Climate Types Lesson Plan: Earth’s Systems

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This lesson accompanies the BrainPOP topic Climate Types. It supports the standard of developing a model using an example to describe ways the geosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and/or atmosphere interact. Students demonstrate understanding through a variety of projects.

Step 1: ACTIVATE PRIOR KNOWLEDGE

Ask students:

• What is the weather usually like where you live?
• How does the weather change with each season?

Step 2: BUILD KNOWLEDGE

• Read the description on the Climate Types topic page.
• Play the Movie, pausing to check for understanding. 
• Assign Related Reading. Have students read one of the following articles: “Etc.” or “Did You Know?” Partner them with someone who read a different article to share what they learned with each other.
  

Step 3: APPLY and ASSESS 

Assign Climate Types Challenge and Quiz, prompting students to apply essential literacy skills while demonstrating what they learned about this topic.

Step 4: DEEPEN and EXTEND

Students express what they learned about climate types while practicing essential literacy skills with one or more of the following activities. Differentiate by assigning ones that meet individual student needs.

• Make-a-Movie: Produce a travelog about the Sahara that describes climate factors in the region, and what weather patterns people should expect during their trip.
• Make-a-Map: Using your state as an example, create a concept map identifying factors that affect its climate and explaining how they interact.
• Creative Coding: Code a learning game challenging players to sort weather descriptions, locations, and wildlife by climate type. 

More to Explore 

Related BrainPOP Topics: Deepen understanding of climate and related factors with these topics: Weather, Seasons, Land Biomes.

Teacher Support Resources:

• Pause Point Overview: Video tutorial showing how Pause Points actively engage students to stop, think, and express ideas. 
• Learning Activities Modifications: Strategies to meet ELL and other instructional and student needs.
• Learning Activities Support: Resources for best practices using BrainPOP.