A Lesson on the Ocean Food ChainSecond Grade

Written by Jessica Nordenson Abstract The ocean is often an abstract topic for students to learn about due to its complexity and the fact that it isnt always something that can be hands-on in a classroom setting. Throughout this lesson I attempted to make the topic of the ocean food chain as concrete as I could. Students will be able to understand what a food chain looks like and the differences between a food chain and a food web. These concepts will help them address some of the national science standards dealing with life cycles, organisms and their environments, and characteristics that organisms have (Science Education, 129). Introduction The second grade class was focusing on an ocean unit. The unit included three parts that were: learning about ocean animals, learning about what ocean animals eat, and finally learning about the visual representation of the ocean food system that is called the ocean food chain. The part of the unit that dealt with the ocean food chain was set up in accordance with the learning cycle, which incorporates three main steps into the learning process: exploration, concept development, and application. This cycle was used to ensure students were fulfilling the goals of working collaboratively, developing a robust understanding of content through application, and meeting standards dealing with science education. Second graders need concrete representations and explanations of material to make connections, and a concrete representation of the ocean proved to be difficult since it was impossible to take the students to the ocean. The second grade students had a small amount of prior knowledge about food chains from the school year before, but English Language Learner (ELL) students were new to the school and had no prior knowledge. These students needed more scaffolding and visuals to not only understand the language but also the content.

Exploration
Day 1 The exploration step of the learning cycle is based on student exploration of the current topic. Rather than following a step-by-step procedure, students are encouraged to creatively investigate the content on their own. The exploration stage of the learning process also gives teachers the opportunity to see what students may already know or want to know Materials: about the content. Envelopes (1 per student pair) 4 cutouts of ocean animals (per envelope) o These should be animals that follow each
other in the ocean food chainex. seal, fish, crab, etc.

Blank sheets of paper (1 per student pair)

In this lesson I began by breaking the students up into pairs. I decided pairs would work best for this lesson because I wanted students to be able to have intimate discussion when answering the question I was about to pose to them. Making them work in pairs also shows students that science is a social field and involves collaboration. I paired English Language Learner (ELL) students with nonELL students who I knew would be willing to assist them in order to make the learning more effective for ELL students as well. After I had broken the students up into pairs I informed them that I would be placing an envelope on their desks and that they were not to open it until I told them it was okay. This was to make sure that they were not going to be distracted by what was inside while I was speaking to them, which is an example of classroom management. After I placed an envelope on the edge of each pair of students desks, I posed this direction to them: In the envelope I have just given you, there are four ocean animals. I would like you to take those animals out and to discuss how you think they may be related.

The animals that I included in the envelope were an orca whale, a seal, a small fish, and a crab. I chose to include these animals because their order in a food chain is easy to graspfor example, it would be hard to believe that a crab would eat a seal. The order of these animals is straightforward, which is beneficial at this part of the lesson because the students are just beginning to learn about the food chain. I wouldnt want to provide them with animals that may confuse them, because they wouldnt be developmentally ready for that. I gave each pair their own set of these manipulatives because I wanted every student to be able to explore possible relationships between the animals in this lesson in the most concrete way possible. Since I wasnt able to take them to the ocean and show them these relationships, I attempted to give them a visual representation that they could investigate with. Also, the visuals made the exploring of possible relationships for ELL students easier to understand and perform. I gave the students around five minutes to discuss any relations they found between the animals with their partner. During their discussions I walked around the classroom and observed what they were saying. Doing this gave me an idea of what the students schemas and prior knowledge were, and it allowed me to see if I needed to scaffold the students to reach the desired thought process. I gave the students a one-minute warning to wrap up their conversations, and then proceeded to let them know I was ready to start the class discussion by standing at the front of the classroom and exhibiting body language that effectively communicated my want for them to quiet down and focus on me. I did this by using an expectant facial expression, looking at all of them, standing by the board, and being silent as I waited for the room to quiet down. These nonverbal behaviors signaled to the class that I was ready to start the discussion without me having to talk over them or ask them to be quiet multiple times.

