1. Assessing Prior Knowledge
a) In the beginning I assumed that just having a mywebspiration review would be ok, after all we are reviewing what they know. However, I have learned that there needs to be more of an assessment of prior knowledge and the students need to be more active in this process. We could have done a KWL chart or did more of a class discussion instead of what we did. Also we could have had students create a couple of mywebspiration rather than just one at the beginning; this would be similar to a KWL chart but not quite the same.
b) I should assume nothing and I should work in baby steps. Even when the standards say that a topic was introduced in the previous year it by no means, means they remember what was taught. Just because I know and understand the information does not mean that all of my students will have the prior knowledge that I think they will have.
2. Planning Instruction
a) In the beginning the planning was done, but we did not think through completely how we were going break down the standard and have the objectives completely cover the standard. We had what we wanted to cover, but we did not think how we were going to do this. Even though we had plans, we often got excited to do the activities that we too forgot important steps to facilitate learning.
b) If you do not have your plan then how can you possibly implement it through instruction? With great planning it will allow for a complete lesson that completely covers the standards and objectives. I will also try harder now to make more step by step instructions for me to follow along when teaching the lesson.
3. Designing Instruction
a) Now looking back, I have realized that we should have walked through the lesson and did it ourselves before we implemented it. We changed several aspects of the lesson by having the video shown before the PowerPoint as well as a handout with the instructions for their electronic flash cards.
b) I need to create lessons that will move smoothly. If I can’t follow my own instructions, then my students will be lost and there will be chaos. If I walk myself through the instruction before implementing it, I will be more successful in the future. I will also always make sure the resources I am giving them contain the information they need.
4. Planning Assessment
a) Next time instead of having the students work in groups all of the time, it would be important to also have individual work for them to complete. This way each student is held accountable for the information. It would also allow for me to make sure that one student isn’t doing all of the work. Also, it would be important to go over the rubric before they start the activity, we had planned on this but we forgot when we began instructing; this we be good time to mention that we need to have everything we want to show students already opened before teaching the lesson. This would allow for all of the students to ask questions they might have about the assessment. We added requirements for each student to create notes as well as how many questions they must answer on the flash cards. We also decided to have them to individually take the quiz rather than together.
b) If one does not have an effective assessment, then how do you know if your objectives were accomplished? It would be best to walk through the assessment yourself before implementing it. It might even be better to create the assessment first before creating the lesson.
5. Instructional Decisions/Teaching
a) The website we used did not have all of the information needed to complete the assignment which was a fear I had in the beginning. It was also information that would be difficult for a 3rd grader to read; we also found out that many students had countries that had many sub groups. This is why we found multiple websites to add with our website.
b) The instructional decisions a teacher chooses will make or break their lesson. If you make bad decisions then your lesson will be negatively affected. It is also important to mention that if the majority of students fail and assessment than it was probably too hard or the information was not taught in a way in which students could understand it. In our cases everyone passed the quiz with flying colors so we needed to make a different assessment.
6. Assessment of Learning
a) We decided that we were going to assess the students on their electronic flash cards as well as their online quiz. The website quizlet.com was great, but the students had never used it before so we needed to walk them through it. We should have done a complete walk through with the class rather than just stating what had to be done. Also, we needed to go over the questions and the rubric they were going to receive a grade for; we failed to explain what was expected at first which made it where we had to keep repeating ourselves. Next time, it would also be helpful to have an individual assessment to keep from one student doing all of the work while the other members are slacking off.
b) The assessment is to make sure the objectives were met and if the assessment does not demonstrate the students’ knowledge and success of the objectives then it would be ineffective. An ineffective assessment will not allow for you to accurately know if your lesson worked or if you need to rewrite the assessment as well as even the lesson. Assessment is key to in multiple aspects of learning most important to make sure students and the teachers are all on the same page.
