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validated by many researchers (Llewellyn, 2002).
The Es are: Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate,
and Evaluate. In the Engagement phase of the
5E model, the teacher's role is to focus the students by introducing the topic. How will you get
the students excited about your plan? Will you tell
a story, show a short clip from YouTube, or bring
in a speaker? Explore is one of the student investigation parts of the model. Students are encouraged to work collaboratively to construct empirically-based concepts using the provided materials. Explain is the next E. In this step, students
share their discoveries with the class and explain
their learning using evidence. Teachers support
the new learning by scaffolding the student experiences into scientific concepts and terminology. Elaborate, the next E, is the second part of
the model in which students investigate. They
may investigate a question of their own that surfaced during the Explore phase or the teacher
may ask the student to extend their new knowledge by making connections to the real world.
For example, if the students have been exploring
sinking/floating of small household objects, the
teacher may ask the students to use that information to create a boat out of craft sticks that could
carry a load of 100 pennies. What properties
were discovered during Explore that could support the design of a practical application? The last
E is Evaluate. Evaluation should occur throughout
all portions of the 5E in formative assessment formats such as probing questions, notebook checkups, or observations using checklists or rubrics.
Summative evaluation provides a measure of closure to a unit of study. Students may be required
to produce a product, demonstrate a process, or
display content knowledge through a paper and
pencil test.
A sample written lesson plan is provided at
the end of this introduction and includes standards from both the Mathematics and English
