Sample Unit Lesson

 

 

Enduring Understandings

1. Observed patterns in nature guide organization and classification.

2. Observed patterns prompt questions about relationships and causes underlying them.

3. Patterns exist everywhere in regularly occurring shapes or structures, repeating events, or repeated relationships.

4. The arrangement of the Periodic Table is based on structures, patterns, and relationships.

5. The elements, arranged by increasing atomic number, exhibit periodic trends in properties.

6. Chemical and physical properties of an element are determined by the element’s structure.

7. The Periodic Table is dynamic as a result of scientific discovery.

 

 

Understanding Questions

1. How does the periodic table help us to discover what the Earth is made of?

2. How does the periodic table help us explain relationships between atoms?

3. How do these relationships help us to explain relationships between other materials in the world?

4. How do these relationships help us to explain other relationships between living organisms in the world?

 

 

Periodic Table Unit

 

Students will be able to:

 

1. Students will investigate the development of the periodic table as a method of organizing elements.

 

        - In class activity spanning 2 days where students will spend time organizing types of materials such as               rocks, tape, wood, etc. to explore why the periodic table is organized the way it is.

 

        - Exit Card per day: Name one thing you learned today.

 

 

  2.  Students will investigate the characteristic properties of metals, non-metals, and metalloids and classify             elements according to these properties.

 

         - Warm up: Give two possible reasons why Iron is where it is on the table.

 

         - Students will have the opportunity to handle metals such as aluminum, copper, zinc, iron, etc. and see                pictures of nonmetals and metalloids while learning properties of each. Nonmetals and metalloids will              be covered in 1 day and metals will be covered separately over 2 days.

 

         - Mini lab with students measuring conductivity of metals and nonmetal plastics. 1 day and at home write            up.

 

         - Exit Card per day: Name one metal (or metalloid or nonmetal) and list 2 characteristics of it)

 

  3.  Students will relate the reactivity and stability of different families of elements to their atomic structure.

 

         - Warm up: Rate the conductivity of Silicon, Copper and Argon

 

         - Atomic structure including nucleus, electrons and protons will be explained and drawn. In 1 day

 

         - Relationship to stability will be explained over the course of 2 days;

 

         - Exit Pair and Share: Pair up and one student draw the atom and the other describe it

 

 

  4.  Identify properties of common families of elements.

 

         - Warm up: Explain the relationship between stability and atomic structure

 

         - These will be pointed out as consequences of previous lessons learned. 1 day.

 

         - Exit: Choose one family of elements and make an argument as to why they are grouped as a family.

 

  5.  Students will be able to identify and explain trends of the periodic table including electronegativity, electron       affinity, atomic radius and ionization energy.

 

         - This is the crux of the unit. Each subcategory is very important and will take 1 day each. The students              will be given a periodic table that they can color and designate however they see fit. 4 days.

 

         - Exit 3-2-1 at the end of the 4th day: Students write 3 things they learned, 2 things they aren’t sure of and            1 thing they want me to know

 

Total Unit Duration = 14 days.

 

Exam = 1 day at end of unit.

 

 

 

** During this I would implement the textbook entitled “Chemistry” by Zumdahl, 7th edition. Having the students    do the background reading would help the classroom discussions be more productive.

 

 

Unit = Periodic Table

 

I chose teaching a unit of the periodic table because it is a unit that I will hopefully be able to teach and it is a topic that lends itself well to a 2-3 week unit. Frankly, my first instinct of how to construct the unit came from my own experience of how I first learned about the periodic table when I was in high school. I then thought of how I could adapt this to my current placement.

 

Currently at my placement the students do not use textbooks, although they are available. I chose to include some light textbook reading in my unit and I think this could be easily handled by either passing the books out for a few days or by copying the relevant sections. I think it would be a good exercise for the students considering almost all college courses still used textbooks as primary sources of information.

 

I tried to incorporate both hands on experiments and experiences as well as more traditional class lecturing and discussions so that all students would have various methods of learning the material. I also chose various kinds of warm ups and exit strategies to assess students’ understandings as the unit progressed. I also chose to end with a more traditional exam that would include a very visual component where the students could choose to indicate the trends of the periodic table in words or with colors and labels on a blank table I provides, again to help those students who might have a language issue or simply prefer to express their knowledge visually.