Saint Marys University of Minnesota

Learner-Centered Instruction Model (LCIM)

Teacher____Jared Cruz_________ Subject___1st Grade Science____ Date__11/9/2015_
Standards and Objectives
Prior knowledge activation (Standard 2)
(student misconceptions?)
I can describe my type of bat.
At this point, students may understand a lot
1.4.1.1.1
Describe and sort animals into groups
in knowledge about bats, but may not
of general
many ways, according to their physical
have experience with description.
characteristics and behaviors.

Introduction / Anticipatory Set (Standards 2,

5, 7)
What students will know and be able to do,
attention getter
(ENGAGE/EXPLORE)
Last week we learned a lot about bats. We
learned that there are many types of bats. We
know about their different habitats and food.
We know a lot about flying fox bats.

Purpose (Standard 5)
Why learn this?
Describing animal behavior and
characteristics allows children to better
understand their world and how animals and
plants and people fit into a larger ecosystem.

But each kind of bat is different, right? I found

a bat video about a very interesting bat. How
would you describe this bat?
(Watch Untamed Americas - Tube-Lipped
Nectar Bat.)
Today we will describe our own bat that we
started on last week.
Presentation / Modeling / Checking for
Understanding (Standards 1, 2, 4) Main
concepts, how they will be introduced,
monitoring questions / techniques (EXPLAIN)
So if we are going to describe something, how
would we do it? Lets start with an animal we
know well. How would you describe a squirrel
for example?
(Look for responses about habitat, food, body,
legs, color, behavior, etc. Write out the response
as well as the category. Then erase the
responses but keep the category.)

Adaptations for diverse learners

(Standard 3)
As I read I will point out some of the
differences mentioned in the reading.
Media / Materials / Resource
Bat booklet template
Images and names of different kinds of bats
on Promethean board
White board
http://mrsgebauer.com/bats/Kinds/kinds.htm

But we are thinking of just one type of squirrel

and there are many different types of bats. We
know that different bats eat different things and
have different habitats. To get a better idea
about how bats differ I will read about the
different kinds of bats megabats or large bats
and microbats or small bats. Think about what
kind of bat you are and how you can use this
information to describe your bat.
(Read the Different Kinds of Bats article.)
What are some of the differences?
(Put the differences on a T chart.)
Learning activity / Guided practice /
Monitoring (Standards 2, 4) How students
will practice, integrate, and extend concepts and
skills (ELABORATE)
Now there are a lot of different types of bats in
the microbat group. How would you describe
some of the differences?
Look at this picture and let see if we can find
any differences. What do you see for this bat?
(Go through all the bats and get one response
for each.)
Now we will finish our bat. We will complete
the type of bat. You can select one of the names
here. We will list 5 words that describe your
bat. And you will write down how the bat finds
food.
(Divide up the tables by type of bat flying
foxes, nectar bat, fish bat, insect bat, etc.)
You can talk in a low voice and share with your
friends ideas that you have about how to
describe your bats. We will not have time to put
our bats together today.
Closure (Standard 4) How lesson will be

Adaptations for diverse learners

(Standard 3)
Write or circle on the Promethean the
mentioned characteristic that the
children saw.
Do an example of the bat booklet.

summarized
How did you describe your bat?
All our different bats have characteristics that
help them find food and survive. The TubeLipped Nectar bat has a pretty amazing tongue.
There are lots of differences in bat bodies, food
and behaviors and now we know some ways to
describe them.
Assessment (Standard 8) How student
learning will be assessed
(EVALUATE)
(Based on their table booklet product.)

Adaptations for diverse learners

(Standard 3)
Teachers will be available to help
during the work period. Spelling
assistance will be available to the
students as well.

Post-Lesson Reflection (Standard 9)

If you were to teach this lesson again to the same group of
Information source(s)
students, what would you do differently? The same?
Time allocation, directions, materials, presentation, etc.
I would shorten the lesson by having pre-decided
categories for the squirrel characteristics, or just
skipped that altogether. I would also have prepared a
list of good descriptive words that the students could
use in case they didnt come up with a lot themselves. I
could even have these printed out before hand and
categorized as a scaffold for ELL students and others
with language challenges. Maybe a reading that was
about describing bat bodies instead of the
megabat/microbat reading would have been better. I
thought that pictures on the Promethean board worked
well and was engaging.

University supervisor,
self, cooperating
teaching

What do most of your students know and are able to do as a

result of this lesson?

Information source(s)

I think most students know that bats differ in their size,

habitats, food, body color, etc. They are able to describe
a bat with one or two or three words.

Lesson activity

Identify those who had difficulty with this lesson. Why?

What could you do differently for them next time?

Information source(s)

Many students were challenged by this lesson and most

Lesson activity

produced fairly simple descriptions like brown and

small. I think that students had difficulty with the
lesson due to the lack of vocabulary and better
examples would have helped.

Based on todays lesson, what do you plan to do next with

this class?

What grouping(s) will you

use?

I will provide a cheat sheet of descriptive words and

phrases when they finish up the bat study on
Wednesday.

I may pull aside the ELL

students and a couple of
others for focused
assistance as a small
group if there is time.