tlh teacher’s little helper
Lesson plan

Lesson 14 — Writing It Up and Pulling It Together

Teacher-facing plan: I do · We do · You do.

Set the dual purpose: "Today you turn your investigation into a proper scientific report, and we pull together the four big ideas of the whole unit."

Model the structure of a scientific report, building a skeleton on the board and naming the job of each part:

Think aloud through the language features scientists use: past tense, precise vocabulary, and an evidence-based conclusion ("The results show... because..." rather than "I think..."). Model turning one data point into a conclusion sentence.

Then briefly recap the unit's four big ideas — survival and environment, reversible/irreversible change, Earth's changing surface, and electrical circuits — using the word wall.

Co-write the opening sections of a model report as a class, using shared/class data:

  • draft the question and method together, checking the method has enough detail to repeat;
  • slot in the results (table + graph reference);
  • model one conclusion sentence drawn straight from the data.

Then run a quick whole-class review of the four big ideas: for each, ask students to supply one key word and one example from the unit, building a shared summary on the board.

Students independently draft their scientific report using the scaffold:

  1. write the question and method;
  2. present results with their table and graph;
  3. write an evidence-based conclusion that says whether the result matched the prediction;
  4. use at least three pieces of key vocabulary from the unit correctly.

Circulate to check conclusions are drawn from evidence, not just opinion or a restated prediction.

Close (last 5 min): a short vocabulary quiz drawn from the unit glossary, then a brief reflection — one thing each student now understands that they didn't at the start of the unit.