Step 2: What about Lesson Planning?

Once you have your year planned, with a general idea of your scope and sequence and units that may overlap with natural connections, you are ready to move into a more specific, daily lesson plan. Make sure you read all ten especially my favorite one...it's at the bottom!  

Just FYI - I did not recieve any FREE products from these sources. These are reviews that I have made just by looking at them online. I want you to know that they are not based on Freebies and I have not purchased any (except the one at the end).  

There are a million different types of lesson plan formats.  Some you can buy at teacher stores, some are created and bound together on sites like Etsy and others are found on Teachers Pay Teachers. In fact, just doing this research tonight I found TONS of resources. How you choose to plan is up to you and your individual needs.  

So here are the Top Ten that I have found online and the links to help you find them.  


1. Erin Condren Lesson Planner  I have a few friends who swear by this lesson planning format.  It's colorful and fun, but in my opinion, at $59 a little too steep for my budget. 

2. Farm Girl Journals 

This  is simliar to the Erin Condren one, but slightly less expensive at $45. Both of these formats have been created by teachers and have color coded sections and a nice spiral binder. * Included are a teacher and substitute information section 
* 40 two page weekly lesson plan spreads 
* 25 double sided blank charts to use as you wish - grades, attendance, check lists, etc.
* 25 double sided notes section to keep track of faculty meetings, planning notes, parent conferences, etc..

3. More resources are found at Etsy including some stickers and supplements for these journals. Sometimes it just fun to have stickers! You can get stickers, tabs and more ranging from $4 and up. 




4.  Another place to look is your typical teachers catalogs and stores.  These are pretty traditional and standard.  Quite frankly they haven't changed much in 25 years.  But they serve the purpose and many teachers are very comfortable with them. In other words, there is nothing wrong with it! I found this one from Carson Delossa for just $7.99.

 If you are looking towards more of a customized look, then head over to Teacher's Pay Teachers.  Here you can find just about anything for just about any type of classroom. 

5.  Teacher Planner from A Modern Teacher.  
This planner has forms for everything that you can choose and print.  Ther are editable Year at a glance, weekly planning, daily planning, and forms galore! There are several different covers and color options for $14.50.  



6. The Ultimate Teacher Binder by One Stop Teacher Shop. This customizable and editable resource has over 1,200 forms.  There are forms for planning, organizing and more. I like it because it has lots of "cute" covers. And when days are rough, its nice to have "cute things" around you. LOL!  The price is only $11.99. 

• 7. FREE!  This is a really great site that I ran across today on Pinterest from the Curriculum Corner.  First, the price is right! Second, it has a lot of pages for planning and organizing that you can choose and print off for a binder of your choice.  Samples include: Parent contacts, IEP at a Glance, Weekly lesson planning, Password check list, and more! This is not as colorful, but it is FREE. 

8. Sticky Note Planbook: This is a real teacher created idea from The Wise and Witty Teacher . This teacher explains how she made it when you click onto her blog.  Basically, she traced the sticky notes to make boxes and then placed different colored notes for different subjects.  I like it! When I used to use a paper template I often had to cover up the plan with a sticky note when things changed.  For example if I had a plan for a week, and after formative assessments I knew we had to rethink the plan...I just put a sticky note on it.  The cost? Well...it depends if you have a spiral notebook and sticky notes already then it is FREE.  If not, then the cost is about $5-10.  Truthfully, if I didn't love the last resource this is what I would probably be using. 

Technology Resources are up last.  

9. And the reason for this is because it is what I use and is the newest up and coming tools.  This from Tracie Clausen at Dragonflies in First and includes 8 editable cover options, 6 autofill forms and 81 premade templates to meet all of your needs.  These can be printed, but also are compatable with your phone and ipad. Genius! Purchase price is $15.00. 

10.  My favorite and the one I use everyday is www.planbook.com.  I can't say enough about this planbook.  Three years ago, my colleague, Elena Beard, convinced us to try it in fourth grade.  We were nervous at first, but now we LOVE it.  First, it is all online, both ipad and for computers, but you can print it or share it (weekly or daily).  My entire team uses it -- why? We can share lessons electronically, we can attach documents and worksheets to the lesson plans, we can edit the classes and even add snow days which bumps the lesson plans over to the next day.  However, my favorite feature is the dropdown feature where you can embed your standards with a click of the button.  At the end of the year, it saves all your plans for the next year and you just edit them as needed. It is the best $12 I have ever spent.  I hope you will search this site out like we did, because it is the BEST lesson plan format that I have ever used. 

What do you use for Lesson Planning? 

Comment:

Step One: What will the year look like?

Truth be told...I'm a little nervous....I'm launching a new format today for this blog and it makes me a little scared. As a reflective practitioner, I thought...what can I do to make ScienceGal better? How can I express myself in a manner that is easier to understand? 

