John Hugunin

Comprehension Lesson
Subject Discipline: 8th Grade Science
Topic: Humans Effects on Ecosystems
1. Bell Ringer
a. What do you think is the biggest way humans impact the ecosystem?
b. How do YOU impact our ecosystem
2. Discussion of Bellringer as a class Hearing opinions of students
3. Concept/Bubble Map Human actions that affect ecosystem
a. Have students come up with ideas of actions tie into slideshow which is next
4. Slideshow of pictures of different kinds of effects of human actions
a. Deforestation
b. Mining/Excavating
c. Oil Spills
d. Reduction of Fossil Fuels
5. Read articles on deforestation 1 identifying cons, 1 justifying the need to do it
a. Hand articles out to class- half pro article, half con article.
b. Students will then find someone with the opposite article, and do a small Jigsaw
activity. This will inform the other student of their articles contents.
c. After this activity, and using the knowledge given to them by their peers, students
will complete a double entry journal to detail the thoughts of both sides of the
deforestation argument
6. Exit Ticket
a. What is one way that you could minimize your negative impact on the ecosystem?
Comprehension Strategies are written in blue
See page 2 for explanation and rationales of strategies implemented in this lesson.

There are multiple comprehension strategies that were used throughout the course of this
lesson plan. First, a concept/bubble map is used to organize the students original ideas
regarding actions that affect the ecosystem. This is also done to get an informal assessment of
the students prior knowledge. This strategy engages all students by first making them make a
bubble map on their own. After a brief discussion the entire class will share their ideas onto the
board to make a class concept map. Throughout the ecosystem unit, students will continue to
add to their bubble map until the end of the unit, when it will be collected and evaluated by the
teacher.
Another strategy that is used in this lesson is a mini Jigsaw activity. This activity is done
when there are the two different articles relating to deforestation. Each of the two articles has
different information and data presented, so in order to have students see both sides of the
argument, students will collaborate. After reading their article, students will pair up and
complete the Jigsaw activity so students will get to experience and discuss both sides of the
argument. This will be assessed through the next comprehension strategy mentioned below.
Finally, in this lesson the students will complete a double journal entry detailing both
sides of the arguments; presenting information, opinions, etc. This will engage students by
actually getting them to discuss and articulate their opinions on both sides of the argument. The
double journal and the jigsaw activity will be assessed through the content of the double journal.
The reason behind this is that if the jigsaw activity was effective, they should have enough
information to complete the double journal adequately.