Lesson Plan: Defining, Describing and Calculating Rate
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Print Lesson PlanOverview
The CyberSquad tests out Wicked's brooms and determines how to calculate their speeds. In these Cyberchase activities, students explore their prior knowledge of rate and extend it to create tables of values coordinating time and distance. They learn how to examine distance-time graphs and how to calculate unit rates (that is, distance per one second).
Grade Level:
5-8Suggested Time
1 hour
Media Resources
The Fastest Broom QuickTime Video
Calculating Speed QuickTime Video
Materials
Handout 1: Exploring Ideas of Rate
Handout 2: Rate on the Coordinate Plane
Assessment: Level A
Assessment: Level B
Answer Key
The Lesson
Part I: Learning Activity
1. Read the following to your students: "In this Cyberchase clip, Wicked the Witch decides to sell brooms. She uses the CyberSquad's pictures to endorse the quality of the brooms. To ensure truth in advertising, the kids decide to test the speed of the brooms. They decide to test which broom goes further after five seconds and then they figure out a way to describe this as a rate or speed."
2. Distribute Handout 1: Exploring Ideas of Rate .
3. Ask the students to complete handout 1 to test their knowledge of rate.
4. Play the The Fastest Broom QuickTime Video . Ask students to pay attention to how the CyberSquad tests the brooms to find out which one is the fastest.
5. Discuss the students' answers to question number 1 in handout 1 to see whether they chose Answer C, which includes both how far and in what amount of time something or someone can move. Discuss why the other answers to question number 1 do not fully describe rate or speed because they do not include both distance and time.
6. Discuss with the students their answers to question 2 and whether they distinguished the numbers (choices a and c) from the rates (b, d and e) and the fraction (g) and ratio (f).
7. Ask the students to predict what kind of measurements they need to make in order to figure out speed. Discuss what tools are necessary to make those measurements. Make a list of students' suggestions on the board.
8. Tell the students that they will now watch a video segment in which the CyberSquad is asked to figure out the speed or rate of their brooms.
9. Play the Calculating Speed QuickTime Video .
10. Discuss the tools and measurements the CyberSquad used in the video segment, and have students compare those with the suggestions the class made before watching the video.
11. Distribute Handout 2: Rate on the Coordinate Plane .
12. Ask the students to complete handout 2, and then discuss their answers.
Part II: Assessment
Assessment: Level A (proficiency): Students determine relevant information from a graph charting the distance of two cars over time.
Assessment: Level B (above proficiency): Students determine the fittest person by calculating heart rates.
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