Week 5 Instructional Plan

This week I designed a lesson on plate tectonic and earthquakes.  I knew this was going to be a hard concept to incorporate because I was teaching two topics at one time, but in order for my students to understand earthquakes they had to understand plate tectonic. 

The first topic I taught was plate tectonic.  At first I did not know how I was going to get the students to understand the earth's plates and what they could cause.  So my students could understand I used a model in which the students could eat after they finished their lesson.  The model I used came out of a book called Geology Rocks (Blobaum, 1999).  The students had to use graham crackers and peanut butter or icing and do different experiment to form mountains, volcanoes, rift and earthquake.  The students enjoyed learning with this type of model.  The next model I used was designing an earthquake and the land it sits on.  The students were so engaged with this experiment, but my room was another story.  In other words my students loved working with the models. 

I felt the students learn so much and so did I.  The first thing I learned was to not purchase peanut butter because of the allergy reaction.  The second thing I learned was the earthquake experiment needed to be completed outside because of the dirt. 

Finally, overall this was a wonderful learning experiment and I plan of doing it again, but maybe adding so more activities.

Reference

Blobaum, C. (1999). Geology Rocks! Nashville: Williamson Books.