Composing Like Beethoven
Students will review music vocabulary, name notes using flashcards, and create and present a 4/4 composition using rhythm sticks and other available instruments.
Music flash cards
Critiquing and Creating Compound and Complex Sentences
Students will create compound and complex sentences with proper comma usage and present their explanations to the class.
Student work
Layers to Understanding Poetry
Students will apply their analytical skills to different types of poems by reviewing the devices used in poetry, reading and analyzing two poems, and creating a poster to demonstrate their learning.
The Next Steps to Great Writing
Students will write a draft that is sequenced and logical after brainstorming.
Teacher introducing lesson
Text Evidence and the Moral Lesson
Teacher will read How Spiders Got Eight Legs as a read-aloud. Students will write notes about what they think the moral is. Students will collaborate in groups to determine what they think the moral lesson is. Students will reread, highlight, and write the text evidence that identifies the moral lesson.
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Connecting Author’s Purpose and Organizational Patterns
Students explore and analyze how the author can achieve a specific purpose by using a variety of organizational patterns.
Glaciologist in Action (Lab)
Students participate in a hands-on lab in which glacier (ice) effects on the Earth’s surface is demonstrated.
Circuit Designers
Students will work in small groups of two to three on a structured challenge around circuits which includes requirements such as including using a switch or a conductor. They will then use that knowledge to work on a collaborative challenge to solve a relevant problem related to elephant poaching. Students will create a containment system that will have an alarm system, a lighting system, and a way to pass through. Finally, they will review the other projects and discuss similarities and differences in the design.
Quality Questioning
In this lesson, students analyze, rate, and revise questions generated in response to their reading of a short story. They use the questions in student-led conversations and activities, helping them understand the connection between strong questioning, inferring, and communicating during reading.
Analyzing the Text for Summary and Connections
Students will critically think and communicate; they will summarize a text to understand and make connections to other texts, themselves, and the world.
Organized Authors: Name That Structure
Students will read a text passage, looking for and highlighting key words that indicate the appropriate organizational pattern of the text.
Students working
Morphology Mania
Students will discover and use knowledge of Greek and Latin roots to determine the meaning of unknown words.
Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) Vertical Alignment
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Got Force?
Students use various surfaces and a weighted car to see how far the car will travel using balanced and unbalanced forces.
The Battle Between Editing and Revising
Students will apply revision strategies to mentor texts. They also will have the opportunity to create a new book.
Earth’s Movements
Students will work in small collaborative groups to demonstrate the rotation of the Earth as it revolves around the Sun which creates a day and night cycle.
Discovering the Power of a Complete Sentence
Students will discover the necessary components of a complete sentence and use the complete subject and complete predicate in their own writing through a process called ratiocination.
Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) Vertical Alignment
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The Key to Key Signature
Students will review previous learning about half steps, whole steps, and enharmonics and will begin to learn the construction of tetrachords using the whole and half step sequence.
Painting With Expository Writing
After students examine an image by Faith Ringgold, they will write supporting sentences when given a central idea sentence.
Mapping Out Our Learning
Students will participate in a workshop-style lesson that includes partner and small-group work, teacher modeling, and independent reflection to not only label and identify text features within informational text, but to also connect the feature to its purpose.
Rolling into Compound Sentences
Students will create compound sentences from simple sentences.
Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) Vertical Alignment
Click below to learn about the TEKS related to the unit and Research Lesson. The highlighted student expectation(s) is the chosen focus for the Research Lesson.