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Study guide
Grade 4
SAMPLE
LESSON ELEMENTS
LEARNING AIMS
What learners should know at the end of the lesson. Taken from CAPS.
IMPORTANT TERMINOLOGY
New terminology to extend understanding of the subject as part of the lesson.
DEFINE
Definitions of concepts to help learners understand the content.
IMPORTANT
A summary or explanation of key concepts explained in the lesson.
TIPS
Information in addition to the content to guide learners through the learning process
FOR THE CURIOUS
Encouragement for learners to do in-depth research about the content on their own.
ACTIVITY
Formative assessment to test learners’ progress and knowledge of the lesson completed.
SAMPLE
EXERCISE
Formative assessment to test learners’ progress and knowledge of the unit completed.
CORE CONTENT
Reinforcement of core of content; in-depth explanation of a specific section of the lesson.
STUDY/REVISION
Demarcation or summary of work to be revised in preparation for tests and examinations.
STUDY TIPS
There are many learners who struggle to study. Even though there are learners who struggle, the marks they obtain are still important, and yet we never teach them how to study optimally. This either leads to learners not studying at all, or sitting for hours every night and never really benefiting from it.
Learners may find it necessary to study more before a test or an examination, but there are ways in which they can stay up to date with the information that has been shared with them, without them having to spend hours on it.
Here are a few tips learners can use to prepare for test and examinations:
1. Firstly, get organised. It is suggested that learners should have a separate file for each subject. On one side of this file, put all the feedback that has been received from formal assessments, and on the other side homework, tasks and even assessments which still have to be done and handed in.
2. About two weeks before learners write tests or examinations, they must be told which units in the study guide will be covered in the test or examination.
3. Learners must mark this clearly in the study guide. (Term 1’s test will be about Unit 1, the June examination will be about Unit 1 and 2, Term 3’s test will be about Unit 3 and the November examination will be about Unit 3 and 4.)
4. Revise/organise/rewrite your notes. Learners must look at their notes from previous tests and examinations. Is it neat and do they make sense? Can it be organised in a better way? For example, can concepts perhaps be grouped together? One of the best ways to remember information is to organise it, and to write it down. Learners should write the notes neatly before studying.
SAMPLE
5. Revise/organise/rewrite the notes of your facilitator. If your facilitator made the time to find extra information for you, it is important to look at that too. It can even be information you found for yourself and printed out. Do you understand these notes? It may be a good idea to write all the additional information on a separate page/pages.
6. Know all the definitions, concepts and ideas which you have been introduced to since the previous test or examination. Learners can find these words at the end of each lesson in the study guide. Learners must write down all these words.
7. Memorise. Learners will be surprised how much information they already know just by organising their notes and taking note of the important words. They must also make sure that they can apply the theory.
Take a look at the good ideas on how to study with flash cards and folded paper at http://www.schoolfamily.com/school-family-articles/article/859-teach-your-kids-how-study.
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YEAR PLAN
Lesson 1: Living and non-living things
Lesson 2: What plants need to grow
Lesson 3: Habitats of animals
Lesson 4: Structures of plants and animals
Lesson 5: Structures for animal shelters
Lesson 6: Materials around us
Lesson 7: Solids
Lesson 8: Reinforcing materials
Lesson 9: Strong frame structures
Lesson 10: Energy and the transfer of energy
Lesson 11: Energy around us
Lesson 12: Motion and energy in a system
Lesson 13: Energy and sound
Lesson 14: Planet Earth
Lesson 15: The sun
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Lesson 16: The earth and the sun
Lesson 17: The moon
Lesson 18: Rocket system
UNIT 1: Life and living things, and structures
LEARNING AIMS
After you have completed this unit, you should be able to do the following:
• Sort a selection of living and non-living things
• Identify and describe the parts of a plant
• Identify and describe the parts of an animal
• Grow plants from seeds, measure and record their growth
• Describe different habitats
• Designs, draw and evaluate an animal shelter
This unit should be completed in 10 weeks. Remember that these 10 weeks exclude all assessments and activities. Ensure that you leave enough time to complete all the activities as well as the assessments in the portfolio book. In this unit you will learn about things you see every day. Take note of what you see, experience, and how they work.
IMPORTANT TERMINOLOGY
SAMPLE
At the end of each lesson there is a list of important terminology. Make sure that you know these terms and that you know what each one of these terms means.
LESSON 1: Living and non-living things
What do you need to complete this lesson?
• Beans (sugar beans or kidney beans)
• A glass bottle
• A paper towel
• Water
• Old magazines
1.1 Living things
When you have to decide whether something is alive, what are you going to look at? Whether it breathes? Whether it has a heartbeat? Although it isn’t incorrect to ask these questions, these are not the only things one looks at when trying to determine whether something is alive or not.
Living things can be distinguished from non-living things by their ability to perform all seven life processes.
What are life processes?
There are seven life processes and these can be identified as feeding, growth, reproduction, breathing, excretion, senses and motion. Let’s take a look at what each of these processes means.
