Cluster 1: Comprehension and CollaborationArchived

Who lives in the Everglades is lesson 3 of 3. Students will review some of the animals that live in the Everglades presented in lessons 1 and 2 by looking at an interactive presentation. Students will collaborate with a partner to do a sorting activity of animals that live in Florida and that do not live in Florida.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will revisit the Everglades discussing the similarities and differences between some of the animals that were presented in lesson one. They will continue to color and build their Everglades class book. Students will draw and write the similarities and differences using a Comparing Everglades Animals worksheet. Everglades Animals is lesson 2 out of 3.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will be introduced to the Everglades, learning about this special place for plants and animals that is unlike anywhere else on Earth. They will watch a presentation on some of the animals that live in the Everglades and start working on their Everglades Class Book.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this Kindergarten MEA lesson, students will work cooperatively to help Sweetie Cake Pops improve their recipe. They will work in groups to look at a data table and generate responses orally and written. Additionally, this lesson has a mathematical focus of skip counting by tens.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this MEA, students will help pick a flower that will be the focus of the Spring Festival.  They will practice counting pictures and representing the number of pictures with a written numeral.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will be asked to choose a new animal for a zoo. They will be asked to rank four animals from best to worst, based on popularity, food needs, danger to zookeepers, etc.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. MEAs resemble engineering problems and encourage students to create solutions in the form of mathematical and scientific models. Students work in teams to apply their knowledge of science and mathematics to solve an open-ended problem, while considering constraints and tradeoffs. Students integrate their ELA skills into MEAs as they are asked to clearly document their thought process. MEAs follow a problem-based, student centered approach to learning, where students are encouraged to grapple with the problem while the teacher acts as a facilitator. To learn more about MEA’s visit: https://www.cpalms.org/cpalms/mea.aspx

Type: Lesson Plan

This Kindergarten MEA will ask students to work in collaborative groups to choose the top three Brands of Ice Cream Bars that an ice cream truck may sell. Students will analyze the data provided and come up with a solution. They will also be asked to re evaluate their written procedures once a second data set is presented.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

This MEA lesson is designed for a Kindergarten grade level. Students will be working in small groups to figure out what moving company is best for a family that is moving to a different state and they will learn about weight by differentiating between heavy items and lighter items. The students will be using criteria such as pricing, moving of vehicles, speed, safety and overall rating.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is a kindergarten MEA in which students are deciding on the ideal day for another student to stay in and do chores.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this close reading lesson, students will compare and contrast the actions of the characters in two of Audrey Penn's beloved books, The Kissing Hand and A Pocket Full of Kisses. They will answer text-dependent questions, and they will describe and sequence story elements as they analyze the two books. Students will truly enjoy interacting with these two delightful stories!

Type: Lesson Plan

In this close reading lesson, students will compare and contrast the actions of the characters in two of Eileen Christelow's beloved books, Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed and Five Little Monkeys Sitting in a Tree. They will answer text-dependent questions and describe story elements as they analyze the two books. Students will truly enjoy interacting with these two delightful stories!

Type: Lesson Plan

In this close reading lesson, students will compare and contrast the actions of the characters in two of Laura Numeroff's beloved books, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie and If You Take a Mouse to School. They will answer text-dependent questions, and they will describe and sequence story elements as they analyze the two books. Students will truly enjoy interacting with these two delightful stories!

Type: Lesson Plan

The five senses are essential to understanding the world around us. What body parts relate to each of the five senses? How do we use the five senses to discover new information? Students will encounter these questions and more as they explore the five senses and their corresponding body parts through observation and conversation.

Type: Lesson Plan

How do you know if an animal is real or make-believe? What characteristics and behaviors do real animals possess? How does the media portray animals with characteristics they do not have in real life? Students will encounter these questions as they explore the differences between real and make-believe animals. This lesson will help you to identify what characteristics and behaviors classify an animal as being real or make-believe.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will become story sequencers as they participate in whole group, partner, and independent activities. Students will recall important events from the story The Little Red Hen and help generate a class story to demonstrate their understanding of beginning, middle, and end before completing their summative assessment. At the end of the lesson students will become authors of their own narrative when they write a sequential story of a special event. They will use suggestions and revisions from their peers and teacher to create a final draft of their narrative that will be shared with the class.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will work in teams to help choose the best Popsicle to sell. They will develop a procedure based on the following criteria: taste, color, cost, and melting speed. They will reassess the Popsicles during the twist incorporating flavors and a fourth Popsicle choice. Students may arrange the criteria based on their team's interpretation of most important to least important. Students may have to make trade offs based on these interpretations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

This MEA is designed on a Kindergarten grade level. Students will work in teams to determine the best pet toys to buy for a pet daycare. Students will use criteria such as fun, exercise, cost, and durability to make their determinations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

How does our sense of smell help us process new information and develop understanding of the world around us? What body part correlates to our sense of smell? How do we use our sense of smell along with many other senses to process or recall information? Students will encounter these questions as they explore their sense of smell. This lesson will help students to identify how they use their sense of smell to help them understand the world around them.

