Primary Type: Lesson Plan
Status: Published
This is a resource from CPALMS (www.cpalms.org) where all educators go for bright ideas!
Resource ID#: 151675
Florida Landforms
Students will identify pictures of various landforms on Earth's surface. They will watch a brief video about Florida’s geologic history. After the
students review a Florida state map, they will design and create a relief map of Florida that includes various landforms such as mountains and hills,
lakes, rivers, deltas, dunes, and coastline.
Subject(s): Science
Grade Level(s): 6
Intended Audience: Educators
Suggested Technology: Computers for Students,
Internet Connection
Instructional Time: 60 Minute(s)
Keywords: landforms
Resource Collection: FCR-STEMLearn Earth Systems 2016
ATTACHMENTS
Landform_Pictures.docx
Relief_Map_Rubric.docx
Relief_Map_Labels.docx
Glue_Mixture.docx
LESSON CONTENT
Lesson Plan Template: General Lesson Plan
Learning Objectives: What should students know and be able to do as a result of this lesson?
Students will recognize and identify landforms on Earth's surface.
Students will create a model of landforms in Florida.
Prior Knowledge: What prior knowledge should students have for this lesson?
Students must know what the following landforms look like: mountains and hills, rivers, deltas, lakes, coastlines, sand dunes, and glaciers.
Students should understand and be familiar with examples of erosion and deposition.
Guiding Questions: What are the guiding questions for this lesson?
What are the landforms in the state of Florida?
How do you know the difference between them?
Where are the landforms located in Florida?
Teaching Phase: How will the teacher present the concept or skill to students?
Lesson opener/attention getter:
page 1 of 4 1. Prior to students coming to class, place 7 large charts on a wall.
2. Label each chart with one of the following words: mountains and hills, river, lake, coastline, glacier, delta, and sand dune.
3. When students walk into the classroom, give each student a picture of a landform (see attached file for landform pictures). They place their picture on the
appropriate chart.
Key talking points about the lesson topic:
The Earth is over 4.5 million years old.
The Earth has transitioned from a molten planet to a cooled surface similar to what we see today.
Continental drift and plate tectonics have moved and shaped the Earth during its history. This change continues today.
Florida has unique geologic structures that provide great insight into the rock history found in and under the state of Florida.
See the Florida Department of Environmental Protection's website titled "Florida's Geologic History" for a more complete overview of the Earth's geologic history.
Guided Practice: What activities or exercises will the students complete with teacher guidance?
Instructions for setting up and leading the activity that the students will complete with teacher guidance:
1. Display the guiding questions.
2. Ask the students to draw a grid of 8 boxes on a piece of paper in their science notebooks. Teacher models the grid. Label each box with the same landform names
as on the charts.
3. Discuss the landforms charts, one at a time, and place pictures on the correct chart, as necessary. Students are to sketch a picture to represent the landform words
in each box.
4. Watch the video titled "Pleistocene Epoch – Florida Fossils: Evolution of Life and Land" (3:57, uploaded by YouTube user FloridaMuseum). Have students share at
least one idea they learned from the video with a shoulder partner. Be sure to note that in the last ice age, which ended about 10,000 years ago, sea level was
globally down about 400 ft (120 m).
How will you check for student understanding? (Formative Assessment):
The teacher will walk around the classroom, stopping at each group to make sure they are text coding correctly.
Ask the groups why they coded a particular piece of text to gather a general consensus of student knowledge as the lesson progresses.
Common errors/misconceptions to anticipate and how to respond:
Florida is solid land: Florida has a porous landscape that stems from high susceptibility of limestone to chemical weathering from rainwater, groundwater and
decaying organic material.
Landforms simply appear: Earth's surface, including Florida, is built up and torn down by physical & chemical weathering, erosion & deposition suddenly or over
time (thousands and millions of years).
Florida hills and mountains: According to the United States Geologic Survey there is no technical definition of a hill or of a mountain in this country at present. As an
example of this, the highest elevation in Florida 345 feet (105 m) is named a hill (Britton Hill found in Fort Walton County in the Panhandle) while the fifth highest at
312 feet (95 m) is named a mountain (Sugarloaf Mountain found in the Florida Highlands in Lake County, a picture of which is the first image under Mountains and
Hills in the attachment Landform Images). If we accept the not-unreasonable British definition of a mountain as having an elevation of 2000 feet (610 m) then
Florida has no mountains but rather only hills.
Independent Practice: What activities or exercises will students complete to reinforce the concepts and skills developed in the
lesson?
1. The students must research the various landforms in Florida and create a relief map of Florida using the following materials:
pieces of cardboard or pizza boxes work well.
