The 5E Instructional Model for Science

The 5E Instructional Model consists of the following phases: Engagement, Exploration, Explanation, Elaboration, and Evaluation.

In Spring 2006, Region 2 facilitated professional development on the use of the 5E Instructional Model as a tool for planning inquiry-based science lessons.  During the session, a model lesson was presented (within the Point of Entry Model), which incorporated each stage of the 5E Instructional Model.  While the Point of Entry Model provides a framework for lesson planning, the 5E Instructional Model provides the stages, or phases, in which a student should progress to gain understandings.

The excerpt below provides a summary of the 5E Instructional Model as well as descriptions of What the Teacher Does and What the Student Does during each of the stages.  Also attached is the Point of Entry Model, the alignment to the 5E Instructional Model, and a blank template for planning.
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An Excerpt from:  
The BSCS 5E Instructional Model: 
Origins and Effectiveness
June 2006

BSCS (Biological Science Curriculum Study)
5415 Mark Dabling Boulevard 
Colorado Springs, CO 80918 
To access the full report:  www.bscs.org 

Table 1. Summary of the BSCS 5E Instructional Model
Phase 	Summary 	
Engagement 	The teacher or a curriculum task accesses the learners’ prior knowledge and helps them become engaged in a new concept through the use of short activities that promote curiosity and elicit prior knowledge. The activity should make connections between past and present learning experiences, expose prior conceptions, and organize students’ thinking toward the learning outcomes of current activities. 	
Exploration 	Exploration experiences provide students with a common base of activities within which current concepts (i.e., misconceptions), processes, and skills are identified and conceptual change is facilitated. Learners may complete lab activities that help them use prior knowledge to generate new ideas, explore questions and possibilities, and design and conduct a preliminary investigation. 	
Explanation 	The explanation phase focuses students’ attention on a particular aspect of their engagement and exploration experiences and provides opportunities to demonstrate their conceptual understanding, process skills, or behaviors. This phase also provides opportunities for teachers to directly introduce a concept, process, or skill. Learners explain their understanding of the concept. An explanation from the teacher or the curriculum may guide them toward a deeper understanding, which is a critical part of this phase. 	
Elaboration 	Teachers challenge and extend students’ conceptual understanding and skills. Through new experiences, the students develop deeper and broader understanding, more information, and adequate skills. Students apply their understanding of the concept by conducting additional activities.  	
Evaluation 	The evaluation phase encourages students to assess their understanding and abilities and provides opportunities for teachers to evaluate student progress toward achieving the educational objectives. 	

Table 13. The BSCS 5E Instructional Model: What the Student Does

Stage of the Instructional Model 	The BSCS 5E Instructional Model:
What the Student Does	
	That Is Consistent with This Model 	That Is Inconsistent with This Model 	
Engagement 	•	Asks questions such as, “Why did this happen?” “What do I already know about this?” “What can I find out about this?”
•	Shows interest in the topic 	•	Asks for the “right” answer 
•	Offers the “right” answer 
•	Seeks one solution 	
Exploration 	•	Thinks freely, within the limits of the activity 
•	Tests predictions and hypotheses
•	Forms new predictions and hypotheses
•	Tries alternatives and discusses them with others 
•	Records observations and ideas 
•	Asks related questions 
•	Suspends judgment 	•	Lets others do the thinking and exploring (passive involvement)
•	“Plays around” indiscriminately with no goal in mind 
•	Stops with one solution 	
Explanation 	•	Explains possible solutions or answers to others
•	Listens critically to others’ explanations 
•	Questions others’ explanations 
•	Listens to and tries to comprehend explanations that the teacher offers
•	Refers to previous activities 
•	Uses recorded observations in explanations 
•	Assesses own understanding 	•	Proposes explanations from “thin air” with no relationship to previous experiences 
•	Brings up irrelevant experiences and examples 
•	Accepts explanations without justification 
•	Does not attend to other plausible explanations 	
Elaboration 	•	Applies new labels, definitions, explanations, and skills in new but similar situations 
•	Uses previous information to ask questions, propose solutions, make decisions, and design experiments
•	Draws reasonable conclusions from evidence 
•	Records observations and explanations
•	Checks for understanding among peers 	•	Plays around with no goal in mind
•	Ignores previous information or evidence 
•	Draws conclusions from thin air 
•	In discussion, uses only those labels that the teacher provided 	
Evaluation 	•	Answers open-ended questions by using observations, evidence, and previously accepted explanations
•	Demonstrates an understanding or knowledge of the concept or skill
•	Evaluates his or her own progress and knowledge 
•	Asks related questions that would encourage future investigations 	•	Draws conclusions, not using evidence or previously accepted explanations 
•	Offers only yes-or-no answers and memorized definitions or explanations as answers 
•	Fails to express satisfactory explanations in his or her own words 	

