Month: March 2019

I was surprised to find that I was genuinely engaged in tonight’s ‘notice and wonder’ map activity.  I had no trouble coming up with questions about what I saw on the map, and I noticed a lot of details that I found interesting.  This was the first activity that I truly felt a grasp on the concept of See, Think, Wonder.  I think back to the Harriet Tubman activity.  I saw first hand how difficult it can be to read a passage about historical events and try to decode, wonder, and ‘read between the lines’.  I think students are more likely to be instantly less excited about a reading passage than a picture, map, or other visual.  With the map activity, we had minimal front-loading, but we recognized the area on the map and many symbols and markings.  Having these connections from prior knowledge allowed us to think and question the map even more.  Overall I think the what made this mini lesson so engaging was the fact that we had a visual, rather than a whole jumble of words on a page, and it was recognizable and relevant.

I was excited to share our group’s nonfiction book with the class.  It aligned so well to our fiction book, which gave me even more faith in using Blood on the River as an appropriate read aloud for a class.  Depending on my grade level, I can definitely see myself having 1607: A New Look at Jamestown in my classroom as a resource.  There are a number lesson plan possibilities I can think to create based off of this book.

I thoroughly enjoyed this week’s article readings about project based learning.  The first-hand account of how a teacher struggled and succeeded while implementing PBL was reassuring to me.  I love the idea of project-based learning and DBQs, but at this point for me it’s all theory.  Connecting this reading with the Kindergarten Teachers’ presentation really made this practice come alive for me.  It’s one thing to learn about PBL and formative assessments through readings and discussions, but it’s an entirely different learning experience when you get to personally interact with teachers implementing these activities on a daily basis.

I think it would be really helpful to hear from an upper elementary teacher who is working on PBLs and DBQs in the classroom.  I would appreciate getting a different perspective or experience.  It was also encouraging to hear the two teachers talk about their professional learning community.  One thing I am worried about when becoming a teacher is the idea of being alone in my lesson planning.  I liked hearing these teachers talk about their collaboration with their kindergarten team and being able to bounce ideas off of each other.

Coming away from class last night, I am still very lost on how to critique a rubric to determine its efficiency level.  I understand the general idea, but I am worried for my assessment project because I feel like I didn’t get enough specific direction about critiquing.  During our discussion, many people had different feelings about the efficiency of the example rubric, so my question is, are differing opinions okay?