Web-Crossing Assignment for Sunday, January 11 and January 17 postings:
(click
here to open this page in a window by itself)
Select a lesson that you taught during your first student teaching that didn't go as you had hoped because of what you might identify as "classroom management issues". That is, a lesson/class in which a few or many students didn't get into the assignment; finished or stopped and talked with others rather than doing what you had hoped, or had some other response that made "management" feel challenging and didn't meet your goal for the class. Your written daily reflections on your lesson plans in your Portfolio should help you choose such a lesson.
Think carefully about such things as how you preassessed before you
taught e.g. what your assumptions were about the student understanding;
your objectives for the lesson; the format you chose e.g. self-selected
groups, whole class, etc.; where and how your assignment was communicated;
your allotment of time; feedback, etc.
Then revise or completely redesign the lesson in such a way that you
think would reduce the "classroom management" issues that may
have been inherent in it the first time you taught it. Be sure to address
all of the "minimum lesson plan components" in the Student Handbook.
You also may want to look again at Teaching With the Brain in Mind, Methods
That Matter or Cohen's Groupwork or Atwell's In the Middle or material
on development to refresh your thinking about what engages student thinking
at different ages/development points.
B. For your first response to two of your colleagues in your seminar by Monday p.m.
Let's try something new this week to see if it works to improve feedback. Using the "Student Teaching Assessment Rubric", take a look at the right hand column of the sections labelled Domains 1,2 and 3 (planning and prep; classroom environment; instruction). Look at the criteria for "skilled experienced teachers" (our goal) in each of those categories and see if they help in guiding your questions/feedback to your colleagues as you look at their lesson plans. For example, as you read their plan you may ask yourself "does the lesson plan allow for different pathways according to different student needs? (question cued by 1e."lesson and unit structure")
C. For your Week 2 Web Crossing posting:
Select a lesson that you taught during your first student teaching that
didn't go as you had hoped because of what you might identify as "accommodations"
that you could have made to better meet the needs of your particular students.
It may have been misjudging reading expectations or vocabulary for reading
delayed studies, students from class backgrounds with limited exposure
to this kind of material, or ESL students; it may have been less successful
group work because of inattention to some student's special behavioral
issues, or something else. Your written daily reflections on your lesson
plans in your Portfolio should help you choose such a lesson. If nothing
comes to mind, then imagine that a student with the specific "special
need" that you have researched in Week 2 is in your class.
Proceed through the next steps of redesigning the lesson, with focused attention to the "accommodations" section of your lesson plan, and explaining what you changed and why, after looking again at resources such as Choate, Payne, Carey, etc.
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