Category Archives: fifth grade

Game Design Unit for Middle School

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INTRO TO GAME DESIGN

In this unit, students will:

Become proficient in use of Google apps Drive, Docs, Slides and Meet software for editing and sharing documents, presentation and videoconferencing.
Use Google Drawings, Chrome extensions e.g., Sketchpad, for creating graphics.
Use audio editing software to edit sound files.
Use educational software to learn and reinforce skills and concepts in mathematics.
Conduct original research on culture and natural environment of our community through outdoor education.
Conduct original research on history, culture and natural environment of our community and other Indigenous peoples through Internet and library research.
Conduct original research on history, culture and natural environment of our community and other Indigenous peoples through oral histories.

Google slides presentation to introduce unit

Module 1

Introduction to game design: Terms, game review, game design documents.

Read intro and game design terms.
Play at least 2 games.
Become familiar with Google apps. https://www.growingmath.org/google-apps-basics-for-hamsters/
Create notes document on games played and record your observations.
Add ideas for game based on outdoor observation. Include photos and sound recordings.
Complete game design course lesson 1 (skip video game vocabulary page)
– https://www.7generationgames.com/game_design/

Module 2

Understanding software enhancement: Game revisions, bug reporting

Play through at least 2 additional games
Add to notes document on game played and record your observations.
Add your ideas for game based on outdoor observation
Introduction to Bug Reporting
https://www.7generationgames.com/game_design/lesson-testing/

Module 3

Deeper dive into game design: Breaking down elements

Add to notes document on game played and record your observations.
Complete software note cards
Read example game design document
Create audio, graphics or video for your game using media collected during outdoor observation
https://www.7generationgames.com/game_design/3-becoming-a-designer/

Module 4

Better games, better world: An inside look inside the game design process

Edit notes to include ideas from the video from Module 3.
Attend game design meeting via Google hangout.
Create game design document
Create audio, graphics or video for your game using media collected during outdoor observation
https://www.7generationgames.com/game_design/4-creative-director/
https://www.7generationgames.com/game_design/game-art/

Module 5

Real-world applications: Critical thinking and professional skills development

Record oral history interviews
Edit notes to include ideas from the video and interviews from Module 4.
Outline presentation or report to be given/submitted in Module 7.
For those opting to present, craft a brief professional email to request a meeting with the software team to present your feedback and game suggestions.

Module 6

Getting your point across: Preparing presentations/reports

Record oral history interviews
Edit notes to include ideas from the video from Module 5.
Create audio, graphics or video for your game based on oral histories
Confirm meeting time/date.
https://www.7generationgames.com/game_design/team-lesson-5/
https://www.7generationgames.com/game_design/game-sounds/

Module 7

Game design in action: Insights, enhancements and feedback

Prepare feedback/enhancement presentation using Powerpoint or Google Slides. Five-minute presentation plus five-minutes of discussion. For those who prefer not to present, draft a 1-2 page game design report.
Present to software design team via Google hangout, Zoom or Microsoft Teams

Unit: Word Problems for fifth-graders

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CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.4.NF.A.2 Compare two fractions with different numerators and different denominators, e.g., by creating common denominators or numerators, or by comparing to a benchmark fraction such as 1/2

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NBT.A.1 Recognize that in a multi-digit number, a digit in one place represents 10 times as much as it represents in the place to its right and 1/10 of what it represents in the place to its left.

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NBT.A.3.A Read and write decimals to thousandths

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NBT.A.4 Use place value understanding to round decimals to any place.

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NF.A.2 Solve word problems involving addition and subtraction of fractions referring to the same whole, including cases of unlike denominators, e.g., by using visual fraction models or equations to represent the problem.

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NBT.B.5 Fluently multiply multi-digit whole numbers using the standard algorithm.

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NBT.B.7 Add, subtract, multiply, and divide decimals to hundredths

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.MD.A.1 Convert among different-sized standard measurement units within a given measurement system (e.g., convert 5 cm to 0.05 m), and use these conversions in solving multi-step, real world problems.

Time

Approximately 2.5 hours

Unit Summary

This cross-curricular unit includes a variety of strategies and examples for solving word problems at a fifth-grade level, including division of three-digit numbers, fractions and decimals.

Buffalo Hunts and Division

This lesson begins with a video on long division (optional) or a presentation on uses of division from the playground to the buffalo hunt. Students then watch a short video working long division problems. Finish with practicing long division in Making Camp Dakota. Short videos on Dakota buffalo hunt traditions and related math lessons are also linked.

