Module 2 Unit Planner - Materials and Their Properties

UNIT:	MATERIALS AND THEIR PROPERTIES	GRADE 1	DURATION: 6 WEEKS
Outcomes from ACARA:	Science Inquiry Skills to be developed from ACARA:	Conceptual Understandings (Written by teacher)	Unit Questions (Written by teacher)
Curriculum content descriptions: Different materials can be combined for a particular purpose (ACSSU031) Elaborations: - exploring the local environment to observe a variety of materials, and describing ways in which materials are used - suggesting why different parts of everyday objects such as toys and clothes are made from different materials - identifying materials such as paper that can be changed and remade or recycled into new products	Pose and respond to questions, and make predictions about familiar objects and events (ACSIS037)  S2 Elaborations • using the senses to explore the local environment to pose interesting questions, make inferences and predictions S4 • thinking about ‘What will happen if...?’ type questions about everyday objects and events S2 Participate in guided investigations to explore and answer questions (ACSIS038) Elaborations • manipulating objects and materials and making observations of the results S4 • researching with the use of simple information sources S4 • sorting objects and events based on easily identified characteristics  S8	Learners understand that the properties of a material will determine how useful an object made from them will be for particular purposes. Learners understand that objects are made from various materials which have specific observable and less observable properties that can be named and described by degree.	How do the properties of a material affect how we can use the objects made from it? What kinds of specific properties do materials have?
Assessment:
Culminating Assessment (DEMONSTRATING UNDERSTANDING)	Goal -  Your goal is to demonstrate your understanding of why we choose certain materials for certain purposes. Role -  You are a designer. Audience – Your audience the teachers of your grade. Situation – The teachers in your grade want to say thank you to the head of the early childhood section of your school. They have baked 6 cup cakes with icing to give to her. They will bring them to school by car tomorrow. It is supposed to rain tomorrow. You have been asked to design a container that will keep the cakes safe while they are carried from the car to the office. Product – Your product should include: • A picture of the container. • Labels on the picture that show what each part of the container is made of. An explanation of why you made the container that shape and why you chose the materials you did (the explanation can be done in writing, orally or both depending on each child’s level of language ability)
Formative Assessments	Knowledge Assessments: Matching materials to their names, sorting materials according to properties	Skills: sorting objects and creating classifications, development of questions	Understanding: Mini design projects - designing a hat for different purposes, making boats and describing material choices.
INQUIRY STAGES:	ACTIVITY 1	ACTIVITY 2	ACTIVITY 3
TAPPING INTO CURRENT UNDERSTANDING	Problem Presentation/Brainstorm Children are presented with a broken umbrella and a range of materials that could be used to fix it. The context is that the umbrella is used to keep us dry. Using a First Thinking/ Second Thinking chart the children sort materials as to which ones they think could be used to fix different parts of the umbrella and asked to justify their thinking.  The First Thinking is done as a group without any discussion around the purpose of different parts (simply by looking at the materials).  Photos are taken of the sorts/ children make their own chart in their journals.	Puzzling Pictures Activity: Children are presented with a range of different chairs that are made out of a variety of different materials.  They are asked to rank them according to which would be the best chair providing positive and negative reasons for each. Children’s thinking is recorded in various ways, either with them using post it notes, photos or class charts, using technology such as Doodlecasts	See-Think-Wonder Using a bicycle children explore a See-Think-Wonder activity. See- What materials do we see on the bicycle? Think – Why are these materials used for the different parts? Wonder – Wonderings about the materials use on the bicycle. I wonder if we could use… to make the…? Children’s thinking is recorded in various ways, either with them using post it notes, photos or class charts, using technology such as Doodlecasts
FINDING QUESTIONS	Record questions that come out of the activity planned above. Map questions and filter then based in the following criteria: answerable, can be explored through experimentation, build on what we know.	Record questions that come out of the activity planned above. Map questions and filter then based in the following criteria: answerable, can be explored through experimentation, build on what we know.	Record questions that come out of the activity planned above. Map questions and filter then based in the following criteria: answerable, can be explored through experimentation, build on what we know.
