the day, for CSO RLA.2.2.4.