Watch out for blood-sucking fishes!

This 40-minute lesson introduces new science vocabulary words, teaches about indigenous and invasive species and includes a couple of math problems showing how quickly invasive species multiply. It concludes with students playing the Making Camp Dakota: Past and Present game. Math word problems require finding half of 500 and 10 x 500.

Using Visual Models To Compare Fractions

Students play 2-3 levels of a game that teaches and assesses adding and comparing fractions with different numerators and denominators, with the context of a story from Ojibwe history. They create their own problems using visual models to compare fractions. Students discuss classmates’ problems. The lesson culminates with a video on visualization as a problem-solving strategy. (35-45 minutes)

Decimals, Epidemics & Fly Vomit – It’s science!

Learn decimals while weighing a flies and the food they eat. The lesson begins with a game on decimals and the Aztec smallpox epidemic, then moves to another disease spreader – flies. Students learn the role flies play in our ecosystem, how they eat and reproduce. (75 minutes)

Differentiation

For students who are struggling with word problems, assign these videos directly teaching strategies or watch together in class.

Word Problem Solving: Write down the numbers and what they represent. This is helpful if you have a lot of numbers and when you have to keep track of several details. A chart organizes data from the word problem. (3:17)
Problem-solving: Start at the end To make those pesky word problems easier. We’ve broken it down for you in this short video for Grades 3-5.
Duration: 3:31
Problem-solving tip: Throw it out This short video shows how to make a problem easier by throwing out information that you don’t need. Duration: 3:39

Using Visual Models To Compare Fractions

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Standards

Technology Required

Students will need a Mac or Windows computer or an iPad to play the Fish Lake game. Alternatively, students can play Forgotten Trail on the web using Chromebooks or any computer with a web browser.

Time

35-45 minutes

Lesson Summary

Lesson

Start with a Game (10-20 minutes)

Students play the Fish Lake game through level 2. This requires installing the game on an iPad or a Mac or Windows computer. If only Chromebooks are available, students can play the Forgotten Trail Game instead. We do recommend Fish Lake if iPads are available. Although mathematics and social studies standards taught in both games overlap, the change from using Chromebooks in most lessons to a more console-level game can improve student engagement.

Students create their own problems (10 minutes)

Use slides 1-4 of this Slides presentation to explain the assignment. Optionally, for students learning at home or for homework, it can be assigned to students in Google classroom or similar system.

Discuss math problems students created (10 minutes)

Because students very often ask, “What do you mean?” or “Give me an example?” slides 5-11 of the presentation give an example.

Watch a video (2.5 minutes)

Visualize! One way of solving a problem

Assessment

This lesson includes three types of assessment. In the games, students are presented with math word problems that relate to the game narrative. Their answers are scored and data can be accessed for each student from the teacher reports. Students submit math problems they have written for teacher feedback. Also, teacher can use whole class discussion of student problems as a gauge for understanding or have students in pairs or small groups submit written discussion of their peers’ math problems.

Ojibwe Clans and Migration (Bilingual English & Spanish)

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📖STANDARDS

NCSS theme – The study of people, places, and environments enables us to understand the relationship between human populations and the physical world.

Minnesota State Standard – History Sub-strand 4, Standard 15 “North America was populated by indigenous nations that had developed a wide range of social structures, political systems, and economic activities, and whose expansive trade networks extended across the continent.”

⏰ Time

40 minutes

📲 Technology needed

Internet connection on a PC or Chromebook laptop, tablet, or phone.

📃 Summary

This Ojibwe clan lesson for Grade 3 is focused on Ojibwe culture. Students learn where people and places are located and why they are there. They will become familiar with the causes, patterns and effects of Ojibwe settlement and migration. They will learn of the different population centers in Ojibwe society and investigate the impact of human activities on the environment.

📚 Lesson

The downloadable Google Slides presentation is available here. This has a digestible summary of the Ojibwe migration, and why and how it happened. The Ojibwe clans are introduced as well as the new lifestyles that the Ojibwe adopted after they migrated to the Great Lakes area and Ontario, Canada.

Game

Making Camp Bilingual can reinforce clans and culture studies using the Life section.

Select the LIFE button from the main choice screen.
From the LIFE choices, click on the box in the middle of the bottom row, the one with the four people, and watch the video about Ojibwe social structure. Answer the questions that follow the video.
Next, select the box on the bottom right. Watch the overview video on clans and totems. Answer the questions.
Students can also click on each individual clan totem icon to learn more about each Ojibwe clan and answer a question about each of them to earn points.
Return to the wigwam and trade with the points earned in this lesson.