Concept Development
The concept development stage of the learning cycle is where students take information learned in a previous lesson and begin to apply it to what they are currently learning. In this case, a class discussion on the relationships between the four animals is where our concept development began. The discussion prompted students with short-answer and thought-provoking questions that scaffolded them to discussing a few of the science standards such as students will understand that all organisms cause changes in the environment where they live and organisms have basic needs (Science Education, 129). I began our class discussion by asking what relationships the students found between the four ocean animals. The students answered that they had noticed that certain animals ate other animals that were in the envelope. I asked What could we call this process?, and the students replied the food chain. Them answering this question so quickly showed me that the students had some prior knowledge about food chains, which would make sense since they had touched on it slightly the year prior. Since the students knew what this process was called so quickly, it was appropriate to scaffold their thinking to a higher level by asking questions such as: Why do you think this is called a food chain? What are some of the ways we can visually represent this food chain? What happens if one of the animals on this food chain dies out? What do you think is at the top/bottom of the food chain and why?

These questions scaffolded the students to have discussions involving a few of the science standards by encouraging them to reflect on the material they had just learned because they were open-ended questions rather than yes or no questions. Using open-ended questions helps students to link new information they are learning to the old information in their schemas (we know this from constructivist learning theory). However, when asking these questions, it is essential that teachers use wait time to allow students enough time to process their thoughts related to the question. Many times, teachers dont allow enough wait time and end up stopping the students thought process by asking another question or simply answering the question for them. In order to increase student responses teachers must use effective wait time to allow the students time to fully process their thoughts. After our class discussion I asked the students to show me how they would visually represent a food chain with the four ocean animals I had given them to show me how well they could apply what they had just discussed. I handed each pair a piece of blank paper and a gluestick, and told them they needed to work together to agree upon how to best represent this food chain visually. This again helped to show my students that science is collaborative and involves social learning theory. It also provided me with a formative assessment of the students understanding, which I was able to use to help format the rest of the unit

Day 2 To involve concept development on Day 2 of the unit I began with questions that encouraged the students to reflect on the previous days content and their prior knowledge. For example: What is one big idea you took away from our discussion on the food chain yesterday? What was the most interesting idea you took away from our discussion on the food chain yesterday? Why did you find it so interesting?

Its important to ask open-ended reflection questions not only because they promote higher levels of thinking for the students, but also because they give teachers an indication of whether or not students grasped the material. Students may show teachers any misconceptions they have about the material through their answers to open-ended questions, which will inform teachers of whether or not changes need to be made to the students schemas. Teachers can use the responses students give to adjust their instruction to cater to the needs of the class. During the wait time that should occur after teachers ask students to access their prior knowledge, teachers should use nonverbal behaviors to encourage students to answer the questions. A few examples of how to do this are: holding out fingers while waiting for students to answer to show how many responses you want or responding with okay or other short phrases after students give their answers to make the students feel like youre looking for another answer to build on. Nonverbal behaviors can have a large impact on increasing motivation for students to think more deeply by making them feel like they need to give higher-level responses. Materials: Large cards Images of ocean animals for cards Images of ocean animals for board o Images should be of ocean animals that connect in a
food webex. orca whale, shark, fish, etc.

String (cut into pieces 2 ft. long) Hole Punch

After we were through discussing the questions, I asked for six volunteers who were comfortable reading in front of the class. This way I didnt end up picking students who were eager to volunteer but would be put in an uncomfortable position when asked to read (this is especially important when considering ELL students. They may want to feel involved in the activity, but may get embarrassed when forced to read in front of a classespecially if they are an early level student).

