L1:
Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English grammar and usage when writing or speaking.

A “Sour” Subject: Students will learn about the growth and production of citrus fruits and participate in an activity where they use skills of observation and mathematical computation to compare and contrast grapefruits and lemons.

A Day Without Dairy: Students will create, read and interpret graphs relating to the economic importance of the dairy industry and be challenged to understand the economic consequences of a day without dairy.

Build-a-Calf Workshop: Students will explore concepts of heredity in beef cattle and identify dominant and recessive traits.

FoodMASTER: Fruits: Students will identify fruits that grow on a tree, bush or vine, classify fruits as pome, drupe, berry, melon, or citrus, perform an experiment about the browning of fruit, and learn drying plums to make prunes.

FoodMASTER: Grains: Students will learn the steps of making flour, compare the nutritional value of different cereals, compare cooked and uncooked rice, and identify the parts of a whole grain.

FoodMASTER: Meat, Poultry, and Fish: Students will learn how animals utilize nutrients and energy from food humans cannot digest and convert it to meat—a food rich in zinc, iron and protein. Students will discover how hamburger is formulated for leanness, compare two kinds of hotdogs and learn about fish.

FoodMASTER: Milk and Cheese: Students will taste test four different milks while comparing color, texture, taste and cost. In addition, students will read the four milk food labels and complete a table comparing calories, fat and calcium found in the milks. The class will make cottage cheese by heating milk to the proper temperature and adding an acid (vinegar) to speed up the separation of curds and whey.

From Chicken Little to Chicken Big: Students will identify different breeds of chickens, examine physical characteristics and determine the stages of a chicken's life cycle.

Homes on the Range: Students will design a board game that reinforces how rangelands provide habitat for livestock and wildlife while benefiting humans, animals and plants. Students will also learn about the responsibilities of a range manager.

In A Nutshell: Students will explore pecan production from farm to fork, simulate the process of grafting and create a nutritious snack.

Inherited Traits in the Living Corn Necklace: Students will observe the growth of Indian corn and popcorn seeds, observe similarities and differences between the two varieties, and discuss heredity.

Made to Move: Students will use simple machines to examine the relationships between force and motion. Students will complete a science journal and participate in group activities demonstrating the use of simple machines.

My Life as a Fruit or Vegetable: The purpose of this lesson is to provide students with an opportunity to enhance writing skills while simultaneously learning about the production and distribution of fresh produce.

Pancakes!: Students describe the physical properties of materials and observe physical and chemical changes as they examine the ingredients in pancakes and how maple syrup is harvested from trees.

Plant Growth Affects the Soil: Students will recognize nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium as soil nutrients, learn that plants use soil nutrients as they grow, and discover that fertilizer replaces depleted nutrients. Students will also analyze information on seed packets to learn more about the needs that different plants have for growth.

Plant-Soil Interactions: Students will discover how plants and soils interact by observing root growth, considering the function of a plant’s roots, modeling the movement of water into the roots, and investigating the movement of water and nutrients throughout the plant.

Plants Around You: Students will categorize plants into groups, describe what plants need for healthy growth and start their own garden by planting seeds inside a cup.

Properties of Soils: Students will discover that different soils have different characteristics, examine different types of soil, investigate soil components, and observe how air space allows soils to hold and transmit water.

Pumpkins… Not Just For Halloween: Students will learn a variety of subjects including history, science, nutrition and math through the study of pumpkins. Activities include estimating the size and weight of pumpkins, sprouting pumpkin seeds and making pumpkin pie in a bag.

Seeds, Miraculous Seeds: Students will develop an appreciation and understanding of the natural development of seeds, learn the anatomy and function of each seed part through a seed dissection, and classify seeds as monocots or dicots.

Topsy-Turvy Soybeans: Students will observe how plants respond to gravity by germinating soybeans in a CD case and rotating the case as they grow.

L2:
Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English capitalization, punctuation and spelling when writing.

Got Guts?: Students will investigate the different digestive systems of livestock and learn how animals have unique nutritional needs based on these structures. Students will also discover the responsibilities of an animal nutritionist.

Right This Very Minute: Students will read “Right This Very Minute”—a table-to-farm book about food production and farming—and diagram the path of production for a processed product. Students will study a map to discover where different commodities are grown and write a thank-you letter to farmers in their local community.

L3:
Use knowledge of language and its conventions when writing, speaking, reading or listening.

A Rafter of Turkeys: Students will learn about the domestication and life cycle of the turkey, recognize how turkeys are raised on farms, and identify turkey products.

Abraham Lincoln Clears a Path: His Agricultural Legacy: Students diagram the life of President Abraham Lincoln, including his childhood, presidency, and role during the Civil War, and describe his agricultural legacy and impact on agriculture today.

Cotton's American Journey: Students investigate the impact of cotton on the history and culture of the United States.

Science and Poetry with Almonds: Students will learn about the almond tree life cycle including tree dormancy, pollination, bloom and kernel development of an almond.

L4:
Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and phrases based on grade-appropriate reading and content, choosing flexibly from a range of strategies.

FoodMASTER: Eggs: Students will examine the process of egg production from hen to home, explore the parts of an egg, perform measurements of circumference and height, compare raw egg whites to egg white foams, and prepare meringue cookies.