Table 14. The BSCS 5E Instructional Model: What the Teacher Does

Stage of the Instructional Model 	The BSCS 5E Instructional Model: What the Teacher Does 	
	That Is Consistent with  This Model 	That Is Inconsistent with  This Model 	
Engagement 	•	Creates interest 
•	Generates curiosity 
•	Raises questions 
•	Elicits responses that uncover what the students know or think about the concept or topic 	•	Explains concepts 
•	Provides definitions and answers 
•	States conclusions 
•	Provides closure 
•	Lectures 	
Exploration 	•	Encourages the students to work together without direct instruction from the teacher 
•	Observes and listens to the students as they interact 
•	Asks probing questions to redirect the students’ investigations when necessary
•	Provides time for the students to puzzle through problems 
•	Acts as a consultant for students 
•	Creates a “need to know” setting 	•	Provides answers 
•	Tells or explains how to work through the problem 
•	Provides closure 
•	Directly tells the students that they are wrong 
•	Gives information or facts that solve the problem 
•	Leads the students step by step to a solution 	
Explanation 	•	Encourages the students to explain concepts and definitions in their own words 
•	Asks for justification (evidence) and clarification from students 
•	Formally clarifies definitions, explanations, and new labels when needed 
•	Uses students’ previous experiences as the basis for explaining concepts 
•	Assesses students’ growing understanding 	•	Accepts explanations that have no justification 
•	Neglects to solicit the students’ explanations 
•	Introduces unrelated concepts or skills 	
Elaboration 	•	Expects the students to use formal labels, definitions, and explanations provided previously 
•	Encourages the students to apply or extend the concepts and skills in new situations 
•	Reminds the students of alternate explanations 
•	Refers the students to existing data and evidence and asks, “What do you already know?” “Why do you think …?” (Strategies from exploration also apply here.) 	•	Provides definitive answers 
•	Directly tells the students that they are wrong 
•	Lectures 
•	Leads students step by step to a solution 
•	Explains how to work through the problem 	
Evaluation 	•	Observes the students as they apply new concepts and skills 
•	Assesses students’ knowledge and skills 
•	Looks for evidence that the students have changed their thinking or behaviors 
•	Allows students to assess their own learning and group-process skills 
•	Asks open-ended questions such as, “Why do you think …?” “What evidence do you have?” “What do you know about x?” “How would you explain x?” 	•	Tests vocabulary words, terms, and isolated facts 
•	Introduces new ideas or concepts 
•	Creates ambiguity 
•	Promotes open-ended discussion unrelated to the concept or skill 	

Region 2
Point of Entry Model

LESSON COMPONENT*	STUDENT ENGAGEMENT ACTIVITY	TEACHER ROLE/ STRATEGIES	ALIGNMENT with the 5E
INSTRUCTIONAL MODEL**	
				
Interactive Mini Lesson	Observe, replicate, preliminary practice, self-assessment to demonstrate understanding

	Model, observe and analyze student understanding, lesson adjustment and correction	Engagement
	
Partner and Small Group Work	Peer-mediated, reciprocal teaching, construct new knowledge, apply knowledge and skills, share understandings, analyze, hypothesize

	Advise, direct, coach, guide, monitor student understanding and application	Engagement
Exploration	
Independent Work	Practice, apply knowledge and skills, construct new knowledge, examine and analyze perspectives, deepen understanding, revise, develop expertise and product, display knowledge publicly	Monitor, advise, coach, guide, question, model when necessary, evaluate, provide resource guidance	Exploration
Explanation
	
Whole Class Sharing	Discuss, summarize, synthesize, make connections, re-conceptualize, offer critical feedback, examine multiple and diverse perspectives, demonstrate learnings (e.g., presentations, oral defenses, gallery walks, etc.)	Facilitate, guide, question, summarize, synthesize, connect to other learnings, extend learnings to future study	Explanation
Elaboration	
Summary Applications and After Class Activities	Extend learnings, apply knowledge and skills to real world, revise work, research

	Guide, reinforce, extend learnings, add mini lessons where necessary, revise assignments and curriculum unit	Elaboration
Evaluation	

*The components include reading, writing, listening, and speaking.
** See 5E for Science Instruction, attached.

Region 2
Point of Entry Model

Lesson:   __________________________________________________                                         Grade Level:  _________________________

NYCDOE Scope and Sequence Alignment:___________________________  NYSED Core Curriculum Area(s) Addressed:  ____________
LESSON
COMPONENT*	STUDENT ENGAGEMENT ACTIVITY	TEACHER ROLE/ STRATEGIES	ALIGNMENT with the 5E
INSTRUCTIONAL MODEL	
				
Interactive Mini Lesson

	

		

	
Partner and 
Small Group Work

				
Independent Work

			

	
Whole Class Sharing

	

			
Summary Applications and After Class Activities

	

			

* The components includes reading, writing, listening, and speaking.