*evaporation

*condensation

*precipitation

*groundwater

1.01 Participate in partner and small group playwriting.

3.01 Participate in making artistic choices in a small group.

4.02 Demonstrate responsible behavior such as sharing, flexibility, leadership, negotiating and teamwork

8.07 Participate in presentations.

Big Ideas:

Objectives:

1. TSW present the stages of the water cycle.
2. TSW identify the important parts of the water cycle.
3. TSW recognize the importance of the water cycle.

Multiple Intelligences:

Bodily/Kinesthetic- students can choose this venue to represent the water cycle

Musical/Rhythmic- students can choose this venue to represent the water cycle

Interpersonal- working collaboratively in their groups toward making a presentation on the water cycle

Verbal/Linguistic- listening to the presentations, using the scripts

Visual/Spatial- watching the presentations of the other groups with visuals

Universal Design:

EC/ESL/AIG- these groups will be mixed together to draw on each other’s strengths and weaknesses; students who are not comfortable verbally representing the water cycle can do it through movement instead; there is a great deal of flexibility in the presentations so everyone can find their niche

Materials: the assigned grouping, the presentation and teamwork rubrics, water cycle test

Procedure:

1. Today we are finally going to be presenting the water cycle to Mrs. Moyers’ class. Is everyone excited?!
2. I would like to have groups to volunteer what order they are going in. I will write the list of groups on the board in the order of presenting.
3. I will remind the students the need to speak loudly and clearly when presenting and about general manners necessary during the performances.
4. Before we go to Mrs. Moyers’ class, you all have a very short amount of time to practice. I will give them 5 minutes to split up into their groups for one last rehearsal of their own.
5. The students will be asked back to their seats before the presentations begin. I will introduce each group before they perform for the first grade class. I will be grading their performances according to the Presentation Rubric while they perform.

Debriefing & Assessment:

1. Did everyone enjoy the presentations today?
2. Does anyone from Mrs. Moyers’ class have a question about the water cycle? (I will ask for student volunteers to answer any questions they might have)
3. Is there anything Mrs. Bateman’s class would like to share or explain with Mrs. Moyers’ class?

(once Mrs. Moyers class is gone)

4. Put your thumbs up if you think the presentation went well and the students learned about the water cycle? I will ask volunteers to explain why it went well or didn’t go well.
5. Did any group make some changes to their presentations because of feedback they got from their classmates? What kind of changes? Do you think the changes made your presentation better for today?
6. I will then say how I expect them to know a great deal about the water cycle now that they’ve even taught it to others. We will go through a quick review of the vocabulary words: precipitation, condensation, evaporation, groundwater, clouds, and heat. I will pass out the Water Cycle Quiz to all the students to assess if they have learned and understood the water cycle.

Reflection:

After my disappointment with the dress rehearsal, I was relieved today when the group who had the most problems with preparation had really pulled their act together. When I arrived, one of the students in the group had all of the parts typed up and each member had their part of the script in hand! We headed to Mrs. Moyers room after we had a short time for preparation. Mrs. Moyers and her class was very gracious and a very attentive audience. The question and answer session following the performances went especially well. The first question by one of the first grade students was "so water recycles itself all the time?" I was very impressed how much the first graders picked up and understood from the short presentations. I think being taught by fifth graders made them especially interested because they viewed them as role models. Some of the questions began to be off topic near the end of the question and answer session, but still very interesting. One student asked about what happened to the sun at night. I am glad that our performances sparked these students’ interest in science!

Mrs. Bateman gave me total control over the grading of the Water Cycle quiz and presentations. She asked me to assign grades to each student for the unit according to however I felt necessary. It felt great to be given the trust of assigning grades to the students. I think grading students will be a challenge for me in the future. It was difficult for me to try to take everything into account for each student: the quiz, the presentation, and the overall science rubric. I could see how certain students shined in different areas. Some students had really pulled more than their weight in the presentation groups but didn’t perform as well on the quiz. I decided on grades taking into consideration the strengths of certain students were not shown through a written quiz. The overall rubric gave me a better sense of what students had accomplished through the unit.