Biography Lesson – I felt that I didn’t make the best use of the time to work on the biography lesson plan. It could be that my process of creating lesson plans is not the best process, but at this point I am not quick at producing them, and it is hard for me to work on them in a group setting if I don’t have something prepared in advance to bring to the table. I wish I had know that we were going to have this time in class, then I would have prepared a possible idea or questions to ask of a partner. It takes me a long time presently to prepare a lesson plan, but a lot of the time is spent just on “google,” teacher sites, social studies sites, reviewing the SOLs and Curriculum Framework, etc. looking for ideas that might work. This research piece of the process is hard for me to do in a paired or group setting. I personally felt a little at a loss of what to do with the time, since I wasn’t well prepared for it. That being said, I feel like I have enough ideas from the readings this week and some of the ideas within my foursome table to work with to create a lesson plan after further research.
Dust Bowl/Jigsaw Puzzle Lesson – I loved this part of our class. It gives me an idea of how I could do station-like/rotation work with students. I liked the template/graphic organizer we had to use as a visual as we completed the activity, and I think that this sort of lesson would provide students with all of the knowledge that they need for the SOL. I like how it appealed to lots of different styles of learners – with the use of the music, maps, correspondence, and an image. It was helpful to consider that there are many different types of primary and secondary document types to choose from. Also, the example questions handouts from the National Archives were nice resources to try out. This is definitely a lesson plan structure that I would use in my future classroom. My only question would be, when using this lesson plan, how would you manage students who really struggle in class? If you have any students with significant behavioral issues, would you make sure that they are not the only student in a particular group for the “expert” piece that will report back on that piece to their original group? Would you make sure that instead 2 members from that group participate?
Hi Tonya, I apologize for catching you off guard with the biography planning section. Being someone who processes things a little longer as well, I can see how that must have frustrated you. Thank you for your honest reflection.
I would like to respond to your question: “If you have any students with significant behavioral issues, would you make sure that they are not the only student in a particular group for the “expert” piece that will report back on that piece to their original group? Would you make sure that instead 2 members from that group participate?” Before making adjustments to this strategy due to the worry you may have about behavioral issues, go ahead and give this student the responsibility. More times than not, these students rise to the occasion. As the teacher, you will need to be keenly aware of the best group to assign this student. If the student finds interest in the topic for which she/he will become an expert, you may find that empowerment takes precedence over poor behavior. Planning ahead in an academic sense for a student with challenging attitudes is indeed a behavioral management strategy.
Well, I was planning to respond to your question, but Lynne has more than covered it.
As to lesson planning, you won’t have the luxury of spending that much time on a single lesson in student teaching or even afterwards when you have your own class. Think about what you might do to streamline your work and how you make the process a bit less cumbersome. If you want to chat about it, let’s do that.