LESSON PLANE Technology at Work,

LESSON PLAN Technology at Work

PROCEDURE:

1. Ask your students what they think of when they hear the word technology. Ask them when they think technology began. Their answers are likely to center on modern technology, especially computer-related technology.

2. Let students know that technology is defined as “any invention, including tools, machines, materials, and sources of power, that makes people's work easier.” Then ask them to reconsider their ideas about when technology began. They should realize that technology began the first time a human, or even a pre-human, used a stick or a rock as a tool or a weapon. Such advances as the ability to make fire, the development of agriculture, and the use of simple machines such as the lever or the inclined plane count as technology, as do electricity, nuclear power, and the computer.

3. Divide your class into groups, and have each group meet to brainstorm a list of at least 10 technological advances they think should be included on a time line of the most important technological advances in human history.

4. Next, have students do research to find the dates for the technological advances they plan to include on their time lines. (Prehistoric technology can be dated simply by the word “prehistoric.”)

5. Students can make their time lines on long strips of paper they cut out and tape together or on brown paper that comes in rolls. Time lines should include illustrations of the technological advances students wish to highlight.

6. When all groups have completed their time lines, display them around the classroom. Invite students to compare the time lines to see which technological advances were included on most of them.

ADAPTATIONS:

Have students choose one of the six simple machines—inclined plane, lever, pulley, wedge, wheel and axle, or screw—and make a model or draw a picture of it.