I also picked an even number of boy volunteers and girl volunteers to not only avoid gender bias but to reinforce the idea that science is a topic and field for both males and females. I handed each of the volunteers a large card with a picture of an ocean animal on itthe six different ocean animals were: an orca whale, a shark, an octopus, a small fish, a crab, and a krill. On the back of each card is a sentence that states what that animal is and what animals it eats out of the ones involved in the activity. For example, if animals were an orca whale, a shark, an octopus, a small fish, a crab, and a krill, the card with the small fish on it would read I am a [small] fish. I eat crab and krill. On the bottom of each card there were long strings hanging through punched holes. While I informed the volunteers of what they were going to be doing, I asked the rest of the class to quietly discuss with their partners what they thought a representation of a food chain might look like if two animals in that food chain ate the same thinghowever, the animal that was higher up in the chain does not eat one of the animals passed on the way down to the animal being eaten. This was to prevent the rest of the class from losing focus while I was talking with the volunteers. After I was finished with the volunteers I had them return to their seats and place their cards on their laps with the strings wound around them. Because the volunteers would not all be coming up to read at the same time, I didnt want the card or the strings to be a distraction to the volunteers or others. I asked a random volunteer that was higher up on the ocean food chain to come to the front of the room. The cardholder showed the rest of the class the picture on their card, and then I would point to the board behind me. On the board behind me I had put up the same six pictures that were on the cards. I would point to each picture on the board and ask How many of you think that [name of the animal on the card] eats [name of the animal on the board]? For example, if the animal on the card was a small fish, I would ask How many of you think a small fish eats orca whales? What about sharks? The students would raise their hands to indicate whether or not they thought the animal on the card ate the animal on the board. After we had gone through all of the board animals for a card animal, the cardholder would read the back of their card and tell the rest of the class what, in fact, the animal on the card ate. When we were told which animals were eaten they would come forward and stand at an angle around two feet away from the other animals. The initial animal would then give the unattached ends of the strings that were attached to their card to the animals that they ate (on every card the number of strings correlated with the number of animals involved in the activity that the card animal ate). This process was repeated for every card until finally all of the cards strings were being held by the animals that they ate. What was left was a visual representation of a food web. At this point, I asked the students questions about the web made by the string connecting the animals that scaffolded them to understand that this complex of a food order between animals was called something other than a food chain. Effective questions to do so include: Where have you seen a shape like this before?

What could we call this shape that is made by all these pathways connecting the animals? How is the shape of all these pathways different from the pathway we studied yesterday?

These questions encouraged the students to think deeply about the differences between the representation in front of them and the food chains they had explored the day before (they were reflectinga key component of concept development). After the students came to the conclusion that the visual representation in front of them was called a food web, I prompted them to think more deeply about what they had just learned by asking what some of the similarities and differences were between the food chain and food web. This promotes analyzing, reflection upon prior knowledge, and making connections.

Application
Day 3 The final stage of the learning cycle process is called the application stage because its the stage in which students apply the knowledge they have learned during the exploration and concept development stage. I began with a class discussion to reflect on what they learned within the exploration and content development stage. I used short-answer questions, which are important to use during the application stage because students need to reflect on the lesson and make connections. Some example questions are: What is a food chain? How would you describe a food web? What new information did you learn throughout this lesson?

Materials: Blank paper Drawing utensils

After the students discussed what new information they gained throughout this lesson, I handed out two sheets of blank paper to each student. I asked them to label one sheet Food Chain and the other Food Web. I then informed them that I was going to give them around twenty minutes to draw examples of each. The examples were allowed to include whatever animals the students wanted, as long as the examples made sense and had an order to them. The minimum number of animals involved in the food chain was three, and the minimum number of animals involved in the food web was four. I chose these numbers because I felt they were the

minimum amount of animals that would show me the students clearly understood not only the concept of a food web and a food chain, but the differences between them. This method of application also served as a summative assessment and therefore showed me if any of my students were still struggling with the concepts, and what parts specifically they were struggling with. When dealing with ELL students this method of assessment can be particularly helpful in many situations due to the fact that the product is visual and is not writing-based. Conclusion The learning cycle helped me to format my lesson by breaking it up into its three components: exploration, concept development, and application. In all of these sections I used open-ended questions, beneficial activities, and behaviors such as wait time and body language to enhance my lesson. I made my lesson as visual and hands-on as possible to enhance the learning of my ELL students, and I used the nature of science to show students that science is a social field that promotes exploration rather than a step-by-step thinking process. Misconceptions that science is a solitary field need to be addressed so that students can understand the communication that exists between scientists and the different types of scientists, so they can truly decide whether or not it is something they are interested in pursuing. References National Research Council. National Science Education Standards. (1996). Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press.