LESSON PLAN Natalie Henes Title of Lesson: What is your opinion? Grade: 4th STANDARDS (4.W.

1) Write opinion pieces on topics or texts, supporting a point of view with reasons and information. (4.W.4) Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development and organization are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience. LESSON SUMMARY/OVERVIEW In this lesson, students will bring together the knowledge about Chinas water crisis that they learned the past few days and write an opinion piece about what they think China should be doing to solve their problem. OBJECTIVES Students will be able to review what Chinas water crisis is. Students will be able to brainstorm ideas to solve Chinas water crisis. Students will be able to state their opinion and support it with a few reasons. Students will be able to discuss their opinion with their peers. Students will be able to read aloud their writing. ASSESSMENT/EVALUATION Students will be able to score 80% or higher according to the writing rubric. PREREQUISITE KNOWLEDGE Students should know what Chinas water crisis is and why it is important to get clean water. The students should share with their shoulder partner and discuss the answers to these questions. MATERIALS Teacher: Smartboard/whiteboard Writing rubric Students: Pencil Lined paper Notes (taken the previous days) VOCABULARY/KEY WORDS Opinion- a view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge. Brainstorming- gathering a list of ideas Chinas water crisis- Chinas waters are lessening and becoming polluted; the south part of China has a lot of water, but the north is like a desert TEACHING PROCEDURES Procedural Steps (Step by step instructions for teaching the lesson): 1. Have students access their prior knowledge about the topic and discuss with their shoulder partner. 2. Brainstorm ideas about how to fix the problem (write ideas on the board) as a class. 3. Have students write down their own ideas on a piece of paper and reasons why they think their idea is the best. 4. Break up the students into groups and have them discuss their ideas. 5. Were any new ideas invented in the small groups? 6. Have volunteers read their writing. WAYS OF THINKING CONNECTION This lesson plan demonstrates mainly strategic and futures thinking. The students will develop a plan to solve Chinas water crisis and write about it. Strategic thinking gets students to think outside of the box and state their opinion on the topic. It also has students take the knowledge previously learned and apply it to make something for the future.