Planning the inquiry

1. What is our purpose? To inquire into the following:

Grade: 5th

Ages: 9-12 School code: 006610

School: Oak Forest Elementary

transdisciplinary theme How we organize ourselves descriptors: an inquiry into the interconnectedness of human-made system and communities; the structure and function of organizations; societal decision-making; economic activities and their impact on humankind and the environment PYP planner Teacher(s): Jones, Parks, Rice, Staffa, Rawlings, Legate, Stephenson Date:

March 25 May 17, 2013

over number of weeks: 7

Proposed duration: 60 hours

central idea Society faces changes with fluctuations in the economy and market

Summative assessment task(s): What are the possible ways of assessing students understanding of the central idea? What evidence, including student-initiated actions, will we look for?
Task: Students will design a brochure for an aerodynamically designed vehicle. The brochure should include: a) a unique design; b) vehicle details that are colorful, c) text design is easy to read, d) vehicle fuel/energy efficiency, e) and energy source. Criteria: Students will be able to: explain how fossils fuels are finite describe the economic need for fuel/energy efficient vehicles describe how some energy fuels are more environmentally friendly than others explain why vehicles of the future will be more aerodynamic Assessment tool: The aerodynamic vehicle brochures and presentation will be assessed by rubric.

2. What do we want to learn? What are the key concepts (form, function, causation, change, connection, perspective, responsibility, reflection) to be emphasized within this inquiry? Key Concepts: change, causation, responsibility Related concepts: Cause-effect, Economics, Cooperation What lines of inquiry will define the scope of the inquiry into the central idea? An economy is the wealth and resources of a country or region. Exploring alternative energies will stimulate a green economy. What causes objects to move differently under different circumstances? Everything in the universe exerts a gravitational force on everything else. What teacher questions/provocations will drive these inquiries? Social Studies Provocation: Write Black Thursday, October 24, 1929 on the SmartBoard. Ask students to speculate the meaning of this date. Science Provocation: A day or two before teaching the unit set up an area of the room with things that move (balls, tops, electronic toys, hot wheels, pinwheels etc. -use your imagination!) - an "artifacts table". Do not tell students what they are for. The artifact table begins to build curiosity and excitement about what might be coming next.

Updated November 2012 to include science lessons Taught and reflected between March 28 April 29, 2012

3. How might we know what we have learned?

What are the possible ways of assessing students prior knowledge and skills? What evidence will we look for? A Carousel Brainstorm would be an effective strategy to use in assessing students prior knowledge of the social studies and science portions of this unit. Chart paper containing several statements or issues for student consideration would be posted at strategic locations around the classroom. Groups of students brainstorm and respond at one station and then rotate to the next position where they add additional comments. As new thoughts and ideas emerge, the list grows. When the carousel stops the original team prepares a summary and then presents the large groups ndings. Knowledge of key vocabulary terms will be important in determining prior knowledge. What are the possible ways of assessing student learning in the context of the lines of inquiry? What evidence will we look for? Provide students with a writing prompt that is based upon a line of inquiry. The prompt could be written on the white board or class website. Evidence of understanding will be shown through students written response. Their response should reflect the central idea and incorporate at least two of the key concepts. Students written response to prompts can be assessed by rubric. Engagement: (box 2) Evidence of student understanding will occur from written jottings, IB journal entries, class discussions, and teachers anecdotal notes. Explore and Explain: Students knowledge through initial exploration will occur through hands on experiences. Understanding can be assessed through journal entries, clicker quizzes, and presentations. Extend: Student created models and charts will be assessed by rubric in a variety of ways; self, peer and teacher. Leading and facilitating student inquiry: Written Document Analysis Worksheet and written report will be assessed by rubric. Students will be assessed on their presentation of the economic heroes based upon class participation and successfully building a web page about their economic hero.