4 or 5 stencil/outline maps of Florida (tagboard) for students to trace (see attached…teacher may enlarge or shrink the size of the outline)
white tissue (toilet paper)
water
bowl for glue mixture
paint (brown, green, blue)
paint brushes
landform labels (see attached to make copies of labels for the students)
2. Each student should have a piece of cardboard or pizza box. Students take turns using a stencil/outline map to trace Florida onto the cardboard.
3. Instruct the students to dip the balls of tissue into the glue mixture (see attachment for instructions) and place onto the outline to make the correct shape of Florida,
building up mountainous and hilly regions, as well as leaving spaces for rivers and lakes.
4. Once dry, paint the mountains and hills brown; rivers, lakes, and oceans blue; coastline and sand dunes light brown; and dot the cities with yellow. Affix each of the
labels (see attachment) to the appropriate landform.
How will you check for student understanding? (Formative Assessment):
The teacher will walk around the classroom looking at the students' relief maps, making sure the correct landforms are included and located in appropriate places.
Ask students to identify the landforms, how the landform may have occurred, and to explain why this specifically occurred in Florida.
Common errors/misconceptions to anticipate and how to respond:
Erosion is detrimental to the environment--While erosion caused by human activities can strip land of valuable soil, it is also responsible for aiding in the
development of soil and for allowing such new land surfaces as deltas to form.
Groundwater flows in vast underground lakes--Groundwater usually flows through tiny spaces between individual mineral grains. Many students have the wrong
mental image of groundwater systems -- they frequently picture water flowing in vast underground lakes and rivers. This is not the case for most of the earth! In
most rocks on earth, groundwater fills the billions of tiny spaces between individual mineral grains or in narrow fractures within rocks -- a lot like the pore spaces in
a sponge. Sinkholes are the rare exception to this sponge-like groundwater system and they actually do form when large cavities develop underground. You can use
the existence of sinkholes to help clear up the common misconception by telling students that if groundwater existed in underground lakes everywhere, we would
see sinkholes in a lot more places.
Groundwater and surface water are separate systems--Water from the atmosphere, surface (rivers, lakes, etc.), and groundwater are all connected via the
hydrologic cycle and get naturally "recycled" over and over again. Actions people take that impact one of the parts of the system (such as over-pumping of ground
page 2 of 4 water) will eventually affect the rest of the system.
Closure: How will the teacher assist students in organizing the knowledge gained in the lesson?
To review the Florida landforms, use this "Florida Landforms" Quizlet and choose one of the activities for a whole group review.
If the teacher does not have access to the Internet, she/he can look back at the landform pictures and have a discussion about the landform features and locations
in Florida.
Summative Assessment
Grade the students' relief maps using the rubric (see attached).
Formative Assessment
The teacher will walk around the classroom looking at the students' relief maps, making sure the correct landforms are included and located in appropriate places.
Ask students to identify the landforms, how the landform may have occurred, and to explain why this specifically occurred in Florida.
Feedback to Students
During the formative section of the teaching phase, the teacher will discuss each picture from the charts by identifying each landform. They will receive specific
feedback during the activity, as well at the end of class.
ACCOMMODATIONS & RECOMMENDATIONS
Accommodations:
Students work in small groups or partners to read and text code the article.
Provide a hard-copy of rubric.
Provide a hard-copy of the 8-box grid.
Provide a pre-drawn Florida map on cardboard.
Post and read science materials/instructions aloud and check for understanding.
Work with a partner to label the maps.
Extensions:
Research landforms in another state and make comparisons to Florida.
Choose one of the Florida landforms and write a report on how it may have formed.
Create a Geotour of Florida landforms using National Geographic's MapMaker Interactive.
Create a multimedia presentation of the various Florida landforms, including pictures, locations, definitions, using sites such as www.goanimate.com,
www.animoto.com, or www.prezi.com.
Suggested Technology: Computers for Students, Internet Connection
Special Materials Needed:
Chart paper
Pictures of landforms (see attached)
Pieces of cardboard or pizza boxes
4 or 5 stencil/outline maps of Florida (tagboard) for students to trace (see attached)
white tissue (toilet paper)
water
paint (brown, green, blue)
paint brushes
bowls
landform labels (see attached)
SOURCE AND ACCESS INFORMATION
Contributed by: Cassie Meyers
Name of Author/Source: Cassie Meyers
District/Organization of Contributor(s): Flagler
Access Privileges: Public
License: CPALMS License - no distribution - non commercial
Related Standards
Name
SC.6.E.6.2:
Description
Recognize that there are a variety of different landforms on Earth's surface such as coastlines, dunes, rivers,
mountains, glaciers, deltas, and lakes and relate these landforms as they apply to Florida.
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