Seasons Lesson Plan: Earth’s Place in the Universe

*Click to open and customize your own copy of the Seasons Lesson Plan. 

This lesson accompanies the BrainPOP topic Seasons, and supports the standard of using a model to describe the cyclical patterns of seasons. Students demonstrate understanding through a variety of projects.

Step 1: ACTIVATE PRIOR KNOWLEDGE

Display an image representing all four seasons, like this one:

Ask students:

• What seasons do you experience where you live? Which is your favorite? 
• What do you think leads to these seasonal changes? 

Step 2: BUILD KNOWLEDGE

• Read the description on the Seasons topic page.
• Play the Movie, pausing to check for understanding. 
• Have students read one of the three Related Reading articles. Partner them with someone who read a different article to share what they learned with each other.
  

Step 3: APPLY and ASSESS 

Students take the Seasons Challenge and Quiz, applying essential literacy skills while demonstrating what they learned about this topic.

Step 4: EXTEND and DEEPEN

Students express what they learned about seasons 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 describing the current season in different hemispheres around the world. In your movie, answer this question: What is the reason for the differences?
• Make-a-Map: Create a concept map identifying the relationship between Earth’s axis and orbit and the seasons we experience. 
• Creative Coding: Code a sorting game where players determine if facts describe winter, spring, summer, or fall in the northern hemisphere.
• Primary Source Activity: Analyze Claude Monet’s seasonal paintings and answer accompanying questions.

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.