Topic: Exploring Plants

Essential Question: How do plants live, grow, and reproduce as well as impact humans and the
world around us?
National and State Standards:
State Standards:
SC12.3.1.d Describe how an organism senses changes in its internal or external
environment and responds to ensure survival.
SC12.3.1.c Describe the cellular functions of photosynthesis, respiration, cell
division, protein synthesis, transport of materials, and energy capture/release
SC8.3.1.c Recognize specialized cells perform specialized functions in
multicellular organisms
SC8.3.3.c Recognize that producers transform sunlight into chemical energy
through photosynthesis
Next Generation Science Standards:
HS-LS2-5. Develop a model to illustrate the role of photosynthesis and cellular
respiration in the cycling of carbon among the biosphere, atmosphere,
hydrosphere, and geosphere.
MS-LS1-2. Develop and use a model to describe the function of a cell as a whole
and ways parts of cells contribute to the function.

Week One: Plants: The BIG Picture

Monday: Observations and data collection of What is a Plant? (5e lesson plan)
Tuesday: Sharing of results and notes on What is a Plant? (5e lesson plan)
Inquiry Phase
Instructional Activity
Time
Engage
Monday: Acorn to oak tree time-lapse Youtube video
5 minutes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BtKAkP5xOk
Textbook example of tree growing
5 minutes
How do we know something is a plant?
Tuesday: What is this? picture (Lithops)

Have students think about what this is

Mention that plants dont always look green and
leafy
Why might a plant look like this?

Explore

Explanation

Elaboration

Evaluation

Goal: to break misconceptions of what plants

look like
Monday: What is a Plant? Investigation
Students will work in pairs
Students will be presented with different things.
They will be encouraged to touch and view the
objects in the classroom and outside.
In their notebooks, students will record
observations about each object
Things they will observe: tree, grass, algae,
moss, sea sponge, coral, bacteria (under a
microscope), chloroplast (under a microscope),
mushroom, fern
Monday: Evaluation of Observations
Students will return to their desks and work in
groups of four to come up with trends and
qualities of plants
Students will be asked to think of
characteristics/processes that classify all plants
that they can pull from observations and
previous knowledge
Students will record these results and turn them
in
Tuesday: Sharing of Trends and Qualities
Teacher will return groups observations and
trends from day 1 and provide discourse
strategies to spur conversation
Can group X tell me which things they thought
were not plants? Why? (Invite)
What characteristics did your plants group
have?
Does this group agree?
What can this group add? (Press)
Teacher will record trends and characteristics on
board (Record)
Tuesday: Characteristics of Plants
Teacher will go through notes better depicting
the characteristics of plants
Characteristics: photosynthetic, multicellular,
growth is indeterminate, hydrostatic systems,
alternation of generation, defense without
moving
Tuesday: Homework Activity (Rubric Attached)

30 minutes

15 minutes

15 minutes

20 minutes

10 minutes

Student will pick a characteristic talked about in

class and discover more about it
Students can make a collage, write a short
summary, make a PowerPoint slide create a
model of their characteristic
Wednesday: Plants Role in Ecology Game/Simulation
Students will review the general trend of a food chain through the game from
SAPS, Ecosystems found at
http://revolution.caret.cam.ac.uk/flash/decomposition00.swf
Students will see how different ratios of producers, primary consumers, and
secondary consumers will impact the ecosystem
Student will interpret results and come up with general trends with help of teacher
Thursday: Carbon Cycle, Decomposition, and Nitrogen Cycle
Conversion of carbon dioxide to oxygen, provide resources, role as producers in
food chain
Students will go through online simulation/game called Decomposition, the
Nitrogen Cycle, and the Carbon Cycle, from SAPS, found at
http://revolution.caret.cam.ac.uk/flash/decomposition00.swf
Have students brainstorm what would happen if we didnt have plants?
Friday: Pulling Together Ideas From Ecology and The Cycles
Notes and sharing of concepts found from Wednesday and Thursdays activities
Come up with model of all the ecological cycles plants contribute to

Week 2: Adaptations Plants Have and How Plants Help Humans

Monday: Humans and Plants: What Resources Do Plants Offer Us?
What do we use that comes from a plant?
Walk around the school and observe activity; have students write down ideas
As a class, come up with list of resources and items we get from plants (ie.
Shelter, food, medicine, personal hygiene products, gum, etc.)
Tuesday: What Nutrients do Plants Need to grow?
Pull ideas from students previous schemas about plants
Formulate the photosynthesis equation
Explain the why between photosynthesis, connect it to what students can see
happening and what they know
Plant seeds and use different variables to plant what plants need. Have the
students pick what variable (light, water, soil nutrients, salinity, etc).
Planting seeds adapted from Indiana.edu at
http://www.indiana.edu/~oso/lessons/Photosynthesis.htm
Have students write their names on the Styrofoam cups
Set up celery and food coloring demonstration to show vascular tissue in celery
stems
Wednesday: Vascular Tissue: Roots and Shoots
Have students place their cups around the room where they are needed

Look at results from celery demonstration

Video: Plant Transport: Xylem and Phloem, Transpiration [3D Animation] from
Biology / Medicine Animations (https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=xGCnuXxbZGk)
Pause video at segments and go over information with class
Notes on xylem and phloem in a plant
Thursday: Unique Adaptations for Acquiring Nutrition
Learn about different mechanisms certain plants have to be able to live in different
ecosystems and be successful
Friday: What Stimuli Must Plants Adapt and Respond to?
Can plants move?
What kinds of stresses can be put on a plant?
How might a plant adapt to these stresses?
Look and talk about specific examples (mangrove trees, cacti, tundra plants,
rainforest plants)