EXPLORING THE EVIDENCE A significant amount of time will be spend in this and the next phase of the inquiry as the students move through exploring a range of different materials and the different types of material. For example: plastic Would include: hard plastic such as plexiglass through to clingfilm	ACTIVITY 1 Sorting Materials: Children are given multiple opportunities to sort and bundle different materials based on a number of things: What they think they are made of? What properties they observe about them? As part of this work the students are introduced to the criteria of scientific questions, being those that are: - answerable and can be tested - can be tested through experimentation -build on what they already know. Teacher and students collectively decide on various ways to record their thinking at this stage, this could be done wit journals and pictures, using photos in a Doodlecast and recording voice recordings with explanations.	ACTIVITY 2 Children are introduced to various different materials through books and short video clips. Various strategies are use to track both their findings and their questions and wonderings. Examples being: We found out that…. This makes me wonder about…. Building on Activity One of this stage, the students continue to develop scientific questions that support the deepening of their understanding of these materials and their properties and that can be explored and tested in Activity 3.	ACTIVITY 3 Students then devise and range of different experiments to test the following properties of the materials: transparency waterproof elasticity toughness There is one model created together as a class and then groups develop an experiment for a new property. The type of language explored with the children here is: If we want to test….I think we could… As part of their work the teacher introduces them to the idea of variable so as to ensure that their experiments have some validity.
	ACTIVITY 1	ACTIVITY 2	ACTIVITY 3
CONSTRUCTING THEORIES	Continuum Thinking: Children are introduced to the idea of a continuum as a way to demonstrate comparative thinking and to show this visually.   The children engage in create large continuum using the different materials that they test through their experiments. For example a continuum would go from absorbent through to waterproof, another would be opaque to transparent.  The children engage in the process of plotting the different materials that they test on the continuum based on the the results from their experiment.	Graphic Organizer: Through a class discussion the group identify what would be key information to keep from their explorations, if they are to go back and be able to offer suitable solutions for the umbrella problem and be able to justify their choices.   As a class the group explore different table formats that could allow them to track the key properties of different materials, and how this property affects the use of the material.  This table then gets created as a wall size document where the findings from the experiments are tracked and recorded.	In order to begin to develop some theories the children would engage in a CLAIM - SUPPORT - QUESTION activity where they use this thinking routine to make recommendations for the umbrella.  In this routine the children make a CLAIM about what would be the best material to fix part of the umbrella, they them provide SUPPORT for that claim from the research they have gathered, and the pose a QUESTION that they are still thinking about. Eg: My CLAIM is that the clear plastic would be the best material to use to fix the top of the umbrella with, this is SUPPORTED by the experiments that we did that showed that no water went through it and that it was able to bend and I know that this part of the umbrella needs to stop water but also fold up when the umbrella is closed. I QUESTION if a coloured plastic might be less distracting for the person…?
	ACTIVITY 1	ACTIVITY 2	ACTIVITY 3
TESTING THEORIES	What if thinking… Students go through the process of responding to various prompts that use “What if thinking”.  They are given questions such as “What is backpacks were made of glass…? The children work in team to come up with as many positive and negative points for each of these what if statements and share as a whole class.	Students are presented with the following problem to solve: Goal -  Your goal is to demonstrate your understanding of why we choose certain materials for certain purposes by designing a container that has a specific purpose. Role -  You are a designer. Audience – Your audience the teachers of your grade. Situation – The teachers in your grade want to say thank you to the head of the early childhood section of your school. They have baked 6 cup cakes with icing to give to her. They will bring them to school by car tomorrow. It is supposed to rain tomorrow. You have been asked to design a container that will keep the cakes safe while they are carried from the car to the office. Product – Your product should include: • A picture of the container. • Labels on the picture that show what each part of the container is made of. An explanation of why you made the container that shape and why you chose the materials you did (the explanation can be done in writing, orally or both depending on each child’s level of language ability)	Students revisit the umbrella problem and complete the process of selecting materials, using them to fix the parts and to justify their choices based on the materials, the purposes and the properties. or Students negotiate with the teacher on a new classroom based design problem that they will try to solve using what they understand about materials and their properties.
	ACTIVITY 1
REFLECTING AND ACTING	Students revisit the three activities that were part of the TUNING in phase of the inquiry and complete various different reflections on them.  For example: I used to think…now I think… I have learned….