Updated November 2012 to include science lessons Taught and reflected between March 28 April 29, 2012

4. How best might we learn? What are the learning experiences suggested by the teacher and/or students to encourage the students to engage with the inquiries and address the driving questions? Explore and Explain: Students will write an IB journal entry 2 or 3 times a week on a prompt provided by the teacher. Whole class discussion to unpack key words in the central idea. Read the novel Number the Stars by Lois Lowery as a class. Visit the Civil Rights Museum Extend: Conduct bubble gum experiment to explore speed Using index cards, string, and washers make a simple accelerometer to learn about acceleration. Explore activity on page 323 of science text Does gravity affect all objects in the same way? Students create timelines of the events that lead up to World War II Conduct an experiment with Newtons Cradle to examine momentum, potential and kinetic energy. Distribute the Student Sheet: Alphabet Soup and give each team a sheet of poster paper. Students in their teams decide which are the ten most valuable or important New Deal programs. Each team creates a collage poster of .The New Deal Big Ten. or .The Most Important Alphabet Soup Programs. That illustrates its choices of the ten programs. The collage should include one or more pictures or illustrations for each of the ten New Deal programs or agencies. Students may cut pictures from magazines and newspapers or draw illustrations that relate to the goals or achievements of their New Deal Big Ten. (For example: young men building a road might illustrate the CCC or photographs of the elderly might illustrate the Social Security Act.) Students respond to the following writing prompt. You are a Japanese American teenager interned in one of the camps. Your parents, who emigrated from Japan, have lost their home and business. You have been separated from your friends, had to leave your school, and were forced to leave your dog behind. You can leave the camp.if you enlist in the armed services. Will you enlist to serve your country? Why or why not? Distribute the Student Sheets: Photographs of Japanese American Internment. Complete photo analyzer worksheet. Complete the Nifty Fifties Scavenger Hunt by searching the library and the Internet. Students must cite their sources for each answer (websites, books, authors, page numbers,issues). After all are complete, come together as a class and discuss each entry. Leading and Facilitating Student Inquiry: Create a Forces and Motion of Roller Coasters project. Students debate one of the following statements regarding the New Deal. 1) The federal government should support the people who need help, or 2) The federal government should not support the people who need help. Students read Remembering D-Day. Working with teammates, students read the first-person account from the D-Day invasion. Students discuss the account, answering the following questions. Does this change your idea of war? In what way? Students research how women in their community supported the war effort in the Second World War. Based upon their research, students will write an informational report and present their findings. Listen to Roosevelts Four Freedoms message to Congress at www.nara.gov/exhall/powers/freedoms.html Then close read Roosevelts Four Freedoms message to Congress and War Bond posters. Students will write a summary and explain why President Roosevelt would have listed these Four Freedoms as those which were most importantto the American public at that time. Students, working in their small teams, read the first set of quotations from In Kennedys Own Words and discuss how President Kennedy.s attitude changed. How had it stayed the same? What events may have caused changes? Write a summary of your groups thoughts. What opportunities will occur for transdisciplinary skills development and for the development of the attributes of the learner profile? Transdisciplinary Skills: Self-Management: Through research, students will be actively involved in making informed choices Communication: Through oral presentations and the use of rubrics, students will effectively utilize their listening, speaking, reading, writing, and non-verbal cues and skills Research: As part of prior learning, students will identify research skills to develop during the inquiry process. They will use these skills to collect, record, organize, and interpret their findings about the global economy. Thinking: Through planning and evaluation, students increase their acquisition of knowledge of the current global economic issues Social: Students will use and develop their social skills by accepting responsibility, respecting others, cooperating, resolving conflict, group decision making, and adopting a variety of group roles.

