Form Follows Function PowerPoint or Google Slide Presentation

Hello Everyone!

As we finish our unit on the concept of STRUCTURE, we are going to communicate our understandings using the tools of PowerPoint or Google Slides, our presentation voices, and the research we did during the unit on an animal’s structure.

Earlier in our unit, we discussed the human skeleton and how its form is related to its function. We then expanded our thinking to look at animal skeletons, observing how they are different from the human one, and thinking about the function of their skeletons based on habitat, adaptations, predators, etc. Each student chose an animal they were interested in and did research to answer these questions:

  1. What is the form of the animal? (Skeleton, features, etc.)
  2. What are the adaptations of the animal? (Adapted to environment/habitat and protecting itself from predators)
  3. How does it get its food source? (what form/features does it have that help it get its food)
  4. Any other interesting facts about your animal?

This was a great introduction to research we will do throughout the year during our inquiry projects. We talked about how to use a question to drive your research AND how to document findings through note taking in the journal.

NOW….we are going to make a PowerPoint or Google Slides presentation to show how form is related to function.

If you are new to PowerPoint, here are the things we are learning how to do. (Know the basics, and then if there’s time, use other fancy features. The fancy features are not required.:

  1. Create a PowerPoint by choosing a theme/design
  2. Insert and add to text boxes
  3. Creating titles
  4. Using different fonts and changing size and colour — making fonts clear to read!
  5. Adding images from the internet (and not using copyrighted images!)
  6. Changing the colour of a background on a slide — but not using red or black!
  7. Viewing the slide show
  8. Changing order of slides
  9. Limiting slides to title, image, 1-2 sentences or bullet points

Most students chose to do their animal for this PowerPoint, while a few decided to do a different object or animal, and that is fine. Just take into mind that this choice results in a bit more work to do the research part again! For those new to PowerPoint or in grade four, I highly recommend you do the animal we already researched to save time.

For the presentation, please include:

  1. A title slide — title, name, date
  2. A theme or design you use throughout the presentation
  3. Talk about an animal or object, and how its form follows function.
  4. Have 10 slides maximum.
  5. Talk about:  What is the form? 
  6. Talk about:  What is the function?
  7. Talk about:  How are form and function of this animal or object connected?
  8. No bibliography is required for this presentation.
  9. Keep text to 1-2 sentences or bullet points per slide.
  10. You will be presenting this out loud. If you want to add notes to slides to help, you can do this.
  11. Remember, PowerPoint is a visual tool! We use it to illustrate the things we want to say! You can always SAY more than you WRITE when you present.

Please let me know if you have any questions!

Ms. D