Lesson Plans

Lesson Plans

Lesson Plans: Reading: "Flat Stanley"

Life in the “Flat” Lane!

Lesson Objective: With this lesson a group of students in grades 3 or 4 or a preferably small special education classroom, will study the book Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown. Using the Smart Board children will understand the lessons, concepts and adventures of the book. Students will have a better understanding of the United States map, facts about some of the states, and exercise their creativity through writing their own stories

Introduce the Learning Activity: I will show the students the cover of Flat Stanley on the Smart Board and have them predict what will happen in the story. Their ideas will be documented on the smart board and be saved. Then I will read the story up on the smart board so all can see the pictures clearly. After the story is read I will bring back the brainstorming and have the class compare their predictions to the real happenings of the story. I will then show the students the back of the book that has the activity for students to send Flat Stanley places and record a journal. I will have a link to the website on the Smart Board. As a class we will go over the website, www.flatstanleyproject.com. This will be fun for children to see the site and what others have really done with Flat Stanley. After we have done I will bring up a map on the Smart Board and each student will get to pick a state. Using the Smart Board will engage students and make them more interested in the project at hand. This will be over 2 periods.

Provide Information: I will tell the children that we will be going to the computer lab four times to do research on their chosen states. I will show them, on the Smart Board, how to save pictures onto a disk. This is so the children can research the state and bring back a picture of their state’s bird, flag, and flower. Using this information each person will give a small presentation on their state and show the class their pictures. I then will tell the students that they will need to write an adventure in which Flat Stanley goes to the chosen state and they have to use the facts they have gotten from the research. This will be around 3 or 4 paragraphs. They also need to provide a summary of their story for their presentation.

Provide Practice: As a class we will go to the computer lab. On the first day we will practice saving different pictures on the disks, showing how to search the internet for facts, and printing. This is so they can save the three pictures they will need. Students will also be asked to look for other facts about their state and print that information off as well. I will have them go to any child safe site that I have put on my website that I get the Smart Board information off from. This will include www.ajkids.com, http://yahooligans.yahoo.com/, and http://www.kidsites.com/. They will have three class periods to do their research and write their short stories. When each child is done their research and done their story they will share their information with the class. This will be on the 6th day. I will ask their computer class teacher if the class can work on this project during that time. They will get to know the Smart Board and how to use it to bring up their information. They will also show the class which state they will be talking about on the map which will be located on the Smart Board.

Provide Knowledge of Results: By having the students give their predictions to the story that allows them to use their imagination. I will ask them questions about their predictions and give them feedback about them and encouraging thoughts. I will know and encourage their progress from watching them in the computer lab and their presentation. Their understanding of the book will be known from the story they write.

Review The Activity: After the lesson is complete I will tell the students that in this lesson we did a lot. I will ask the students to each say something they learned by doing this activity. We will write the answers down on the Smart Board and then share how we accomplished this.

Method of Assessment: The class will continue to work on maps. The child will again be assessed in their presentation to see if they know where the state was and the facts they were assigned. I will also be seeing if they know anything more about the state such as climate or population. I will grade their papers on Flat Stanley for creativity and grammar.

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Jessica Drinkwine
Email: drin0348@mail.plattsburgh.edu
Site hosted by: SUNY Plattsburgh
last updated: August 31, 2006