Teacher:

Date:
Subject / grade level:
Materials:

Competency

Lesson objective(s):

ENGAGEMENT
 Describe how the teacher will capture students’ interest.
 What kind of questions should the students ask themselves after the engagement?

EXPLORATION
 Describe what hands-on/minds-on activities students will be doing.
 List “big idea” conceptual questions the teacher will use to encourage and/or focus students’ exploration

EXPLANATION
 Student explanations should precede introduction of terms or explanations by the teacher. What questions or techniques will the teacher use to help
students connect their exploration to the concept under examination?
 List higher order thinking questions which teachers will use to solicit student explanations and help them to justify their explanations.

ELABORATION
 Describe how students will develop a more sophisticated understanding of the concept.
 What vocabulary will be introduced and how will it connect to students’ observations?
 How is this knowledge applied in our daily lives?

EVALUATION
 How will students demonstrate that they have achieved the lesson objective?
 This should be embedded throughout the lesson as well as at the end of the lesson

What is a 5E Lesson Plan?

The 5 E lesson supports inquire-based instruction. It allows children to make discoveries and to
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process new skills in an engaging way. Teachers can also adequately plan power objectives
more effectively by using the 5E process. Children are not just learning with this method, they
are more knowledgeable about their own metacognition because they are coached along and
not dictated by teachers merely lecturing. The role of the teacher is to facilitate and support
students as they use prior knowledge to build new knowledge.
The 5 Es are:
• Engage
• Explore
• Explain
• Elaborate
• Evaluate
When planning a lesson each of these areas should be completed. Often times these lessons
may take a few days to complete.

1. Engage
To engage means to excite and to draw your child or student's curiosity. It means to wow them
in a way that catches their attention. It is not forcing children to learn but inviting them to do
so. This is how lessons are introduce. It does not have to be difficult or overly detailed just
interesting enough to open students minds for the learning process to begin. Using technology
to engage student learning makes planning very easy for teachers in today's classrooms. Using
Smartboard technology, videos, illustrations, asking questions, KWL charts, reading a great
book, acting out a character or even introducing a game are ways to engage students at the
beginning of a lesson.

2. Explore
Once students are fully in grossed in the lesson, intrigued by a video or maybe a book, now it is
time to allow them to explore the concept. Lets say I do a lesson on Camouflage, first I would
engage them with an informative video, explaining camouflage with animation. Now in the
explore they will play lets say a game where they will go out side and break up into teams.
Each team will be given a minute to find as many various colored strings scattered in the grass.
The idea with exploring is to give the learner the opportunity to practice or work with their
new knowledge in some way. The most effective explorations allow for mistakes or trial and
error. Its is looking at a concept before discussing all the details, with hopes that students will
discover answers to possible questions through exploration.

3. Explain
Students now have an opportunity to hear from their educator. The teacher's role so far has
been to mainly facilitate learning, now they can use their expertise to answer questions
students may have about what they are learning. They also may pose questions to the student
to see what they are able to explain what they have learned. Checking for misunderstandings
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helps the teacher to observe what objectives need to be clarified or taught. So for example,
with the Camouflage Lesson, once the students have picked as many strings as possible, they
should count each color that they picked. Which color did they pick up the most, which color
did they pick the least amount of? Have them make a chart, so they can look at their findings
and compare as a group. Students should notice that they picked less green strings because
the green was blending in with the grass. They have more of a different color like purple
because of its contrast in color. This explaining is done without the teacher having to do much
lecturing. The lesson is reinforced by what the students have seen from their exploring.

4. Elaborate
Here the students can participate in an extension or a different activity that either re-teaches
an objective or teaches more details about the concept being taught. Here differentiation can
be used. A student above level will need an elaboration that extends or enriches the lesson. A
student below level will need perhaps a repeat of the same explore activity with more teacher
input to guide students through again to correct misunderstandings. Again with the
camouflage, elaboration may be discussing what other animals besides say frogs use
camouflage? What elements in their habitat allow them to do so? Or the teacher might say
let's look at our charts again from the results of our game. Doing so will allow him or her to re-
teach or elaborate on what was misunderstood.
5. Evaluate
Finally, after the objectives are taught, it is time to assess. What have students effectively
learned? What do they not understand? What should be done to help them? Assessments do
not have to be the traditional quiz or essay. It can be a reflection, a project, book report, or a
model. Like with the camouflage lesson, the evaluation could an assignment where students
come up with 5 facts about camouflage and illustrate each in their own unique way. They
might make a model, paint a picture, or make a mini book with drawings and facts to illustrate
what they learned. Using a rubric the teacher or parent can now easily grade or make note of
what is learned and of what needs to be retaught.

Make it Easy on Yourself When Planning

Many veteran teachers find the 5E lesson plan just more to do. I think that it makes teaching
the lesson easier in that the students are more willing to learn, the activities are set up, the
lesson sequence is well thought out and the objective is thoroughly covered.
Use the following words when questioning and make sure to keep the Scientific Method in
mind:
• What do you observe?
• Make a hypothesis.
• Analyze the data, what can you conclude?
What connections can you make?
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Module Outline
Title Page
Acknowledgment
Introduction
Overview (target/intended audience)
Rationale of choosing the Topics/Theme.
Insights/Experiences while crafting the Module.
Table of Contents
Lessons
Lesson 1
Lesson 2
Lesson 3
Lesson 4
Lesson 5
References