Students can use the language button to switch between English and Spanish while watching the videos.

Alternatively, students may also play Forgotten Trail, which is an adventure game that homes in on the Ojibwe migration. Two kids in the game retrace the Ojibwe migration on their own and learn more about Ojibwe history along the way.

Assessment

Teachers will be able to view student reports for Making Camp Bilingual to view how many modules students completed in the LIFE section and their scores for each one.

Related Lesson

“Ojibwe Clans and Migration” – The English Only version of the lesson plan above featuring Making Camp Premium.

Decimals, Epidemics & Fly Vomit – It’s science!

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📖Standards

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NBT.B.7 Add, subtract, multiply, and divide decimals to hundredths

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.6.6 Acquire and use accurately grade-appropriate general academic and domain-specific words and phrases; gather vocabulary knowledge when considering a word or phrase important to comprehension or expression.

Technology

Students will need a phone or tablet to play the game.

Time

75 minutes

Lesson Summary

Lesson

1. Play a game

Play AzTech: Empiric Empire to learn basic conversions from fractions to decimals. Empiric Empire is available free for iPad or iPhone and for Android phones. As an added bonus, students will also learn about epidemics. It’s worth mentioning that the smallpox epidemic was spread by viruses but a lot of other diseases are spread by flies.

Note: For summer learning, you may want to just copy the paragraph above into your Google classroom for students to download the games to their phones.

2. Watch a video

I pasted in a link starting after the first minute because that is mostly telling you to like/ subscribe and comment. Ah, YouTube!

Bell Ringer – What if flies went extinct ? This 7:33 minute video discusses flies as agricultural pests and disease vectors, but also their benefits as scavengers eating up decaying carcasses, pollinators and animal feed.

Here is the link if you’d like to post in your Google classroom or other CMS for students to watch at home. https://youtu.be/80Iqp6bqc-0?t=76

3. Read about flies & perform a demonstration

4. Complete word journal

This lesson provides the opportunity for students to learn many words, in the reading, in the videos and possibly in the Empiric Empire game as well. Students add words or terms with which they are unfamiliar to their word journal. Some teachers call it a personal dictionary, to others it’s a word journal. Regardless, the goal is the same, for students to record new words, give a dictionary definition and “make the word their own”. This can be done by rewriting the definition in their own words, using the word in a sentence or including an illustration of the word.

Two dictionary sites to recommend for definitions are below. An added bonus to mention to students is that they can hear words pronounced.

Since students often ask for an example, here is an example you can link in your lesson.

The personal dictionary assignment, with all links, can be found here. Feel free to copy and paste into your Google classroom or other site, or print out for your class.

5. Presentation on Decimals in Science (Fly Experiment)

Give this presentation on using decimals to weigh flies, their containers and the food they eat to answer the question, “Do flies really eat 10 times their weight each day?”

Watch a second video

I recommend watching the first 5 1/2 minutes of the Facts About Flies – Secret Nature video to give the students some idea about both flies as vectors of disease but also important scavengers consuming decaying material. The full documentary is 49 minutes, which I personally found to be more about flies than I wanted to know.

Assessment

Three types of assessment are included in this lesson.

The Word Journal assignment is completed individually and submitted.
Math questions answered within the Empiric Empire game are scored automatically with immediate feedback and student results can be viewed in the teacher reports.
Math questions posed within the presentation can be answered as a whole class, having students hold up a card with their answer or with individual students responding and asking the rest of the class to agree or disagree.

Differentiated instruction

Review of Decimal Addition

One-minute step-by-step video from TeacherTube on Adding Decimals may be helpful for students who need a review of decimal addition.

Watch the whole video

For students who are extremely interested in insects, watching the entire 49 minute video of Facts about Flies will satisfy their curiosity

Experiments with fly larva

Hungry Hungry Hermetia

For teachers who want to do a deep dive into the role flies in consuming food waste, the experiment above uses 100 black soldier fly larvae. I am extremely impressed with this lesson because not only does it include a link to where to buy maggots (on Amazon, of course) but also answers the obvious question of what do you do with 100 fly larvae after your experiment is over. The answer is that you feed these to your class reptile. Would I bring 100 maggots into my classroom? Not in a million years, but that is why I am not an entomologist.

