Planning a Full Elementary or Middle School Science Unit Using Trade Books

Teaching elementary and middle school science is exciting. After all, watching as students perform successful experiments gives you immediate feedback that you can use to guide future lessons. Plus, you might even learn a few things yourself as you read through trade books and create lesson plans.

Trade books provide several benefits for teaching science concepts to students of all ages. While textbooks provide factual information, students can sometimes find them to be overwhelming or hard to follow. Including trade books in your lesson plans brings science stories to life in ways that foster greater student engagement. When your ultimate goal is to encourage a love of learning and the field of science, you’ll want to use these ideas to plan for using more trade books in your lessons for each new unit.

Use Foundational Planning to Guide the Book Selection

Effective science lesson plans include key objectives that you can use to select books that guide students to the core concepts that you want them to learn. Fortunately, there is a wide array of trade books that you can explore that help students to learn how to explore the world through making objective observations.

With unique stories and illustrations that cover a broad range of topics, you can teach earth, life and physical science concepts. Whether you are teaching kindergartners basic concepts such as the needs of living things or are guiding middle schoolers through the process of setting up an experiment, you’ll find it easier to select books when you already have the concepts you need in mind.

Structure Engaging Lessons that Encourage Exploration

If you are familiar with the 5E model for planning science lessons, then you’ll find it is easy to choose books that boost engagement while encouraging exploration through age-appropriate experiences.

Trade books can also help you with explaining essential concepts, and the right ones will help you elaborate as you engage students in discussions and activities. You can also use the information that a trade book covers to evaluate your students’ learning.

In the early parts of the unit, you might use trade books to spark interest. Picture books work well for introducing a new concept to visual learners. You can also use books to activate a student’s prior learning that you plan to build on. For instance, you might read about forest or marine animals as you begin a lesson on different habitats or ecosystems.

Trade books can also help you fill in gaps when a field trip or experiment might not be possible. For instance, delving into a trade book about an astronaut can help you teach space science in a way that is relevant to students.

Focus On Strategic Book Integration 

Read-alouds are naturally great for introducing a new unit or covering core concepts that you want students to grasp before they begin hands-on experiences. But, you can also include trade books in other parts of the learning plan.

Buying sets of books that you can place in the classroom encourages independent reading. Students who find a subject especially interesting might enjoy checking out a trade book to read at home, or you might want to include them in a reading center or classroom library for students to enjoy during breaks or solo reading times.

Trade books can also invite multiple readings. For the first reading, you might use the pictures to spark inquiries. Doing a picture walk and discussing the images students see can help you gauge their current understanding for greater individualization. As your students gain knowledge, you can read through the book with a more intensive lens. Analyzing the text or asking students to give their reactions to concepts that the book covers helps them to begin applying more critical thinking skills that enhance their science learning.

Include Differentiation for Reading Level Ranges

Meeting the needs of the different reading levels in your classroom is easy when you choose trade books, since they offer more variety than traditional textbooks. You can start by choosing a couple of books that fit the lowest reading level in your class. Then, add more books that can meet the needs of more advanced readers.

If you have multiple ages, grade levels or widely varying reading skills in your class, then implementing small group instruction times helps ensure that each student understands the books you choose. Keep in mind that you’ll also want to make sure to include several different levels of books in stations, classroom libraries and take home kits to ensure that every student can find one that fits their reading abilities.

Adapting your teaching techniques to include all reading levels during whole group read aloud’s is also important. For instance, you can scaffold learning by introducing new vocabulary as you read. Planning to read a book multiple times also allows students of all abilities to get more from each reading as their knowledge grows.

Conduct Age-Appropriate Assessments to Check Progress 

Science journals are great resources to use for assessments in your classroom. At the beginning of a unit, you can have students brainstorm the things they already know about a topic. Then, you can have them self-reflect later in the unit to discover how much they’ve learned.

Using observations and rubrics to assess projects and experiments is an additional strategy that you can use. If you opt to use a rubric, then showing your students how you will be assessing their learning helps them prepare to demonstrate specific skills and concepts. Using these assessments to guide future lesson planning can also help you select new trade books for upcoming units that resonate with your students. 

The learning curve for using trade books is small, which means that you can launch your new teaching strategy right away. If you already have a lesson plan in place, then you can supplement your current resources by sprinkling a few new books into the lessons. Or, you might be ready to create a full curriculum based on the books you choose for a science unit. Either way, remember to select books that align with the core goals for each lesson, and be ready to share your excitement with your students. Showing just how much you love each book sparks your students’ interest as you embark on a new science discovery journey together.