Grade Levels: 6-8, 9-12

*Click to open and customize your own copy of the Property Changes Lesson Plan

This lesson accompanies the BrainPOP topic Property Changes. It supports the standard of analyzing data on the properties of substances before and after they interact to determine if a chemical reaction has occurred. Students demonstrate understanding through a variety of projects.

Step 1: ACTIVATE PRIOR KNOWLEDGE

Display an image of rusted metal, like this one:

Ask students: What do you think happened to the metal on this car? What may have caused this change? 

Step 2: BUILD KNOWLEDGE

Step 3: APPLY and ASSESS 

Assign the Property Changes Quiz, prompting students to apply essential literacy skills while demonstrating what they learned about this topic.

Step 4: EXTEND and DEEPEN

Students express what they learned about property changes 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 cooking show that describes the physical and chemical changes necessary to make a cake.
  • Make-a-Map: Create a concept map identifying evidence that indicates a substance has undergone a chemical change.
  • Creative Coding: Code a true or false game about chemical changes. 

More to Explore 

Matter and Chemistry Unit: Continue to build understanding around chemical and physical changes by exploring more BrainPOP matter and chemistry movies.

Teacher Support Resources: