·
What did you notice about your
students’ participation and learning in relation to your objectives?
Preface: “A Long Way from Chicago” is a historical fiction
book set during the late 1920s and 1930s.
In the beginning of my lesson, the
students and I worked hard to explain and understand “schema.” During this
time, the students were very energetic and active. They were willing to engage
in a conversation with me and made a great attempt to have a conversation. As
soon as I said the word “schema,” a student a “What the heck is a schema?” I
predicted this response and had a good description prepared for the students.
From my description, the students were able to make a connection, “Oh, so it’s
our brain.” This is a rough equivalent, but they realized that a schema is
everything they know. During this discussion, the students had several comments
that were unrelated to the discussion but I limited these responses by simply
cutting off the students.
Sticking
the lesson plan, I read the first page for the students and we had a discussion
about the introduction. I facilitated this discussion by asking them “What do
you know about this?” and the students willingly provided everything they knew about
each topic. They were even generating questions about the text before I asked
(ex. “Why do they call it St. Valentine’s Day?”). We continued our discussion
and the students realized this was a very different way of approaching a text, “This
is the weirdest conversation ever!” Regardless of their slight discomfort with
our approach, the students were still very engaged in discussion.
As we read,
the word “Prohibition” appeared and we stopped to discuss this word. The
students were able to apply their schema and made a fantastic connection as
they figured that Al Capone became a gangster during this time to capitalize on
illegal alcohol sales. I only had to ask the students, “What connection would
Al Capone have to prohibition?”
During our
reading, the students engaged in the text and followed along closely. Whenever I
made an error in my reading, they were quick to correct it. Also, whenever the
students had a simple question, (“What’s a quail?” “What’s a sty?”) a student
quickly volunteered an answer. Another example of their engagement came as a
student remarked on the language being used by the characters (“They need to go
school. They have bad grammar.”).
Finally, we
closed our lesson with a discussion about text-to-self, text-to-text, and
text-to-world connections. I asked students to provide me their thoughts about
what these mean. All students were able of figuring out what these meant. After
this, I asked the students to make all three connections. The students were
fully capable of performing this task except for one student who struggled
mightily to make a text-to-text connection (“I don’t read books. I don’t know
any books.”). This student became disengaged quickly during this task and
needed extensive help to complete the task.
·
What were the strengths and limitations
of your lesson for supporting your students’ learning?
Before we began reading, I set a
norm for the students. If my book was up, all the students books needed to be
up and everyone would be reading. When my book was down, this was the
designated time for discussion. I verbally reminded the students of this rule
and they followed it accordingly. This was very effective in controlling the
discussion and the student’s contributions. Another strength to this lesson was
that students were able to discuss their thoughts and had feedback from their
peers and myself. During the making connections task, students were able to use
their schema to help them comprehend and make connections. At this point,
students were bridging their knowledge to the book. They did so while also
using relevant vocabulary. One
limitation to the task that presented itself was my administration of the
connections task. I did not include examples for the students and this was
problematic for them because they had no experience with such a task. Thus, the
responses did not exactly meet my expectations.
·
What did you notice about yourself as a
teacher? What questions do you have?
I noticed that I need prepare
better for such a lesson. Students need to have clear expectations and
familiarity with tasks before I can assess them properly. I also noticed that I
can lead a discussion but I leave many openings for students to go off on
tangents. This may be contributed to the unclear expectations.
How do I make students focus on
the task at hand and maintain their focus without “cracking the whip” on them?
What is the optimal way for setting expectations with a small group?
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