Rationale for Unit Plan:

Context:

This integrated unit was created as a block II requirement, and was under the advisement of Dr. Ellen Pesko for CI 4000.  I created 5 lessons which were: a vocabulary unit, a comprehension lesson, a 5 E lesson on owl pellets, a campaigning of bones lesson, and a muscles lesson. Through these lessons I was able to teach the students about the human body. We discussed the bones, joints, muscles, and some health.  I was able to challenge the students as well as answer their questions they had about the human body.  The students worked on a KWL chart with the comprehension lesson we did, and were able to learn the scientific names for a lot of the bones.  This unit was designed to help the students understand their own body better, and how and why they move.  The unit was designed for a third grade class and the unit was aligned with the North Carolina Standard Course of Study for Language Arts, and Science.

Impact:

The unit impacted them because they were learning about themselves, and how the parts of their bodies operated.  The unit required the students to have a deeper understanding of the human body, and they had different ways to look at it.  All the students will be learning and understanding how their bones, joints, and muscles, all work together to help them move.  The students will realize that they are not that different from each other after they complete this unit.  The unit uses fictional and non-fictional text throughout the unit. This will help the students and provide the students with different types of opportunities to learn about their bodies. The different books will help the students understand the material they are learning better, and provide them with more information about the human body. The different books will provide the students with different genres, and to learn how to use different text structures.  The unit meets a lot of their standards for science as well as language arts. Most of the text reinforces the vocabulary they are learning.  The students are assessed throughout the unit, to make sure they have an understanding of what they are learning and on each lesson that we are going to be covering throughout the unit.

Alignment:

 Standard 1 Indicator 5, 6, 7, and 8:

I met this standard and indicators by having a good understanding of English Language Arts.  I acknowledged that each child was at a different stage in learning.  I did this by selecting different genres of books to read in the classroom.  I also had an understanding for the importance of literacy for personal and social growth of the students. I also kept in mind that the English Language is continually changing when we worked on the assessment projects in the classroom.  I also understood different written and oral composition processes, and that it can be a symbolic system. 

Standard 3 Indicator 1 and 3: I met this standard and indicators by having a broad knowledge of Science.  I was able to do this because I have knowledge of basic life science concepts including the diversity of organisms and their environments and the structure and the functions of animals and their parts.  Also I had an understanding of the health, and the human body.  I understand the relationship between humans, organisms, and the environment (ecology).  I was able to get a better understanding of the relationship between humans and other living things by doing the owl pellets lesson with the students.  I had knowledge of the basic earth science concepts that included properties of earth materials (rock, minerals, fossils, water, and air).  I was able to get this broad understanding from dissecting the owl pellets and learning about the rodents owls eat and looking at the fossils that were left behind with the rodents bones