Plant and Animal Cells in Human Life: Lesson Plan

• Helping the students understand what a cell is and explore its nature, components, and functions in plants and animals;
• Expanding the learners’ ability to transform the provided information and use it to complete basic tasks;
• Improving the learners’ literacy by encouraging them to spell complicated terms properly;
• Inviting the learners to discuss the new information and their performance in the tasks.

• ESL learners: Making the instructions simple, concise, and accurate so that ESL students could understand the guidelines and complete the tasks accordingly;
• Learners with disabilities: Providing the required equipment, making the text legible, and using IT tools to accommodate students with physical and mental disabilities;
• Learners from different social backgrounds: providing students with detailed instruction and inviting them to ask questions to clarify any issue.

• Describe how the teacher will capture students’ interest.
• State objective and essential question.

The teacher shows the students a small construction toy set (e.g., big LEGO blocks clipped together) and asks what they think is also built out of similar “bricks.” After the students participate in a small class discussion, the teacher reveals that every living organism is made of small “bricks,” i.e., cells. A colorful image of a cell is shown with the help of a classroom projector. The teacher states that, during the lesson, the students will learn:

• What a cell is;
• What plant cells are made of;
• What animal cells are made of.

Essential question: What are the key components of plant and animal cells?

• Describe what hands-on/minds-on activities students will be doing.

The students are provided with activity sheets, asked to read the definitions, and mark the appropriate part of a cell on their sheets by signing it and coloring it with a crayon (a different color per each element). The teacher controls the process, correcting the mistakes, and clarifying the issues that confuse the students.

• What questions or techniques will the teacher use to help students connect their exploration to the concept under examination?
• List higher order thinkingquestionswhich teachers will use to solicit studentexplanations and help them to justify their explanations.

The students will have to answer the following questions:
High Order Thinking Questions:
Creating: What information did you use to complete the task?
Evaluating: How can this information help you determine the parts of a cell?
Analysis: What seemed difficult to understand when completing the task?
Application: How would you define the following concepts using your own words: cell, nucleus, prokaryotic, eukaryotic, membrane?
Comprehension: Could you show the corresponding parts of a cell in the picture? (The teacher shows a poster).
Knowledge: Could you sum up what a plant ell is made of? An animal cell? How does this knowledge affect you?

• Extending the concept for deeper understanding.
• How is this knowledge applied in our daily lives?

The teacher asks the students to show how the knowledge of a cell’s properties will help them learn more about plants and animals, The students share their opinions in a group discussion.

• How will students demonstrate that they have achieved the lesson objective?
• This should be embedded throughout the lesson as well as at the end of the lesson.

The teacher provides the learners with a list of concepts (i.e., a cell, a chloroplast, etc.) and asks the learners to define them in their own words. After a learner provides a definition, the rest of the class agrees, expands the answer, or corrects it, while the teacher supervises the discussion and corrects the learners (if necessary).