Week 3: Plants Key to Survival, Gymnosperms, and Angiosperms

Monday: General Adaptations of Plants
Notes on tropisms, rapid plant movements, drought, flooding, and disease
Tuesday: Plant Hormones
Notes on Plant Hormones and Stresses a Plant has
Functions of auxins, cytokinins, gibberellins, abscisic acid and ethylene
Wednesday: How Plants Tell Time and Seasons
How does a plant know what to do when?
Thursday: Evolution of Plants
How did plants evolve?
A look at the phylogenetic tree of plants
Friday: Angiosperms and Gymnosperms
Observation of pine cone and fruit (apple slices showing seeds)
Observation of seeds (mustard, acorn, cherry pits, etc).
Notes on characteristics of gymnosperms and angiosperms

Week 4: Specifics of a Flowering Plant

Monday: How Do Flowering Plants Reproduce? : Plant Dissection (5e lesson plan)
Tuesday: Pollinators and Lab Wrap-up (5e lesson plan)
Inquiry Phase
Instructional Activity
Time
Engage
Monday: Youtube Video: Exploding Pollen
10 minutes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrKeAqVVt3s
Ask students what they think the stuff is coming
off of the tree
What is pollen used for?

How does pollen get from one plant to another?

Think-Pair Share Activity (discourse activity) for the
two questions above
Tuesday: Engaging Picture: Bee Covered in Pollen

10 minutes

Explore

Explanation

Elaboration

Evaluation

How Did the Pollen get on the bee?

How do flowers make themselves appealing to
their pollinators?
Address the questions from the previous day here
that students wrote down and turned in
Monday: Plant Dissection (see lab in appendix)
Lab from Beverly Hills High School http://bhhs.bhusd.org/
Students will work individually on a flower dissection
(use gladioli or lilies flowers and using scissors if
needed)
Teacher will walk around and perform summative
assessment during the lab, asking students probing
questions about what they are experiencing
Debrief Lab: Collect packets and have students
discard of all flower parts
Have students journal what they learned and have
them write on a slip of paper one question they have
as a form of summative assessment
Tuesday: Flower Diagram
Have students work together (in groups of two or
three) to fill out a blank flower dissection diagram
When completed, have students fill out the master
diagram projected onto the white board
Tuesday: Design a Flower Game
Created by Centre for Applied Research in
Educational Technologies
http://revolution.caret.cam.ac.uk/flash/flowers.swf
Students will work independently to play the game
in order to create flowers to see how successful it is
in attracting different types of pollinators
Tuesday: Each student will get a worksheet with pictures of
a type of flower on it different than what was presented in
class. Students will identify the parts of the flower and how
its pollen is spread, distributed as homework

40 minutes

15 minutes

15 minutes

10 minutes

Wednesday: Primary Growth

What is primary growth and how does it help the plant be successful?
Thursday: Secondary Growth
What is secondary growth and how does it help the plant be successful?
Friday: Types of Tissues and Types of Cells
Make a graphic organizer and make diagrams outlining the three types of cells
and tissues
Structure, function, and location should be areas on the diagrams

Week 5: A Plant Cell

Monday: Plant Cell: Turgor Pressure Lab
Students will work through turgor pressure lab (see lab in appendix)
Lab from Judson Independent School District (http://school.judsonisd.org)
Teacher will hand out study guide as form of summative assessment. Students will
complete study guide to the best of their ability so teacher knows what to go over
during review session Thursday
Tuesday: Review Results of Turgor Pressure Lab; Begin Plant Cell
Students will review results from lab and as a group come up with conclusions
Students will think about role of cell wall and vacuole in turgor pressure
Begin notes on plant cell components
Wednesday: Plant Cell Continued
Notes on plant cell concerning structure and function
Look at results from Styrofoam cups
Teacher will look at study guides while students are looking at results
Thursday: Wrap it up
Students will present results to class on their seeds in a Styrofoam cup, no
rubric/grading required
Review for test on Friday
Friday: Test Over Unit (Final, Summative Evaluation)
How I Will Assess Students Learning
Formative assessment will be met by a variety of ways. The two homework assignments,
the plant characteristic as well as the labeling of flower parts, will be a way for me to gauge if they
understand those concepts. Another point I will use formative evaluation will be when they turn in
their notebooks after the What is a Plant? observation. It will give me time to see their initial
misconceptions and ideas about what plants are. It is important for the teacher to be active during
the times when students are exploring or doing labs. By doing so and asking them probing
questions, a teacher can perform formative assessment as the students are responding as well as
interacting with each other. The sharing results of their plants and how they did with the variables
is another way to use summative assessment. Finally, the study guide will be the final mode of
summative evaluation. By having them fill it out to the best of their abilities, it will show what they
learned and what they still need to review before the test.
The summative assessment will be in the form of a test at the end of the unit.

Rubric of Characteristic Homework Activity:

Student will pick a characteristic and discover more about it. Students can make a collage, write a
short summary, make a PowerPoint slide create a model of their characteristic.
Criteria
3 points
2 points
1 point
Characteristic
Student picked plant
Student picked
Student did not pick
characteristic from
characteristic of plant plant characteristic/
options presented in
that was not presented student inaccurately
class and accurately
in class but is accurate depicted characteristic
defined it
Definition
Student accurately
Student adequately
Student incorrectly
defined the
defined characteristic defined the
characteristic
with some
characteristic
misinformation
Creativity/Work Ethic
Student used chosen
Student generally
Student did not use
medium well
used medium well
medium well
Total= ________ / 9

Flower Dissection Evaluation Worksheet Example

Name: _____________________________________

Label the following on the picture above:

(a) anther
(d) stigma
(b) filament
(e) style
(c) stamen
(f) ovary

(g) petal
(h) sepal
(i) receptacle

If any of the parts are not on the picture, please diagram where they would be in the space below: