Lesson Plan

Teacher Candidate: Lauren Deibert Date: February 21, 2023

Group Size: Whole Group Allotted Time: 30 minutes Grade Level: 3rd grade
Subject or Topic: Conserving Resources

Common Core/PA Standard(s)

4.3.3.A:Identify the natural resources used to make various products.
4.3.3.B:Identify local natural resources.
4.5.3.A:Identify resources humans take from the environment for their survival.
3.4.3.B2: Explain how materials are re-used or recycled.
Learning Targets/Objectives
The third grade students will learn the importance of conserving nonrenewable resources by
interacting in a mining simulation of fossil fuels.

The third grade students will learn the importance and the specific classifications when
recycling by classifying objects into recycling categories.
Formative Assessment Approaches Evidence observation or method of collection
1. Conserving resources and recycling 1. Morning work review sheet.
lesson review. 2. Observational
2. Recycling Sort …
….
Assessment Scale for any of the assessments above if needed
N/A
Summative if applicable
Subject Matter/Content to be taught in the lesson
● Conserving Resources

Prerequisites
● Knowledge of natural resources
● Knowledge of nonrenewable and renewable resources.
● A basic understanding of recycling.

New Key Vocabulary

● Conserving: the act of protecting and preserving natural resources and the environment
for future generations.
● Recycling: is the process of converting waste materials into new products or materials.
Content/Facts
● Non Renewable resources are limited, once we use them up they cannot be replaced.
● Because nonrenewable resources are limited we must do things to conserve these
resources. We can conserve them by…
 ○ Traditional power plants burn fossil fuels to create electricity, so it is a good
idea to turn off any device that uses electricity when it isn’t being used.
○ Use alternative energy sources like solar energy and solar panels.
○ recycle material when possible.
○ repurpose materials instead of throwing them out.
○ Don’t drive unless you have to, carpool, or use public transportation.
● Recycling is another way we can conserve earth’s natural resources. Items that can be
recycled include..
○ paper and cardboard
○ glass
○ plastic
○ metal
○ electronics
○ batteries
○ clothing and textiles.
○ Food waste through composting.

Introduction/Activating/Launch Strategies
1. I will begin by reviewing what we learned yesterday. Renewable resources can be
replaced, nonrenewable resources cannot be replaced, and flow resources are
renewable resources that cannot be used at all times.
2. I will explain to the students that it is important for us to conserve our natural resources
so we have them and our future children will have them and so on.
3. To show you just how important it is to conserve nonrenewable resources we are going
to do a fun simulation activity.
4. I will start by putting students into groups of 3.
Development/Teaching Approaches
1. Each student in the group will get an index card with a type of pasta and a name of a
fossil fuel; oil, gas, and coal.
2. I will give the students a few minutes to create a “company” name.
3. I will explain to the students that when I give the signal, each company is going to
compete with one another to mine for the same resource. You are only going to get 20
seconds to do this and the other companies will be mining the same resource as you.
4. I will dump a few boxes of each type of pasta on the floor on a table cloth.
5. I will call out that oil will be the first resource that will be mined. The student who has
the oil index card will go first. Using a paper bag they will have 30 seconds to collect
their type of pasta aka oil.
6. The student will return back to their group and as a group they will count how much
pasta they mined. The group will write how many collected under round one on their
handout. They will then put the pasta in the “used up” paper bag to indicate that the
resource has been used.
7. We will continue this until each resource has been mined for twice.
8. By the end the students should have trouble finding their resources and there may not
even be anymore left.
 9. After the simulation is finished I will explain how this is what is happening, this is
reality. Earth just has a much larger pasta pile then we have so it is not happening right
now but we are moving towards that direction.
10. Fossil fuels come from years and years of the building up of the remains of ancient
living organisms. So this is not something that can quickly be made; it takes a long
time. So we do not want to run out of fossil fuels.
11. So it is important to conserve our energy we do have so we are not wasting it and using
it up quicker.
12. We will have a discussion on how we can conserve nonrenewable resources and write
them on the board, some things we should discuss is;
a. Traditional power plants burn fossil fuels to create electricity, so it is a good
idea to turn off any device that uses electricity when it isn’t being used.
b. Use alternative energy sources like solar energy and solar panels.
c. recycle material when possible.
d. repurpose materials instead of throwing them out.
e. Don’t drive unless you have to, carpool, or use public transportation.
(Day 2) Recycling
1. I will begin by reminding students what we learned yesterday. Nonrenewable resources
take a very long time for earth to make so we must conserve them and not waste them.
2. Another thing we can do is recycle. Let’s read a fun book on why we should recycle.
3. I will read the book “Why Should I Recycle?” by Mike Gordon.
4. Recycling is another way we can conserve our earth’s natural resources.

