Earth Week

Welcome to Earth Week!



Earth Day is coming up on April 22nd, so what better way to celebrate than dedicating a whole week to learn about the many ways we can keep our Earth healthy and safe for all species. 

You will become teachers during this lesson. We will split into groups and every group will be in charge of researching an environmental issue currently threatening our beautiful planet Earth. You will research essential questions and transfer all your research onto chart paper, which you will present to the class. You are in charge of creating beautiful and substantial work, so put a lot of thought on what you want to include on your chart paper. Include facts, illustrations, solutions, numbers, etc. This will be displayed around the classroom after you presentation. Afterwards, the whole class will compete in a game of Earth Day Jeopardy, which will contain questions based off all the material discussed and presented in class.

Part 1: Research   

Introduce the Earth Day holiday and what it signifies. As a class, create a a KWQ chart to activate their prior knowledge on Earth day and to introduce any new questions they might have. After the KWQ chart, tell them the objectives and activity for the day. Working in groups, choose and research an environmental issue/threat, preparing to present their findings to the class. The issues are air pollution, water pollution, overflowing landfills, vanishing species and forest destruction. Provide them with resources to use, such as Live Science and Living Green. They are also able watch videos for research as well. While researching, answer four essential questions 1) Introduce and explain your environmental issue to the class, 2) How is this environmental issue threatening Earth, and 3) What does this look like, and 4) What can we do? The research is not limited to these questions. They can include whatever research they think is significant to know and add any illustrations that might better bring the issue to light.

Part 2: Presentations

After they are done researching, each group will present their issue on chart paper to the class. The other groups will take notes on each presentation to prepare for the final part of the lesson.



Part 3: Jeopardy Game/Assessment 

1. Recite the learning objectives: “Today we will continue discussing the environmental threats to our planet and we will apply your knowledge to a game of Jeopardy”.
2. Ask the students about some of the content they learned during Part 1 of the lesson. Use this time to initiate discussion among the classroom.
3. Split the class into groups. Introduce the rules of the Jeopardy Game and encourage them to use their notes to answer some questions. Have them pick out team names to engage them into the activity.
4. Play the game of Jeopardy. If time permits, end the game when all questions are answered.
5. Add up all the points to find a winning team.
6. After the Jeopardy game is over, hand out the exit slip.

Encourage them to work towards some of the solutions they offered during their presentations, in honor of celebrating Earth Day.

 

Earth Day Exit Slip

Instructions: Please answer each question to the best of your ability.

1) Why do we celebrate Earth Day?

2) To conserve means to:

• A) Protect
• B) Damage
• C) Clean

3) List three environmental issues currently threatening our Planet Earth.

4) Explain three ways we can contribute to Earth Day (what can you do to help protect our Planet Earth?)

By the end of this lessons, students should be able to...

 

• Understand what Earth Day is and accurately identify environmental issues and solutions
• Work collaboratively with classmates to determine what makes a powerful message and what information about the environment is most important to share

State Standards:

5-ESS3-1. Obtain and combine information about ways individual communities use science ideas to protect the Earth’s resources and environment

RI.5.9 Integrate information from several texts on the same topic in order to write or speak about the subject knowledgeably. (5-ESS3-1)

State Standards:

5-ESS3-1. Obtain and combine information about ways individual communities use science ideas to protect the Earth’s resources and environment

RI.5.9 Integrate information from several texts on the same topic in order to write or speak about the subject knowledgeably. (5-ESS3-1)