Food chains (5th level)

1. Food chains
5th level
Anna Mas

2. Introduction
I decided to implement a lesson about food chains to 5th level.
As you are going to see after, I added some changes when I
implemented it.

3. Lesson plan

4. Resources provided during the activities:
1. Introductory text:
“ All living things need food to give them the energy
to grow and move. A food chain shows how each
living thing gets its food. It shows who eats whom”.

5. Resources provided during the activities:
2.

6. Scafolding:

What happens if ________ disappears?
 There will be a lot of ______
 The ______ won’t have anything to eat

7. Assessment activity:
Look at the food chain picture and complete:
 What happens if the snake disappears?
 There will be a lot of ______
 The ______ won’t have anything to eat.
 What happens if insects disappear?
 There will be a lot of ______
 The ______ won’t have anything to eat.

8. Assessment activity:
Food chain picture:

9. Changes during the implementation:
Activity title
Time
Description
Interaction
Skills
Materials
1-Brainstorming:
Food 10
chain
min
It happened the same I had
planned
and
students
exposed good ideas.

The teacher asks what they T-Ss
think a food chain could be.
After listening some ideas
and writing them on the
board, the teacher reads a
text (you can find it in the
next page).
R/S/I
Text
2- Photocopy and food 18
chain explanation
min
I realized that I was difficult
for
the
students
to
understand what happened
if a member of the food
chain disappears. Seeing
this
and
after
my
explanation, I asked them
to talk about this in pairs
and to write their own
reflections. After 3 minutes,
they had to expose it to the
rest of the class.
Once seeing what is a food T-S/Ss- Ss
chain, the teacher hands
out a food chain photocopy
and talks about the
different
concepts
(consumer, producer, etc.)
After seeing this, they start
to talk about what happens
if an element of the chain
disappears and what are
the consequences.
L/R/ I
Photocopy 1
3- BBC game
10
It was quicker than I min
expected and the majority
only needed ten minutes to
complete it.
They play this educational S-S
game
in
pairs:
S/ I
Online resource:
http://www.bbc.co.
uk/bitesize/ks2/sci
ence/living_things/
food_chains/play/
4- What happens if the 10
____ disappears?
min
Children have to look at a T-S / S-S
food chain and answer
some questions. They
worked in pairs because I
preferred
they
collaborated.
W
Photocopy 2
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bites
ize/ks2/science/living_thing
s/food_chains/play/

10. Pictures:

11. Pictures:

12. Reflections:
•
The more you practice, the more you learn.
The practise helps you to improve. In my case, I changed the last
activity because I though that students didn’t have enough experience
working about food chains in order to do that activity alone. Some of
them were able but others not and there was no sense in discouraging
them (in case they realised they couldn’t do it by themselves). They
did it in pairs and it worked.
• This activity was a nice opportunity to prepare, implement and
reflect about a CLIL lesson.
• I learnt about the great amount of CLIL resources that exist.