Introduction to Lakota/Dakota Oral Histories & Storytelling

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by Jen Mellette

📖 STANDARD

ND H.3-5.3, & ND H.3-5.9 Describe North Dakota Native American Essential Understandings. Describe how individuals and groups contributed to North Dakota.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.5.3 Use knowledge of language and its conventions when writing, speaking, reading, or listening.

⏰ LESSON TIME

45-60 minutes

📲 TECHNOLOGY REQUIRED

Computer with internet connection

📃 Summary

Students read a Lakota story on the end of the world. The teacher gives a short presentation on oral history as used by the Lakota/Dakota. Students play a game with stories from Dakota or Lakota culture. Students present their own examples of oral history in writing or orally. Assessment is in oral or written presentation and via data reports on answers in Making Camp Lakota or Dakota.

📚 Lesson

Read the Story

Read or have a student read the Lakota story of the end of the world . The English translation can be found on the Akta Lakota Museum site here or you can copy it as a Google doc into your own classroom.

Presentation

This short (5 minute) Google slide presentation explains what oral history is and how it was used by the Lakota/Dakota.

Play a Game

Have students play either Making Camp Lakota or Making Camp Dakota. From the earn page, select the LIFE tab. Select any 3 activities on the page to watch and answer the questions. If students have not played the game before, this should take 10-15 minutes from logging in, introduction, and the three choices.

The lessons featured in the Life tab are perfect examples of traditional oral history passed down by both Lakota/Dakota tribes.

Share Oral Histories

Once students have played the game, ask students to think of and share orally a story told to them or if they are not comfortable with public speaking, have them write down in a notebook entry to be turned in for grading.

Assessment

The assessment value is based on what is written down in the notebook or what is shared orally with the rest of the class. Some students will not share or write anything down due to lack of knowledge, so those will be case by case and one on one with the student in question. Based on stories shared and notebook entries, adjustments to class series can be made to target how much time we can spend on a second lesson and third lesson with oral histories.

Students completion of Life activities and their correct/ incorrect answers are recorded and data on student task completion and performance are available from the teacher reports.

RELATED Lessons You May Wish to Use

A Dakota boyhood is a lesson that also includes a story of Dakota life and teaches ELA at the fifth-grade level. This lesson also uses the Life section from the game Making Camp Lakota.

Breaking Down Division with Remainders – is a great addition for a cross-curricular unit. Making Camp Dakota follows a family at a pow-wow as the children learn about Dakota culture through stories from their elders and apply their long division skills along the way. This division lesson includes Making Camp Dakota game play, a video and Google slides presentation on division with remainders.

This lesson plan was originally developed as part of a series on returning culture and knowledge back to our youth as a part of the youth social skills night activities for the Native American Development Center in Bismarck, ND. It is part of a lesson plan series created by Jen Mellette, Youth and Community Coordinator.

Reflections on Ojibwe Migration

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by Janna Jensen and AnnMaria De Mars

📖 Standard

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NF.B.4 Apply and extend previous understandings of multiplication to multiply a fraction or whole number by a fraction.

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.6.SP.A.3 Recognize that a measure of center for a numerical data set summarizes all of its values with a single number.

D2.His.13.3-5 Use information about a historical source, including the maker, date, place of origin, intended audience, and purpose to judge the extent to which the source is useful for studying a particular topic.

⏰ Time

60 minutes

📲 Technology Required

Students need access to a computer with web browser.

📃 Summary

This lesson begins with a storyboard on the route and major events of the Ojibwe migration. Students then play the Forgotten Trail game, computing the average number of miles a character walked per day, followed by watching a video on map reading. As a group, students reflect on the challenges of the Ojibwe migration, compute the distance for just one segment and convert the distance from miles to kilometers.

📚Lesson

Storyboard on the Ojibwe Migration

Begin with this story board on the route and major events of the Ojibwe migration. We recommend having students read each section of the story as it advances. Alternatively, the teacher may read it to the class or students can read it to themselves either on devices in the classroom or at home.

Watch a video on how to find the mean

Warning: bad singing ahead. This short video tells how to find the mean – in song. You may skip this video if you have already used it in a previous lesson.

Play the Forgotten Trail Game

Students should play the game at least through the first level. The game begins with a middle school class learning about the Ojibwe migration. Students will solve math problems related to the average number of miles walked per day and fraction of distance covered.