Type: Lesson Plan

This MEA is designed on a Kindergarten grade level. Students will work in teams to determine the best unique pizza topping to add to a restaurant menu. Students will use criteria such as taste, cost, and nutrition to make their determinations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

This MEA is designed on a Kindergarten grade level. Students will work in teams to determine the best piece of playground equipment to add to the city playground. Students will use criteria such as safety, cost, degree of fun, and time to build to make their determinations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

This MEA is designed at a Kindergarten grade level. Students will work in teams to determine the best apple treat to showcase in a display at a farm stand. Students will use criteria such as smell, taste, and profit to make their determinations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

The students will participate in reading the rhyming story The Crayon Box That Talked and help to generate words that rhyme with colors. Then, students will be able to demonstrate their understanding of rhyming words by completing a sorting activity.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will use the book, On a Farm by Alexa Andrews to practice identifying the topic and details of a text. Through the use of a bubble map and a student response sheet, students will record their learning after exploring the book. Student work will be appreciated at the end of the lesson with a gallery walk.

Type: Lesson Plan

As part of learning about Concepts of Print, students will explore how some books do not have words and you need to "read" the pictures to understand what is happening. The book, Chalk by Bill Thomson will be used to inspire the students to add writing to his book as they dream what they would draw if they knew their chalk drawings would come to life.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will listen to the teacher read aloud the well-loved book, The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. Students will collaboratively practice retelling the story with a partner and record the food that the caterpillar ate on a class chart. Using their imagination, students will create a sentence and accompanying illustration of what their caterpillar would eat using the high frequency word ‘and’. Teachers are provided with a rubric to assess how the students are using punctuationusing punctuation, capitalization, finger spacing, and phonetic spelling.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will record what they hear on a nature walk. They will learn that sounds are all around us and that they are made by vibrations.

Type: Lesson Plan

How do you know if an object is a plant or not? What are the major parts of a plant? Are plants living things? Student will encounter these questions and more as they identify and explore the different parts of a plant. This lesson will help students identify different types of plants as well as the major parts of a plant.

Type: Lesson Plan

The Fire Wheels MEA provides students with a problem in which they must work as a team to design a procedure to select the best toy car for a company to sell.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

In teams, students will make decisions about how to select the best bakery based on various cupcake characteristics (e.g., taste, smell).

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

"Taking Care of Business" is a Kindergarten level lesson plan that allows students to investigate the world of jobs. In this lesson, the students will read Everybody Works by Shelley Rotner and Ken Kreisler. Then, the students will work together in small groups to show what they have learned. Your superstar students will understand more about jobs, job duties, and job settings by the end of this lesson.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson focuses on different sound qualities and being able to distinguish the different qualities. This lesson explains how vibrations cause sound to be produced. How sound travels is also explored during this lesson. These concepts are explored while children solve an engineering design challenge through guided inquiry.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson provides students an opportunity recognizing the properties of objects and how objects move as well as working collaboratively to solve an engineering design challenge. This lesson is not the first introduction to sorting objects by their properties and observing how objects move, but a way for children to apply the concept in a more in-depth manner.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will read and observe ants to discover how ants are the same and different than people.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this MEA, the class receives a letter from the principal informing them they will be getting a class pet. They need to determine which pet to pick based on the data.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will help Mr. Bob Fitness choose a piece of sports equipment for his new store. Students will work with three-dimensional shapes and determine a procedure in choosing the equipment.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. MEAs resemble engineering problems and encourage students to create solutions in the form of mathematical and scientific models. Students work in teams to apply their knowledge of science and mathematics to solve an open-ended problem, while considering constraints and tradeoffs. Students integrate their ELA skills into MEAs as they are asked to clearly document their thought process. MEAs follow a problem-based, student centered approach to learning, where students are encouraged to grapple with the problem while the teacher acts as a facilitator. To learn more about MEA’s visit: https://www.cpalms.org/cpalms/mea.aspx

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will use Scholastic book order forms (or magazines) to sort animal pictures into two categories, real and make believe.

Type: Lesson Plan