This is what I have come up with - it's still a blog, but with a video/audio component. There will still be visuals, photographs, freebies and also a few things for purchase.  ScienceGal has always been a way for me to express what is going on in Science Education.  It is based on best practices, sound pedagogy and upcoming trends.  

If you read my last post, you will know I am currently on a mission to help teachers take part in a paradigm shift.  A shift that will take them from "traditional, silo teaching" to a more all encompasing science centered classroom.  I have even uploaded an audio/powerpoint mix to the last blog so that you can "hear" my thoughts as an introduction to this new topic. 

So how would you start to think about planning for the year? Oh...in order to see how this works, you will have to listen to the audio component.  Leave a comment after you do!  I will pick 3 comments and send them the Rube Goldberg Design brief for free! But you have to comment on what you liked, didn't like or other helpful suggestions in order to be placed in the drawing. The drawing will take place on Sunday, August 2nd at 8pm EST. Make sure you leave a comment by then! 

Okay...drum roll....here it is! Click on this link to see the presentation. 

Don't forget to leave a comment! 

PS - I don't know why some of the text is messed up in the presentation.  It didn't look cut off when I was recording it.  I am not sure why it changed when it was published.   

Comment:

Meet the newest class members...

I have been super busy getting ready for my class this week.  I am so happy to have some amazing live organisms this year.  Meet the Crayfish:  We have 12 crayfish and lots of elodea plants for oxygen and food.  They will also eat bologna and cat food!  The kids will observe them to learn the difference between structural and behavioral adaptations. 

And the bess beetles...these guys are super fun because they love to eat wood and leaves.  I found out one of my students loves the woods - so I put him in charge of bringing me in some dead wood and leaves to fill up their habitat right away!  The kids love to spray the habitat with a water bottle to give them the moisture they need.
I have another picture that shows what the habitat area looks like, but I am having a hard time inserting it so that it isn't sideways.  I am not sure why???

Anyway...I also wanted to share with you my lessonplan form...When I plan, I plan out the details...and I know some of you do too. 

My daily science plans have six components:

1. Cumulative review activity
2. Focus Question
3. 10 minute instruction
4. independent practice or group investigation
5. reflection
6. next steps

I like this format because it forces me to remember to review at the start and reflect at the close of the lesson.  I intend to leave the next steps portion empty as this is the place where I will add notes such as "not sure they get the difference between variable and constant yet" or other such observations.
I will let you know how it goes in a few weeks after I have taught my first few lessons using this plan. 

I will add this lesson plan to my documents link on the sidebar.  I am still trying to figure out ways to get direct links into my postings.

That's all for now! Remember ... this is the last day to download the mento's investigation for FREE. Tomorrow I will start charging $5 a copy. 

So how do you start thinking about creating science notebooks in your class?

      On Tueday, August 9th,  I am leading a workshop for my county on creating and using science notebooks in grades 3-5 for the upcoming year.  I started on this journey several years ago.  I must admit...the first year, they were a little bit of a mess!  Yet as time goes on, and with several other workshop trainings at NSTA regional and national conferences, I feel like I have a better grip on what I'm doing.  I'd like to share some of my summer planning with you....


First I start by meeting with my team members and coming up with a common pacing guide for the upcoming year. What sequence of units will we teach?  What should we change from last year?  What would we like to do new? What can we do better?  We had already decided to use a black composition notebook this year for our science notebooks.  We prefer them to spirals (tear easily) and construction paper models (get lost easily).

Next, I plan how to set up my notebooks.  I type up my Table of Contents with the eight units for the year with a space to add page numbers.  Some years I use them, and some years I use it as my guide for the students to copy as the year goes on.

After the Table of Contents, I need to add my expectations.  What will go in the notebook? I try to keep this short and sweet..limited to just eight ideas. I will have my students cut and paste this on the second page and we will refer back to it quite often during the first six weeks.  I want thm to understand that not only content and vocabulary goes into these notebooks, but also questions, drawings, color, and yes...even mistakes.

The third thing I will put in to start the year will be the Word Bank.  Every unit will have a word bank and the first one is no exception.  My students will lable the next clean page with the title of the first unit: What is Science? and decorate it with pictures that come to mind when they think about science.  This is always a good pre-assessment piece to see what they are thinking at the beginning of any unit.  After they have drawn their pictures, then we will add the Word Bank.  Some teachers like to add this at the end of a section like a typical glossary, but I like it at the front.  That way I am free to use as many notebook pages as possible. I like the flexibility of adding more pages if needed.
     
So...that is my starting point for now.  Tomorrow I will add some reflections about why science notebooks are important to use in any 3-5 classroom......... On a side note....I am having trouble inserting my documents.  The only way I could do it for now was to scan them and insert as a picture.  If anyone knows a better way, I would love some advice! 

For now, gotta run!