Homeostasis and Feedback Mechanisms

In this lesson, students will be gaining knowledge about how to regulate homeostasis. We will learn what homeostasis is and the feedback mechanisms that help us reach it. As before, my goal for this lesson is to lecture less and get the students involved more. I hope to do this by having students model different types of negative and positive feedback in the classroom.


HS-LS1-3. Plan and conduct an investigation to provide evidence that feedback mechanisms maintain homeostasis.

 

TIMELINE OF ACTIVITIES

  1. Before class begins, I will put a fan in the classroom in order to get the room temperature down. The hope is that students will get goosebumps and I can ask them about how this relates to negative feedback.

  2. The class will start with a 2 minute 30 second video from YouTube that goes through the basic concepts of homeostasis. It discusses what it is, why it is important to our body function, and the different feedback loops that our body takes to regulate itself. This video will serve to pre teach the lesson and give a little background to the topic in a fun, cartoon format.

  3. The next part of class will be the lecture/ activity portion. Steps 3-8 should take almost the rest of the period. I will present what homeostasis means for our body and the two types of mechanisms our body employs to help it. 

  4. I will start with negative feedback and give the students this image that maps out general responses for both negative and positive:



  1. This is when I plan to ask the students why they think they have goosebumps. We will go through the general steps of negative feedback and how we can get more specific by applying it to decreasing body temperature.  

  2. I will then have the students run up and down the hall a few times to sweat. Sweating is another example of a negative feedback mechanism. I will ask the same questions (why this is happening, etc) and then go through how we can relate the steps again as we did before but with this example.


  1. Then we will move on to positive feedback. Positive feedback is a little harder to act out in the classroom. To supplement thai before the activity, I will go through the two most popular examples: contractions when giving birth and permafrost.

     

  2. To act positive feedback out in class, I will have one student stand on the “positive side.” That student will start to give compliments to the rest of the students in the classroom standing in the neutral position. Once given a compliment, that student will join the positive side and also start giving out compliments. This will cause the positive side to get louder and louder causing a positive feedback loop, as the sound does not die down.

  3. To end the class, in the last 5 minutes I will ask students to complete an exit ticket. They will be asked to come up with their own feedback loop, may it be negative or positive. This is how I will informally assess them and their understanding of homeostasis.

 

REFLECTION:

This lesson was really fun to plan. I believe I was able to hit on a variety of learning styles (video, performance, notes) to suit all student needs. I do think I hit my goal of not lecturing too much and getting the class more involved because I was able to give them notes and expand on concepts by getting students out of their seats. I anticipate that these activities will make students laugh, instead of sitting in silence copying notes. I also leave room for their own creativity at the end of class by having them come up with their own mechanisms. There is definitely nothing boring about this lesson!

 

Links:

 

Comments

  1. Rachel FalisiNovember 11, 2021 at 4:01 PM

    I really like this lesson! I also strive to lecture less in my chemistry classes and have my students work together in attempt to figure out chemistry problems. I think that the movement involved in this lesson (having the students run up and down the hallway) is a great way to keep the students interested and also motivated in the lesson to figure out why and how sweating is an example of negative feedback. I have found that my high school juniors love when I integrate movement around the classroom, and they often learn best when I create activities with movement, so this is really great! Whether it's having them clap, stomp, and stand-up to show me what type of chemical bond they've calculated or having them move around in lab stations, I believe they learn best by doing and when they are in motion. Overall, this is really great!

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