Name: Melissa Blanton
School: Clyattville Elementary
Grade Level: Third Grade
Time Length of Lesson: 45 minutes
Grouping Plan for Teaching: Whole Group
Lesson Objective(s): The students will work as a group to determine the probability of pulling given colors out of a paper bag.

QCC Standard(s): 1. Grade Level: Third Grade; 2. Subject: Mathematics;
3. Number: 41; Topic: Algebra; Standard: Determines probability of a given event through exploration (equally likely, least likely, and most likely).

Materials:
5 probability experiment sheets, 5 paper towels; 5 brown paper lunch bags each filled with 5 purple skittles, 4 orange, 3 yellow, 2 green, and 1 red. 1 brown paper bag filled with 5 purple paper circles, 4 orange, 3 green, 2 yellow, and 1 red.  1 copy of the movie “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”, 1 coin, 1 VCR, and 1 Television.

· “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”, copyright 1971, Wolpher Pictures Ltd.  and The Quaker Oats Company.

Technology Connection:
www.edhelper.com – This website has a webquest on probability.

Beginning Attention & Interest Focus:
Tell students that we will be learning about probability today, and that the movie clip we are about to see has to do with probability. Students will watch a short clip from the movie “Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”.  Explain that in this movie, Willy Wonka puts five golden tickets inside 5 chocolate bars.  The teacher will say, “ If there were 1 billion Wonka bars we would only have 5 chances in 1 billion to find a golden wrapper!”

Introduction:  (Student volunteers can be used as examples.  They will be the ones to flip the coin.)
Tell students that probability is how likely something is to happen.  Give students an initial problem.  The teacher says, “Two friends want to decide who will take the first turn on a four wheeler.  They flip a coin to decide.  One friend chooses heads.  How many possible outcomes are there when you flip a coin?  What would be that friend’s chances of winning on the first turn?” (Allow students time to respond.)  Then say, “The coin will either land on heads or tails.  Two outcomes are possible, so the friend’s chances of winning on the first flip are 1 in 2.”

Modeling:
The teacher will have 5 purple, 4 orange, 3 green, 2 yellow, and 1 red circle in a paper bag.  A student volunteer will pull a total of 15 times from the bag, each time putting the pulled circle back into the bag.  Have another student tally up the number of circles for each color represented in the bag using a chart.   Have the student make another tally chart on the board.  As a color is pulled, the student volunteer will make a tally on the chart for that color and then put the circle back into the bag.

Guided Practice:
Explain to students that since there are 5 purple circles and only 1 red circle, there is a greater probability that you would pull a purple circle because there are more purple than red.  Explain however that it is possible to pull more red, but the chances of that happening are not very high.  Have students divide up into groups of 5 and give each group a paper bag with 5 purple skittles, 4 orange, 3 green, 2 yellow, and 1 red.  Also give each group a piece of paper towel and a probability experiment sheet.  Have each group pour their skittles onto the paper towel and record the number on their chart sheet using tally marks representing each color.  The groups will record what color they think will be pulled the most and why.  Then the groups will record what color they think will be pulled out the least.  Ask each group to share their answer.

Independent Practice: Have the groups follow the instructions on their sheet and fill in the next chart as they take turns pulling out the skittles one at a time, recording a tally mark on the chart for the color pulled. The group should pull a total of 15 times as demonstrated earlier by the student volunteers.

Assessment:
The students will be graded on their group participation during the activity.  Each group will be evaluated as a whole for completion of the probability chart sheet.

Closure:
Once everyone is finished, discuss which colors were pulled out the most and the least in each group, and have the students tell if this was the color that the group thought would be pulled the most. Explain to students that they will see probability many times in their everyday life.  Give some examples: board games, dice games, the lottery, etc.  Have each group turn in their sheet with everyone’s names on it.

Tally up the amount of purple, orange, green, yellow, and red skittles in the paper bag.  Write your answers in the chart.
 
 

· Which color do you think will be pulled out of the bag the most?
____________

· Why?

· Which color do you think will be pulled out of the bag the least?
_____________

· Why?

· Put a tally mark in the columns as you pull out a color. Then, put the color back in the bag and pull again.  You will pull a total of 15 times.
 
 
 

· Which color was pulled the most?

· Which color was pulled the least?

· Did the experiment turn out like you expected?

Names of Group members:   ______________________
                                            ______________________
                                            ______________________
                                            ______________________

1.  Describe how the students were engaged in learning during your lesson.
In the beginning of the lesson, two student volunteers came to the front of the class and flipped a coin.  The coin had a 1 out of 2 chance of landing on heads and a 1 out of 2 chance of landing on tails.  This was the introduction to probability.  This seemed to relate probability to a real life situation.  then, I had another student volunteer pull colored circles out of a bag to model for the rest of the class what they would be doing with their skittles.  The students were learning by making predictions about which color skittle would be pulled out the most and the least.  At the close of the lesson, I had the students share other real life situations where probability is involved.  They gave such examples as the lottery and weather.

2.  Describe how the students responded to your lesson.
The students enjoyed the video clip from "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory".  This clip was an exaggerated example of probability.  The students enjoyed the class participation with the flipping of coins and grabbing skittles and circles from bags.  Some of the students predicted that the more skittles representing a color, the more chances that color has to be pulled out of the bag.  Almost every group predicted purple as the color that would be pulled the most, however orange was the color pulled most often among the groups.  This proved to the kids that probability is just the chance that something will happen, however something unexpected could happen also.  

3.  Describe how the students achieved the assessment of your lesson.
The students were assessed through class participation and their probability experiment.  There were no right or wrong answers, but the kids had to record exactly what they pulled from their bag in order for the experiment to work.  I think this seemed less like a test and more like a fun activity involving skittles.