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Texas Adult Education Standards and Benchmarks
for ABE ASE and ESL Learners

Lesson Plan Bank

ABE/ASE LESSON PLANS

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Texas Adult Education Standards
Lesson Plan

Before you begin

Title: Choosing an Electric Company

Setting: ABE/ASE

NRS Level(s):

Level 3: Low Intermediate Basic Education
Level 4: High Intermediate Basic Education
Level 5: Low Adult Secondary Education

Open entry/exit: Yes

Context: Family

Standard(s):

Use Math to Solve Problems and Communicate
ABE/ASE Read with Understanding

Benchmark(s):

Use Math to Solve Problems and Communicate: 10.3, 10.4, 10.5
ABE/ASE Read with Understanding: 1.3, 1.4, 4.3, 4.4

Objective: To compare data with graphs to make comparisons between electric companies.

Materials: Internet access (or brochures collected from several electric companies), graph paper, colored pencils or markers

Estimated time needed to prepare for this lesson plan: 30 minutes, plus gathering brochures if needed

Estimated time needed to complete this lesson plan: 4 hours

The Lesson Plan

Introduce the lesson:
Start with a discussion about monthly bills and budgets, and ask the class for examples of how electric bills seem to be going up every month. Ask if anyone has thought about switching their electric companies or if they even knew that was possible. Explain that today we will start an investigation about electric companies, and will graph the results to help determine which company will save them money.

Teach the lesson:
Access the website www.powertochoose.com; navigate to the comparison of companies page. Discuss how the companies are different, including environmental information. Gather data from the website. The data to be collected should be the cost per month, the kWh, and the name of the companies. One of the companies should be WTU. Have students individually choose at least 3 more companies. Record the data on a piece of paper. As a class, review the different kinds of graphs (line, bar, circle). Discuss which graph or graphs would be more appropriate for this data. Model for the class a small bar graph using the cost per month and a line graph using the kWh. Hand out graph paper, colored pencils or markers and have the class construct individual graphs. Ideally they will construct more than one, and more advanced students could create a double line graph with the data. After graphs are complete, have each student describe their graph and explain which electric company they would choose and why.

Practice the lesson:
As a class, students will share their completed graphs and discuss what company they would choose and why.

Assess the lesson:
Teacher observation of how the graphs were drawn and interpreted.

Apply the lesson to the real world:
Have students call the chosen company to get further information about switching.

Submitted by: Krista Young

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