Health Unit: Earth and Space Science

Lesson Topic: Insects

Grade Level: 3^rd Grade

OBJECTIVES:

Behavior- The students will identify various insects and identify their different characteristics.

Affective- The students believe by learning about the different insects and their characteristics they will be able to recognize those insects on their own.

Cognitive- The students will be able to identify different insects by reading about their characteristics and seeing a picture of them.

METHODOLOGY:

            We will start off the class by brainstorming about insects we have seen and the names of insects we know.  We will write these insects names on the board and talk about them with the class. Then we will learn about several different insects and the characteristics of these insects.  Next, we will read stories about different insects. This will help the students get to know the insects more, and place visuals with the names of the insects. After reviewing the information on insects I will have the students get into groups. Within these groups students will create posters of a bug they made up containing characteristics of insects they learned about.  They will write these characteristics on their poster in order to display their knowledge of the topic. An example would be, “Our insect has eight legs, like a spider has”; “our insect has a stinger, like a bee has”; etc.  To finish up our unit we will bring in our own butterfly hatching kit.  By doing this the students will be able to observe the life cycle of a butterfly over a course of time.

MATERIALS:

Materials include books about insects, poster board, markers, crayons, butterfly kit.

ASSESSMENT:

            The students will be assessed on this material in two different ways.  As a class we will go on an “insect scavenger hunt”.  While on this scavenger hunt, the student is responsible for identifying five insects on their own, and showing them to the teacher.  The second form of assessment is individual.  The students will play “The Bugs Life” game to show that they are able to identify insects we talked about in class.

THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVE:

            This is an important unit because it is under the Earth Science Unit, and it is a part of the Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks.

ADAPTATIONS:

            For a student who is visually impaired, they will have someone read them the questions to the website assessment.