Updated November 2012 to include science lessons Taught and reflected between March 28 April 29, 2012

Planning the inquiry

5. What resources need to be gathered?

What people, places, audio-visual materials, related literature, music, art, computer software, etc, will be available? Newspaper: USA Today International Book: The Giving Tree ISBN: 0060256656 How will the classroom environment, local environment, and/or the community be used to facilitate the inquiry? The classroom environment will be the center of analysis for research and discussions. It will serve as a common meeting place for students to communicate their ideas through the collaborative process. Field Trip to Civil Rights Museum Field Trip: JA Biztown

Updated November 2012 to include science lessons Taught and reflected between March 28 April 29, 2012
International Baccalaureate Organization 2007

6. To what extent did we achieve our purpose? Assess the outcome of the inquiry by providing evidence of students understanding of the central idea. The reflections of all teachers involved in the planning and teaching of the inquiry should be included. During the visit to J. A. Biztown, children demonstrated their knowledge of change in a market by operating a business and trading with other companies. Teachers observed children analyzing and processing the central idea while they were engaged in several instructional games that required them to collaborate with each other. Simulations were another teaching strategy used to reinforce the idea of change and development in economies and markets. We know that students understood the central idea from reading their journals, listening to their discussions, and grading their projects.

How you could improve on the assessment task(s) so that you would have a more accurate picture of each students understanding of the central idea. To improve future assessments, we would have the students come up with a project that would allow them to display their understanding of the central idea in place of teacher driven project.

What was the evidence that connections were made between the central idea and the Transdisciplinary theme?

We observed students function as organized units trying to accomplish one goal. Students demonstrated the importance of being organized in order to be productive in a dynamic work environment.

Updated November 2012 to include science lessons Taught and reflected between March 28 April 29, 2012

Updated November 2012 to include science lessons Taught and reflected between March 28 April 29, 2012

Reflecting on the inquiry

8. What student-initiated inquiries arose from the learning? Record a range of student-initiated inquiries and student questions and highlight any that were incorporated into the teaching and learning.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Are there hybrid cars and go green initiatives in other countries too? How does using alternative fuels help our economy and the global economy? Does using an alternative fuel car actually save you money? How do things that happen in other parts of the world affect our economy? Do we really need gasoline anymore, or is it that the oil industry makes a lot of money and people rely on it for the economy? What kind of things can I do to be more green?

At this point teachers should go back to box 2 What do we want to learn? and highlight the teacher questions/provocations that were most effective in driving the inquiries.

Exploring alternative energies will stimulate a green economy. Everything in the universe exerts a gravitational force on everything else.

What student-initiated actions arose from the learning? Record student-initiated actions taken by individuals or groups showing their ability to reflect, to choose and to act. A student started an online blog, and her focus was on the current state of the economy. She talked about current events and issues affecting our economy and the effects of going green environmentally and economically. She frequently referenced Al Gores work. One student entered into an oratorical contest. Her focus of her speech was having a voice and impacting your community in order to make a difference. Several students requested the start of a debate club at Oak Forest so that they can have discussions and debates about issues relating to the economy and environment. One student entered into a poetry contest, with the theme of his poem being to save the earth.

Updated November 2012 to include science lessons Taught and reflected between March 28 April 29, 2012

Reflecting on the inquiry

9.

Teacher notes

This year, TCAP review fell during our unit study time frame. Therefore, we adjusted our summative assessment of creating a hybrid car from a model to a descriptive brochure. Although we modified the summative assessment, the quality of learning was not compromised. Students still analyzed the global economy, fuel alternatives, and the effects of aerodynamics on vehicle design. Students analyzed business newspaper articles to make conscious decisions of which stocks to purchase as part of the Commercial Appeal Stock Market Game. They researched marketing techniques and implemented those techniques to create their own visual commercial and print ad for their team. Throughout the unit they tracked the progression and/or decline of their team stocks and graphed the results. Just like last year, students did not initially relate the word economy to a system that sells goods and services, nor did they know that there are about 6 alternative fuels used to operate vehicles; all of which we researched throughout the unit. Students had a much better idea of how an economy functions after completing the JABiz Town curriculum. They learned how a local economy functions and were then able to extrapolate to the global economy.

Updated November 2012 to include science lessons Taught and reflected between March 28 April 29, 2012

International Baccalaureate Organization 2

Updated November 2012 to include science lessons Taught and reflected between March 28 April 29, 2012
International Baccalaureate Organization 2007