Nutrition
SAMPLE
What is nutrition? This is a question which is not often asked, because we all know what it means to eat and everyone knows that we should eat every day. Nutrition refers to the food you eat. Food is the fuel that all living things need in order to function. Remember that all animals do not eat the same food, and that it is not only animals that absorb nutrients. Plants absorb food from the soil and receive nutrients from water and sunlight.
Why do we need food?
We need food to give energy to all the cells in our bodies so that they can perform their functions. New cells are necessary for growth and food gives building materials to the cells so that they can form new cells and allow growth to take place.
We have all heard that you should eat an apple every day in order to stay healthy, and there is some truth in that: food provides protection against diseases. Healthy eating habits can build up your immune system to protect you against something such as colds, and it can also help you to recover from them more quickly. Healthy nutrition doesn’t only help with
protecting you from diseases, and making you recover from them more quickly, but it also helps with growth and energy, and the recovery of damaged tissues Nutrients are needed to replace dead cells, such as when you fall and hurt yourself – that’s when new cells are needed to replace the dead cells and to heal the wounds.
Growth
From the moment you are born, your growth is monitored against your age on a chart like the one below. According to this chart it is easy to see if you are growing enough and whether you weigh enough for your age. This growth chart can also indicate to you whether you might not be getting enough of the right nutrition, or whether you might be getting too much of the wrong kinds of food.
SAMPLE
CDC growth chart
Although it is easy to measure your growth, and even to observe it, it isn’t always so easy to see the growth of all living creatures, for example new cells which are growing. Those are far too small to see with the naked eye, but that doesn’t mean that they are not growing. Even small plants, bacteria and mould all grow!
Reproduction
Reproduction means to bring forth new life. An example of that is if you got a new sister or brother. Can you think of other examples of reproduction? Use the pictures below for some guidance and make a list for yourself in the space provided.
A few examples of how reproduction can take place:
Breathing
Look down at your chest. Do you see how it moves up and down as air moves into and out of your lungs? Respiration is another word for breathing and it means that oxygen in the air replaces carbon dioxide in your blood. There are different ways in which respiration takes place. Respiration does not just take place in your lungs as you breathe, respiration also takes place in the cells. Respiration takes place in the cells of both plants and animals. Go and do some research by using the internet, textbooks, or even magazines to find out more about the different ways in which respiration takes place.
Excretion
FOR THE CURIOUS
Give some thought to the cause and the influence of air pollution on your ability to breathe.
The human body excretes substances which are called waste products. These waste products transport all the unnecessary or toxic matter out of the body, so that you do not become ill, and your body does not become poisoned. Examples of this is if you sweat and when you urinate.
Senses
We use our senses to observe everything around us, and also in order to react to our environment. There are five senses we use for this. Use the pictures below to identify the five senses.
SAMPLE
By using our senses, we react differently to different situations. An example of this is when you use your touch sense – when you feel that it is cold, you go and put on a jacket, but if you touch a hot stove plate, you will immediately pull away your hand, otherwise you could be seriously hurt. Our senses are also there to protect our bodies.
Motion
FOR THE CURIOUS
Think about how the senses are used to protect the body.
SAMPLE
It isn’t only people who move – plants do too. Phototropism is when the plant stem adapts to the light to which it is exposed. Positive phototropy of plant stems is when the stems bend towards the light and negative phototropy is when the stems bend away from the light. This bending represents movement of the plant stem. Just as plants can move, so can people and animals. People can run, swing their arms, turn around and many other movements.
It isn’t always so easy to identify living things, because often it seems as if there are no living processes taking place. Things which might appear to you to be dry bones, dry yeast, and even a fertilised egg can “live” again in the right circumstances. These circumstances include the right temperature, humidity and light intensity. The next investigation is aimed at demonstrating this phenomenon to you where something which appears to be non-living, can live again given the right circumstances.
Investigation 1.1: A bean in a bottle
This investigation is both simple and fascinating. Not only are you going to see that the bean “lives” again, but you are also going to see how its roots grow, and also how the plant grows in the bottle.
What do you need?
1. A sugar bean or kidney bean
2. A glass bottle
3. A paper towel
4. Water
Method
1. Pour a little bit of water in the glass bottle and let the water wet the insides of the bottle by swirling it around. (1)
2. Moisten the paper towel slightly using the water and also put it in the glass bottle (you can crumple it). (1)
3. Put the bean in the glass bottle on top of the paper towel (1)
4. Pour a bit of water onto the bean every few days. (1)
5. What do you observe? (What do you see?)
6. In the space below, draw (with a heading and captions) what you see.
These roots which begin to grow after a few days show that the bean is alive. There has been feeding, growth, respiration, motion, and even to an extent reproduction, in this investigation.