Closure/Summarizing Strategies
1. After reading the book we will be doing a recycling sort with real life materials. I will
bring in paper, newspaper, soda can, soda bottle, food can, glass jar, cardboard box, and
a plastic bag.
2. I will have three labels on the whiteboard, paper, glass, and plastic. I will reveal one of
the objects and as a class we will discuss which recycling bin the object goes in.
3. I will end the lesson by telling the students that it is important for us to do our duties to
conserve and recycle natural resources to make sure they last for us, our future children
and so on.
4. I will create a review sheet for the students to do Monday morning for morning work.
This way they can review the content and I can see how much they learned. We will go
over it during social studies time.

Accommodations/Differentiation
● Materials translated into Spanish for Spanish speaking students.
● Adapt the morning review worksheet for learning support students.
● Give extra support when working through classroom discussions and activities for
students who are spanish speaking and are in learning support.

Materials and Resources:

● 4 types of pasta (2 boxes of each)
● Index cards
● Mining record sheet Fossil Fuel Mining Recording sheet
 ● Paper bag
● Plastic table cloth
● “Why Should I Recycle?” by Mike Gordon
● Paper, glass, and plastic labels
● Paper, newspaper, soda can, soda bottle, food can, glass jar, cardboard box, and a
plastic bag.
● Morning work review sheet. Conserving Natural Resources. Review

Reflective Response:
Report of Student Learning Target/Objectives Proficiency Levels

I collected their morning work review paper in the morning when they were finished with it but
we ended up going over it on day 2. I picked sticks to have students read the question, then I had
the class raise their hand for the answer they chose, so I could get an overall feel for how the
students did. The students seemed to do very well on all the questions except number 2 on the
front. Majority put A, by recycling materials when possible. But a handful of students put B, by
using them as decorations in our homes to preserve their beauty. Other than that question the
students did well.

Personal Reflection Questions

What went well in this lesson?

The pasta activity went amazingly and the students really understood the concept that if
we harvest fossil fuels too quickly in a short amount of time we could possibly run out of them
for future generations. The students also enjoyed going into the topic of recycling. We even got
into the topic of compost and I quickly found a video to share with them about what compost
is.

What could I improve in this lesson?

Next time I would use this lesson I would make sure to take a little more time to do the
pasta activity. I didn’t get to do it in its entirety. The students didn’t actually get to count the
pasta they brought back and we were rushed. Even though the students still got the point of why
we did the activity I would definitely take more time to do it.

Additional reflection/thoughts

Day one of this activity was a lot of fun. The students enjoyed the pasta activity even though
we went through it quickly. It really gave the students an understanding of the idea that we
must conserve our fossil fuels or the coming generations will not have any. We only got
through the activity that day. We did not get to go through ways to conserve fossil fuels, I
started talking about that on day 2. Day 2 we read the read aloud. The students really enjoyed
this book and we even got talking about what compost was. The students seemed very
interested in it so I quickly pulled up a video that explained what compost was. The students
really loved the hands-on aspect of our recycling sort activity in class with the physical items.