Sample Lesson Overview and Assessment!

Take a read to get an idea of what your child is learning in school!

Lesson Overview:

Big Ideas:

• Canadians are fortunate to have easy access to large quantities of clean drinking water, yet we use (and waste) larger amounts of water than other countries

• 1/6 of people on Earth do not have access to clean drinking water and struggle to find adequate water sources; there are many negative consequences of drinking dirty  water

Goals:

• Students will identify a major issue facing the world

• Students will think more critically about the world they live in

• Students will have a better understanding of how water is accessed in both Canada and in C.A.R.

• Students will develop a concrete understanding of social injustice

“H20 to Go!” addresses the Ontario curriculum and assessment policy document for Grade 6  as  it  consists  of  two  overall  expectations  from  two  different  subject  areas,  social  studies  and  mathematics,  and  four specific  expectations, split between each subject area.  By  learning about water  consumption, its  retrieval and it’s use in Canada and Central African Republic,  students gain valuable  knowledge about privilege, responsibility and equity.  The  Growing Success: Assessment, Evaluation, and Reporting in Ontario Schools 1-12 document – provides a  framework for creating assessments which provide opportunities for rich data with concrete and applicable learning opportunities.  By designing with the culminating task/assessment in mind, the lesson plans ensure that teachers have strong sense of students’  learning  styles  and  interests in conjunction with meeting curriculum  expectations.  This lesson includes a role‐playing  game which allows students  to  move  around and participate  in  cooperative  group  learning;  it also promotes the development of critical thinking  skill development.  Throughout the multi-day lesson, students will experience a variety of lesson formats to meet the demands of the 21st Century Learner including: student groupings, and content that incorporate media literacy, reading, writing/recording,  mathematics  and  physical  movement  ensure  that  the  lesson  will encourage meaningful learning opportunities with a variety of meaningful feedback. On day one, students will be asked to think about the way they use water each day, how much they use on average, and the availability of water in their own community.  They will then compare this information with water use and availability facts in Central African Republic (CAR). During the game, students will gain knowledge on how difficult it is for some Central Africans to obtain safe drinking water and what the consequences are for drinking unsafe water. Additionally, students will explore the time and energy requirements necessary to  access water when you do not have the privilege of living in a nation of abundance. Students will then reflect on their findings through a short discussion about the drastic contrast between many regions in Canada and Central African Republic by creating a  bar or line graph.

Assessment & Evaluation:

Methods:

• Assessment For Learning: Kahoot quiz data
• Assessment For Learning: Anecdotal notes during oral small group and whole class discussions
• Assessment As Learning: Writing Prompt
• Assessment OF Learning: Summative task at end of unit

This lesson also includes a diagnostic assessment (assessment FOR learning), through the completion of a Kahoot quiz, which will provide the teacher with data about student knowledge prior to beginning the unit. The responses can be exported into an excel spread sheet to be analyzed by the teacher at the beginning of the lesson. This assessment will then be completed again at the end to assess knowledge gained. For homework, students complete a second diagnostic assessment - a writing prompt. The task is given for homework and is evaluated outside of class time in order to provide the student with feedback, as well as to determine students’ strengths and needs in order to modify or adjust instruction and potentially provide additional or alternative learning opportunities that are interest based. The homework writing prompt is used as an opportunity for oral discussion in the next day’s lesson. Between the two diagnostics, all three of the overall expectations are covered in these diagnostic evaluations:

B1. Application: explain the importance of international cooperation in addressing global issues, and evaluate the effectiveness of selected actions by Canada and Canadian citizens in the international arena

B2. Inquiry: use the social studies inquiry process to investigate some global issues of political, social, economic, and/or environmental importance, their impact on the global community, and responses to the issues

B3. Understanding Context: describe significant aspects of the involvement of Canada and Canadians in some regions around the world, including the impact of this involvement

The writing prompt can  be found at the end of this document, while the rubric is under “assessment” in Lesson 1: H20 to Go!  In  relation  to  the Achievement  Chart,  the  rubric for the writing task  has  two  categories: knowledge  and  understanding and  thinking. Knowledge  and  understanding  is  subject‐specific  content  and  comprehension  of  its  meaning and significance.

Students are evaluated on their abilities to describe some of  the connections Canada shares with the rest of the world (B3.1, B3.5), to gather information to support ideas for writing using a variety of strategies (B2.2), and to explain why current global issues and influences are of importance to Canada (B3.9). Cross-curricular planning allows students to further demonstrate knowledge in mathematics, through the completion of a graph after collecting and analyzing data. This meets overall expectation number one of the data management strand (collect and organize discrete or continuous primary data and secondary data and display the data using charts and graphs, including continuous line graphs); Evaluation of these skills is done by examining student use of critical and creative  thinking skills including planning, processing and critical/creative thinking. Students are assessed on their abilities to draw conclusions about ideas based on the evidence which they collected during the role play game, H2O to Go!;  They are further assessed on how they process and synthesize this information and on their ability to make a decision about whether or not everyone has the right to clean drinking water. The  purpose of the rubric is to provide students’ with the assessment criterion upfront so that they know which knowledge,  understanding and  thinking skills are being assessed and develop a better grasp of the subject matter. The rubric is divided into four levels, each distinguished through the use of qualifiers (some, adequately, competently, expertly). As a class, we would have co-constructed success criteria for each level, which would provide more quality to the assessment criteria. Further assessments would continue as we progress through the unit, including the formative assessment in lesson two; the Jay Z questions and answers!