Lesson Design Template for IRA#2 or Text-Based Discussion:

Your name: Alison Lucas Date: 10/11/2010 Location/Grade: Bach Elementary School, first grade

Topic: Interactive Read Aloud of Autumn Leaves by Ken Robbins + hand-drawn coloring/identification worksheet

Big Ideas/Learning Goals/Driving Questions: We make sense of our world/learn through categorizing. Learning to identify leaves.

Context: Students will be collecting leaves on a fall walk field trip. They will be learning about classification and identification by making a grid
to sort and display the leaves they collect.

This worksheet I created served as a fun assessment of students’ ability to identify leaves.

Created by Katrin Oddleifson Robertson and Shannon Kurtz McGrath, 2010 1

 Content Standards or
GLCE’s (state or district): Objectives /Assessments

- Make purposeful Students will be able to: Student will:

observation of the natural
world using the appropriate
senses
- Describe and compare
weather related to the four
seasons
- Classify plants on the basis
of observable physical
characteristics
- Understand the role of categorization in the
learning process.
- Sort leaves into different descriptive categories.
- Recognize and identify leaves.
- Contribute to the process of categorizing leaves
during the read-aloud.
- Successfully complete the worksheet I designed.
Teacher will:
- Observe students’ ability to replicate the colors of fall
leaves and identify leaves on the worksheet.

Duration: One hour- 2:30- 3:00 (the Science block)

Materials: Book, dry-erase board, marker, index cards with leaf samples/labels, printed paper cut-outs of three types of leaves, the “leaf people”
worksheet I designed, and crayons and pencils (already on tables).

Teaching Sequence
SEQUENCE PART 1: A script for how I will introduce the story.

Time/Task Introduction - Instructional Moves Considerations

Share - My mother loves nature and worked very hard to learn the names of the
personal plants and trees she sees when she spends time outdoors.
story - Because she knows their names, she feels like they are her friends.
- I love to go on walks with her because she can introduce me to the plants and
trees she knows.

More general - There are many people in the world who have learned to identify things in Ask students to share or maybe do a Turn-
examples/ the world that they love. These people are able to enjoy and experience the and-Talk depending on interest

Created by Katrin Oddleifson Robertson and Shannon Kurtz McGrath, 2010 2

Activate world in a different way because of this knowledge. (Give examples: level/desire to share
background cooking, animals, cars) Do you know anyone like this in your life? Maybe
knowledge you would consider yourself to be someone who is an expert about
something you care about.

Categori- - So how do you think these experts came to learn to identify all these things? Make sure they understand this before
zation as a I’m willing to bet that they didn’t just memorize each thing separately; on going on: access contributions and
method to it’s own, one-by-one. When people are trying to learn a lot of information- reactions when talking about academic
learning one thing they do is to categorize. This means putting things in groups learning.
according to things they have in common. (Discuss examples from school:
learning how to read/spell- the teacher didn’t tell you everything you know
in one lesson!)
Introduce
book/point of - Today we are going to read a book written by a man who is an expert at
focus identifying leaves. This man’s name is Ken Robbins and he wrote a book
called Autumn Leaves. In the first part of the book, he’ll tell us a little about
what happens to leaves in autumn, and then he’ll give us some suggestions or
examples of ways to categorize leaves. Next, Ken Robbins will tell us about
leaves from different trees- each page will be about a new leaf.

- This is what WE are going to do. We’ll make a little chart on the board of
different ways to categorize leaves. Then, as he tells us about the different
types, we will decide how to classify them. This will help us to learn how to
identify the leaves. Then, after the book, I have a special worksheet that I
made to help us practice identifying leaves in a fun way.

Set behavior - Review what being a respectful listener is. Point out/thank students who
expectations have been exemplifying this behavior.
- They will need to pay attention to Ken’s book in order to be able to complete
the worksheet that comes next. I must be “real” about only rewarding
- Tell them about the leaves I have to give them before they are dismissed to students with focused and respectful
their seats and that people who cannot manage to be a respectful listener will behavior throughout the lesson.
not get one.

Created by Katrin Oddleifson Robertson and Shannon Kurtz McGrath, 2010 3

SEQUENCE PART 2: An outline of the queries I will pose during the reading of the text.
Stopping Place
Pg. 9 “Some leaves have
simple shapes, some do not.”
Pg. 11 “Some leaves have
jagged edges, some have
smooth edges”
“Leaves are different on each
different tree. Look at them
carefully and see what you
see.”
Pg. 13 Smoke Tree
Pg. 15 Birch
Pg. 19 Linden
Pg. 21 Sassafras
Pg. 23 Sweet Gum
Pg. 27 Oak
Pg. 29 Maple
Chosen Because
The author is addressing different categories of
leaf shape. These are two of the categories we
are going to use as we continue to read the book
and categorize the leaves we learn about. I will
write “simple” and “not simple” on the white
board that will be divided into four sections.
Make sure the word “jagged” does not cause
confusion.
More categories of leaves. I will write “jagged”
and “smooth” on the white board. We will use
this table to categorize leaves throughout the
remainder of the TBD.
This is the focus of the lesson and the text.
The rest of this book highlights a different leaf on
each page. I have chosen 6 to work with based
on how visually recognizable they are and my
artistic ability to replicate their shapes in the
worksheet I designed for completion after the
read-aloud.
Created by Katrin Oddleifson Robertson and Shannon Kurtz McGrath, 2010
Possible Query
What are the different things Ken is telling us about
leaves? How can we use these to make sense of the
leaves I brought in today?
Explain the meaning of the word “jagged” by using
hand motions and pointing at photographs in the book.
Why do you think Ken is telling us about all these
different features of leaves? How can we use this
information?
What do you think Ken wants us to notice in the rest of
his book?
Students will be putting these leaves into the four
categories taken from the text (simple, not simple,
jagged, and smooth).
Since each type of leaf can be classified in more than
one of the four sections, students will need to decide as
a group which one each leaf should be in.
4
Pg. 19 Linden The distinct heart shape of Linden leaves serves What do you notice about Linden leaves? What shape
as a kid-friendly way to distinguish this leaf. do they remind you of? What does that tell us about
which of our categories Linden leaves could go in?

Pg. 21 Sassafras The differentiating shapes of Sassafras leaves are What do you notice about Sassafras leaves? Are you
both interesting and confusing. It is important to noticing anything that can help us decide what category
stress this point. to put Sassafras in?

Pg. 23 Sweet Gum The distinct star shape of Sweet Gum leaves What do you notice about the leaves of Sweet Gum
serves as a kid-friendly way to distinguish this trees? What shape do they remind you of? What does
leaf. that tell us about which of our categories Sweet Gum
leaves could go in?

Pg. 27 Oak Oak trees are populous in this area, and one that What do you think about this tree? Is anyone familiar
students are sure to encounter on a regular basis. with Oak trees? Acorns?
I want to point out that acorns come from Oak
trees- another element of Oaks that students are
most likely very familiar with. Plus, in the
worksheet, acorns are featured.

Created by Katrin Oddleifson Robertson and Shannon Kurtz McGrath, 2010 5

 Pg. 29 Maple Maple trees are also populous in this area- there is What do you notice about these maple leaves I found?
a maple tree right outside the classroom! Also, What about the colors in these leaves? Why do you
samples of maple leaves I found are a beautiful think that is?
blend of many colors- I want to highlight this
special aspect of changing autumn leaves.

SEQUENCE PART 3: A script for how I will close the lesson

Time/Task Lesson Closing - Instructional Moves Considerations

Author’s - Why do you think Ken Robbins wanted to write Autumn Leaves?
Purpose

Reader’s - What do you think Ken Robbins wanted readers to understand about his Relate this book to the “bigger picture” of
Role book? student’s lives, and the instructional
- How can we use what Ken has taught us in other ways besides working with purpose.
autumn leaves?

Created by Katrin Oddleifson Robertson and Shannon Kurtz McGrath, 2010 6