Let’s Raise a Barn: Students will explore the benefits and functions of different types of barns and use problem-solving skills to build a model of a hay barn that meets specific requirements.

Machines in Agriculture: The purpose of this activity is for students to make connections between the six types of simple machines and the complex machinery used to produce food and fiber.

Milk Makin’ Math: Students will learn about the numerous career opportunities involved in the dairy industry. They will also practice real world math problems related to specific careers within the industry.

Nuts About Peanuts!: Students label the parts of a peanut plant on a diagram, follow step-by-step instructions to plant a peanut and use a chart to record the growth of peanut plants.

Significant Surroundings: Students will identify basic animal behaviors and hypothesize what causes them. Students will also discover the responsibilities of an animal physiologist.

Sun, to Moo, to You!: Students will investigate the transfer of energy in the process of making milk. Students will understand that there are different forms of energy, that living things need energy to survive, and that the primary source of energy is the sun.

Test Tube Hydroponics: Students will investigate the importance of nutrients for plant growth and discover how plants grow without soil by growing and observing plants in a test tube hydroponic system.

What’s in Soil?: Students will identify the components of soil and demonstrate that soil contains air and water.

L6:
Acquire and use accurately grade-appropriate general academic and domain-specific words and phrases, including those that signal precise actions, emotions, or states of being (e.g., quizzed, whined, stammered) and that are basic to a particular topic (e.g., wildlife, conservation and endangered when discussing animal preservation).

A Day Without Agriculture: Students explore the wide scope of agriculture, identify the variety of agricultural products they use in their daily lives, and discuss the difference between needs and wants.

Apple Science: Comparing Apples and Onions: Students will explore heredity concepts by comparing observable traits of apples and onions, collecting data on the traits of different apple varieties, and learning about apple production. Additional activities include hands-on methods for testing apple ripeness.

At Home on the Range: Students will learn about rangelands by participating in a hands-on activity of growing their own grass to represent a beef or sheep ranch.

Caring for the Land: Students will explain why people have different opinions regarding soil management and identify cause and effect relationships relating to agriculture and the environment.

Color in the Garden: Students will use the art of soil painting to explore science and the natural world while learning about the color wheel, the importance of soil to agriculture, and why soils have different colors.

Exploring Texture in the Garden: Students will explore living and nonliving things, determine how nonliving resources help sustain plant life, and experiment with visual arts techniques through an examination of texture in the natural world. Activities include collecting and categorizing items from the natural environment, creating seed and soil mosaics, making clay imprints, and coloring cloth with plant materials.

Flower Power: Students will observe physical characteristics of flowers and explore principles of pollination.

FoodMASTER: Meal Management: Students will choose foods from each of the five food groups to create a meal and calculate the cost of serving the meal to five people and to one person. Students will then be challenged to plan a meal that costs less than $1.50 per person. Students will prepare, evaluate and eat a lunch meal.

From Wool to Wheel: Students investigate how the need for wool impacted the American colonists by examining the Wool Act of 1699, determining the importance of wool in colonial America, and comparing and contrasting the differences between processing wool then and now. Students spin, weave and dye wool to explore how wool was processed in Colonial times.

Hatching Science with Classroom Chicks: Students will explore how an embryo develops inside of a chicken egg over time, discuss life cycles and other natural cycles, and observe similarities and differences between parents and offspring.

Honey Bees: A Pollination Simulation: Students will identify the parts of a honey bee, the stages of its life cycle and its role in pollination.

Hunger and Malnutrition: Students will learn about the importance of eating a variety of foods in order to get all the nutrients needed to be healthy, explore diets around the world using Peter Menzel's Hungry Planet Family Food Portraits, and discuss the scope of the problems of hunger and malnutrition using the World Food Programme Hunger Map.

Inside the Egg, Hatching Chicks: Students will learn about biology by studying embryo development in chicken eggs.

Making a Brand for Ourselves the “Cowboy” Way: Students will explore cowboy culture and history and learn about 19th-century Texas cattle trails. Activities include writing cowboy poetry, mapping historic cattle trails and creating cattle brands.

Peas in a Pod: Students will explore the concept of inherited traits and understand the significance of Gregor Mendel's discoveries related to heredity.

Rock, Paper, Scissors—Dominant and Recessive Traits: Students will explore how dominant and recessive traits are expressed and learn how knowledge of heredity is important to agriculture.

A Search for the Source: Students determine that agriculture provides nearly all of the products we rely on in any given day by participating in a relay where they match an everyday items with its “source.”

Terrariums: A Look at the Living and Nonliving World: Students will observe the interactions between living plants and other living and nonliving things in a small terrarium environment. They will also learn about farms and discuss similarities between the terrarium environment and the farm environment.

The Quicker the Better? Food Processing: Students will explore different levels of food processing and the ways in which processed foods affect the health of our diets by looking at examples of foods from the grocery store and by closely examining food labels.

The Soil Chain: Students will recognize their relationship to soil and model the connections between common objects and the soil.

Vermicomposting: The class will create a worm bin which will serve as a basis for investigations about ecosystems, life and nutrient cycles, and decomposition.

Wheat Germ DNA: Using wheat as an example, students will explore how DNA determines the genetic traits of a plant and how plant breeders change the DNA of a plant to produce desired characteristics.