Anatomy of a Lesson

How to use our lessons to meet your goals!

To help you understand the features of our lessons and how they can help you help your students, we've put together this overview of our lesson structure and features.  The predicable format makes planning easier and gives you the flexibility you need to implement lessons in a way that works for your educational enviornment.  Read on for information about:

• an easy way to select lessons your learners need.
• framing lessons though a science, ELA, or math lens.
• extending the learning with Service Learning and Arts Integration.
• sharing student pages in the pdf through your learning management system.
• using Go2Science growth mindset rubrics to support all three CCSS writing genres.

We craft each lesson to be both flexible and robust!  Every lesson can help you address NGSS standards, Common Core ELA and Math standards, and a Sustainable Development Goal.  Read on for more details!  

​All of these standards are listed on the cover of each lesson so you can quickly choose if the lesson will help you meet your goals and if so, how you'd like to frame it with your students.  Look ahead to the materials list on page two, and Main Event on page three to quickly determine if a lesson looks like a good fit for your group.

Each lesson helps students build science process thinking as they explore phenomena related to the mission, however it is quite possible to skip any or all lessons and still investigate the overarching hypothesis for the mission.   It can also be helpful to look at other grade level lessons if you need to differentiate further for your students. 
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PreK lessons do not address these same sets of standards but are an excellent way to build critical thinking, language, math, and problem solving skills and are a good fit for many kindergarten classes too!

​Each K-2 lesson opens with an objective that aims high on Blooms Taxonomy hierarchy focusing on analyzing, evaluating, and creating!  We lead with NGSS Cross Cutting Concepts because we believe science process thinking is the most critical component of high quality science experiences in the early elementary grades.  

The base knowledge, misconception, and vocabulary sections serve as a quick reference for you.  For more info about the terminology, download the full vocabulary list on the Field Videos & Lessons  page.

The Materials and Preparation section lets you quickly see if you have all the supplies you'll need for a lesson and how much set up is needed.  

The third page of every lesson walks you though the main activity and always follows this three part format.  Setting the Stage is where you introduce the lesson to your group and hook students for the activity ahead. 

The Main Event is the heart of any given lesson.  It's helpful to re-read this section prior to doing a lesson with students.

The Encore section often includes extensions in addition to a wrap up for the main lesson.  This section is flexible and can help you adjust the pacing and time needed for a lesson.

The fourth page of each K-2 lesson presents integration opportunities for grade level specific ELA and Math standards.  These integrations are helpful in extending the lesson beyond your science block or using science content to teach vital skills in application.  Teachers who "don't have time" for science in their schedules find framing lessons though literacy or math an effective way to get science into their day.

This page also has a suggested service learning activity.  The goal of this section is to inspire you to take a lesson or two a year to the next level and give back to the community in some way.

Finally, the Arts Integration section provides another learning modality and opportunity to hook learners!

Most lessons have some supplemental pages.  These can include a more visual description of all or part of the lesson as well as game components, other lesson printables, and journal pages.  These pdf pages can be shared though your learning management system.  Just delete the teacher pages and share the remaining file.  If you have questions about sharing materials within your specific LMS, we'd be happy to help.  Reach out to us at Curious@Go2Science.com!

We also include journal pages and growth mindset writing rubrics aligned the the three CCSS writing genres.  Many teachers report that Go2Science inspires students to write!