OpenSciEd Unit 7.4 · Lesson 04 · 4.A
Look for: Students cite data their class collected and…
From Teacher Edition
Facilitation guidance from the lesson plan — what to notice in student thinking and how to respond while teaching.
Building towards
4.A.2 Engage in argument from evidence by comparing and critiquing claims that plants take in (input) water through their roots and give off (output) water through their leaves.
What to look / listen for
- Students cite data their class collected and secondary data showing a decrease in carbon dioxide levels as evidence that carbon dioxide is going into plant leaves.
- Students cite data their class collected and secondary data showing an increase in water levels as evidence that water is coming out of plant leaves.
- Students cite secondary data showing an increase in oxygen levels as evidence that oxygen is coming out of plant leaves.
- Students cite the need to refill the hydroponic plant food solution as evidence that water and hydroponic plant food are going into the plant through the roots.
- Students may note that all of these data were collected with light present.
What to do
The skill of using data from an investigation as evidence when supporting a claim is one that can be challenging for many students. If students are not using actual evidence from the investigation in this lesson such as the levels of water changing over time, then it could be helpful to summarize this data in bullet points that the students can then use in sentence form. Two examples: (1) The amount of water in the closed bag with spinach went up after the light was shined on it for a little time. (2) The amount of water and hydroponic plant food in the hydroponic setup decreased over time and need to be refilled.
Suggested prompts
Sample student responses
Follow-up questions
What inputs from our candidates list that contain parts of food molecules are entering plants?
Carbon dioxide because its levels went down in our experiment and the other kids’ data.
Would anyone have put this point a different way?
How should we represent this on our model?
What else did we figure out from our data and the other kids’ data?
Water and oxygen are coming out of the leaves.
What is our evidence for this?
How should we represent it on our model?
What new questions do we have that might help us move forward?
How do the gases get in there?
How is carbon dioxide going in and oxygen going out?
What’s happening inside the system?
What other processes of living organisms involve the same gases?
Tell students,This process of plants taking in water through the roots and some of that water evaporating from parts of it that are in the air such as its leaves and stems, is called transpiration.