Alabama Social Studies SS24.P.8

Social StudiesGrades 9–12Biological Basis of Psychology

The Standard

Compare theories about the functions of sleep and of dreaming.

2024 Alabama Course of Study: Social Studies

Teacher's field guide

What Students Need to Do: Students explain different reasons researchers think people sleep, such as body repair and memory storage. They compare ideas about why people dream, including memory processing, threat practice, and the brain making sense of signals during REM sleep.
What Mastery Looks Like: A student can explain how body repair and memory storage give different reasons for sleep. They can compare a dream that helps process an experience with a dream that may have no purpose.
Common Misconceptions: Students may assume sleep and dreaming serve the same purpose, or that every dream has a hidden message. They may treat one dream as proof of a theory.
How to Assess It: Exit ticket: Maya studies for a test, sleeps, and dreams about it. Give two different reasons she needed sleep, then compare two explanations for her dream.

Lesson moves

Sort paper cards labeled sore muscles, remembered words, chase dream, and jumbled dream under repair, memory storage, threat practice, or REM signals.
Ask, "Does a test dream show memory processing or threat practice? What evidence would help tell the difference?"
Run a theory relay: teams write one prediction each for body repair, memory storage, threat practice, and REM signal interpretation.
Compare an all-nighter with a full night's sleep before a quiz; ask which sleep theories predict differences in recall and fatigue.

Free download

A ready-to-print activity worksheet aligned to SS24.P.8, with an answer key for the teacher on its own page. No account needed.

PDF, US Letter, prints cleanly in black and white.

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