Watch a video on using scales in maps

This video is 7 minutes and covers what is a scale, how to use one and that different maps have different scales. If you feel your students are already familiar with this information, you may skip this video. In the days of Google maps and GPS we have found students often are not as familiar with this information as you might assume.

Presentation on Reflections on the Ojibwe Migration

In this Google slides presentation, students are asked to reflect on the Ojibwe migration. What would it have taken to survive such a journey? They use their map skills to estimate the distance of one leg of the journey, in both kilometers and miles.

Presentation is also available as a PowerPoint.

Synonyms Video

Now that students have seen synonyms as words for the same thing and miles and kilometers as measures for the same distance, finish up with this short (less than 2 minutes) video on synonyms.

Assessment

Slides 14, 18 and 21 can be printed out for students to answer individually, or can be answered as a group in class. Data are available on activities completed and math problems answered in the Forgotten Trail reports. For more information, check out our reports page.

Buffalo Hunts and Division

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📖 Standard

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NBT.B.5 Fluently multiply multi-digit whole numbers using the standard algorithm.

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NBT.A.3.A Read and write decimals to thousandths

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.5.NBT.A.4 Use place value understanding to round decimals to any place.

NOTE: Teachers who have not yet covered decimals in their class have an option within the lesson to only teach the first standard.

⏰ Time

25- 30 minutes

📲 Technology Required

Computer or mobile device

📃 Summary

Begin with a video on long division (optional) or a presentation on uses of division from the playground to the buffalo hunt. Watch a short video working long division problems. Finish with practicing long division in Making Camp Dakota. Short videos on Dakota buffalo hunt traditions and related math lessons are also linked.

📚Lesson

Video: Optional for Review

If your students need a review of the steps in long division, we recommend this six-minute video that uses the acronym HMS ↓ to teach students to :

Ask How Many
Multiply
Subtract
Bring down

Presentation on Division and Buffalo Hunts

This Google slides presentation gives common factors in buffalo hunts across different tribes and explains how whether it is computing the number of hides a horse can carry or how long each group gets to play at recess, division is always useful.

NOTE: This presentation includes two slides that reference converting a fraction to a decimal. If you have not yet introduced this concept, those slides can be deleted.

Video: Long Division by Guessing

For those students who don’t know where to start with long division – guess!

Play a Game – Making Camp Dakota

Select the Buffalo Icon (top left corner) in the first MATH screen to practice long division.

Related Lessons

For more instruction on division check out these two lessons:

Google Apps Basics for Hamsters

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While I have heard many teachers say,

“My students know technology better than I do.”
– Teacher who is often incorrect.

I have often found this not to be the case when it comes to Google apps. I’ve often found that students sometimes don’t want to admit that they don’t know Google apps, assuming that everyone else does.

No hamsters were available so I used my guinea pig

This is the first in a series of lessons for either teachers or students who may not be extremely familiar with Google apps.

For many years, I taught statistics in graduate programs in education, psychology, business and engineering. On a conference planning committee, we had a request that read,

“I would like a session on statistics, but not statistics for dummies. I want a session so easy that a hamster could understand it.”

So, that was the origin of my session, “Statistics for Hamsters.”

Now, maybe you are a Google apps guru and you don’t need any of this. Yay for you. Seriously, yay! Let’s hang out. Still, you may find these resources helpful to share with your students. Just copy the link into your Google classroom, which, of course, you know how to do.

If that is not you, keep reading, and we can still hang out. Especially if you bring coffee.

⏰ Lesson Time

25 minutes

📲 Technology Required

Device with web-browser – Chromebook, laptop or desktop computer, iPhone or iPad

📚 Lessons

Google Drive and Google Doc: Super-Basics

All the Google apps lessons follow a similar format of a series of 15-30 second videos on simple tasks like opening the app, creating a new file and sharing. The lessons are 6-7 minutes but by the time your students get their computers open, log on and start the lesson we estimate around ten minutes of class time.

We have had more success with having students do these activities in class prior to an assignment that will use the app.

This is our favorite basic–basic lesson on Google Drive. From Google for Education, takes six minutes and ends with a quiz where you can test your knowledge.

Introduction to Google docs – The total lesson should take about 7 minutes.

Use what you learned

Follow up this lesson with a simple assignment in Google docs. This provides three prompts students can choose from to answer a question. They will practice creating a doc, copying and pasting from a doc (or, alternatively, saving to their drive), editing a doc and sharing it.

Note to the teacher: You should save the assignment in your Google classroom or other system and be sure to edit it to include your email before assigning to students.