Activity 1.1
1. Look at all the pictures below. Make a tick in each of the blocks in which there are living things. Then give a reason why you decided that this thing is indeed alive. (28)
SAMPLE
2. Make a mind map of all the life processes. Make sure that you know what all the life processes are and also what they mean. If your mind map is fully completed, you can use it for preparation for your tests and examinations. (17) [45]
1.2 Non-living things
By now you already know that living things can perform the seven living processes. Non-living things do not possess the ability to perform these life processes. In other words, they cannot eat, they cannot grow, reproduce, breathe (respirate), excrete, use their senses, or move around.
Things that were alive can die and now be non-living. Examples of this are not only when someone close to us dies, but also when we look at something such as wood, which was part of a living tree, which has been chopped down, and is now dead.
Activity 1.2
1. Now that you know what the difference between living and non-living things is, use an old magazine and cut out pictures of living and non-living things. Stick all the pictures of living things on one sheet of paper and those of nonliving things on another. (6)
2. Not all things can be seen with the naked eye and we can only observe it with a microscope. Name three living things that we are unable to see with the naked eye. You can do some research on this if you do not know. (6)
3. Do a bit of research on the internet about how these things look that we are unable to see with the naked eye. Store these images on your computer so that you can look at them again, or print them and stick them into a book. (5)
4. In the following table there are a few living and non-living things which are not so easy to identify. Think carefully about what it means to be living or non-living. Classify each of the following pictures as living or non-living and give a reason for your choice.
Living or non-living Reason
IMPORTANT TERMINOLOGY
Make sure that you know the meaning of each of these terms:
• Waste matter
• Phototropism
• Immune system
• Respiration
• Reproduction
• Tissue
LESSON 2: What plants need to grow
What do you need to complete this lesson?
• Seeds
• Cuttings
• A ruler or measuring tape
2.1 Conditions for growth
Just as in our case (humans), plants also need to grow in order to be classified as living. Has your mother ever told you that if you don’t eat your food, you will not grow? Well, it’s true! In Lesson 1 you learned that nutrition is necessary for energy, growth, protection against diseases and the repair and replacement of damaged cells and tissues. Plants need everything to grow that you need to grow.
FOR THE CURIOUS
Think about everything you need in order to grow, and compile a list of them.
Look at the picture below and identify all the conditions which are necessary for a plant to grow. Remember that not everything can be shown on a picture, therefore you need to use some critical thought. Think of how you would tend to this little plant to make it grow.
In Investigation 1 you let a bean grow, and observed its developing roots. This bean represents any seed. When a new plant develops from a seed, it is called the germination of the seed. There are three factors necessary for the germination of seeds, namely water, oxygen and the necessary heat or warmth.
The three factors:
SAMPLE
• Water: Water is necessary so that the seed swells and activates the embryo (the baby plant) to start growing.
• Oxygen: The germination of seed requires a lot of energy, just like your body needs energy to grow. Oxygen is necessary so that the necessary energy can be released in order for the germination of the seed to take place.
• Heat/warmth: when you lie nice and warm in your bed at night, your body grows at its best – in the same way seeds also need a nice warm environment. Germination of seed improves as the temperature rises. However, this is only true up to a certain point – if it is too hot, the seed will not germinate.
New plants can grow from cuttings and seeds. In both cases plants still need …
… to grow. You already know how to let a plant grow from a seedling (Investigation 1). In Investigation 2 you are going to observe the growth of a plant.
Investigation 2.1: The growth of a plant
SAMPLE
In this investigation you are going to observe how plants grow from a seedling by measuring the height of the stem and counting the number of leaves on the plant over a period of time. You are going to write down your observations in a table (that which you have noted in the table are called results).
What are you going to need?
1. Seedling (you can buy this at any nursery)
2. Water
3. A ruler or measuring tape
Method
1. Keep the seedling in its container
2. Use the ruler and measure the length of the stem of the plant and make a note of it on a piece of paper.
3. Now count the number of leaves on the seedling and make a note of it.
4. Look after the seedling. Remember that water, light and oxygen are necessary for a plant to grow.
5. Repeat Step 2 and 3 every 4 to 5 days.
What do you observe? (What do you see?)
Results
Complete the table below. Use the measurements you collected in Step 2 and 3 to complete the table.
LESSON 3: Habitats of animals
What do you need to complete this lesson?
• Photos of plants and animals in their habitats
3.1 Different habitats
A habitat is an ecological area in which a plant or animal species lives. A habitat is a system consisting of various physical factors such as the soil, humidity, variation of temperature and availability of light. A habitat does not only consist of physical factors, but also includes the availability of food and the presence of predators.
There are different types of habitats. As every habitat has its own characteristics, different animals live in different habitats depending on their needs. Take a look at the picture below of different habitats and the animals that live in them.
Just as animals have different needs in different habitats, so plants also have different needs. For this reason we find different plants with different characteristics in different habitats. Let’s take a quick look at the different plants we find in different types of habitats Remember that the plants found in these different habitats form part of the food and possibly also the shelter of the animals we find there. This “working together” or dependence on one another in a habitat is called an ecosystem.
