Lesson Plan Reflections

Lesson Plan #1
During this lesson students witnessed a think aloud of The Napping House. They learned how to visualize what an author writes by taking the “description words” (also known as adjectives!) and relating them to their own lives. The students that struggled the most with this lesson were the few students that have trouble sitting still and focusing. In order to visualize, they had to listen to what I was saying the entire time which was difficult for them.
While listening to the think aloud, students were able to picture what I was describing because when we would get to silly parts, I would hear, “Oh man!” and other reactions that would not have been present if they did not have a mental picture of the story. I also know that my students were able to give a list of reasons why visualizing is important. I heard some partners during turn and talk time, and other partners shared their ideas with the class. A few students were only able to tell me that visualizing is important because it “helps us picture what we read.” This is true, but this more describes what visualizing is and not why it is important.
I learned that fluency impedes many of my students’ visualizing abilities. They are so focused on decoding a text that they never get the opportunity to create mental pictures of what the author is saying. Because of this, their visualization skills are significantly stronger when they are listening to a read aloud.
Read to self time during the next couple of weeks is when I plan to reach all of my struggling visualizers. They will continue to get practice in my whole group lessons, but because they have a hard time focusing, I think I will be more successful reading individually to them a few pages at a time. I will basically repeat what I did for the entire class, only look for more response because it will be one on one.
If I were to teach this lesson again, I would change it so that my students had more time to talk throughout the book. I think that if they had more turn and talk time that they would have an easier time sitting and focusing while I was reading. This would help them create a stronger visualization because they will be able to focus on only one or two pages at a time.


Lesson Plan #2
My students learned that their visualizations became better as they received more details from the text. They also learned that it is okay for students’ drawings to all look different, because our “schemas” are all different. Many of my first graders struggled with understanding that the drawings began with a text-to-self connection and changed to look more like what the author wanted us to visualize.
All of my students began by drawing a baby in the first square. Because of this, I know that all of them were visualizing the title and first two lines of the poem. It also tells me that whether they knew it or not, they were making text-to-self connections because each baby looked different. Many of my students made changes in their drawings in each square that followed the poem (i.e. black, curly hair). This is proof that they were listening and visualizing what the author suggested.
I learned that my students are able to communicate their understanding much easier in pictures than in words. The past few lessons I have had students write in their journal and turn and talk, but today I saw really clear results when they were asked to draw pictures. This shows me that their comprehension is greater than what they can typically express.
I will not worry about teaching this lesson again to the first graders that struggled because I know they will receive this same information again next year. Because we are on second grade GLCEs this year, it is just an introduction for first graders so they have prior knowledge of the concept next year. I will work with the few second graders that did not show me in their drawings that they were visualizing what the author wanted in a small group during read to self. I will have them verbalize their visualizations of the poem to a partner to see if they are more successful.
If I were to teach this lesson again, I would probably give the students a shorter amount of time to draw each picture. The students who were on task the entire time finished early, and were waiting on the students who were talking and messing around. Shortening the time they had to complete the drawings may have ensured that they got right to work and concentrated better. Also, being able to complete the entire lesson in a shorter amount of time would probably help students to remember the entire lesson when wrapping up at the end. In reality, first and second graders can barely remember what happened 30 seconds ago!


Lesson Plan #3
During this lesson, my students learned that visualizing requires more than just sight, it requires all five senses. All of my students seemed to understand this, but some of the first graders struggled with knowing which sense they were using.
Students were all able to shout out, “sight” when I asked them which sense the author wanted them to use for the first excerpt. Less students were as confident about the other senses, which tells me that they have not had as much practice and they are more confusing. All students had something written down for each sense, which tells me that they were at least following along and understand that we were using different senses.
I learned that my students have a difficult time with vocabulary. If there is a word they are unfamiliar with, they are unable to move past the individual word to understand the entire sentence.
Students will continuously get more practice using their senses throughout the year. We have Rocky Raccoon that we use to remind them to visualize when they read, and I will mention little reminders about using all five senses. At the end of the day, it is not as important for me to see that students are visualizing with all five senses as it is for me to see that they are comprehending what they are reading. Therefore, if showing me that they are visualizing with five senses is confusing them, I will try other ways to ensure they are comprehending.
If I were to teach this lesson again, I would be more prepared to discuss vocabulary words. I am horrible at describing what basic words mean and I did not anticipate them being unfamiliar with so many words. This would improve students understanding of what sense they should be using because they would not be concentrating on figuring out what the text means.

Lesson Reflection

Lesson #1:

During this lesson the students responded well to the expectations and concepts presented. I had students that understood prefixes, suffixes and base words. However, I had some students that had misconceptions about how these mechanics constitute and change a word. My students were able to identify the base words within the vocabulary words, but struggled to understand what that really meant. For instance, one vocabulary word was 'funny' and my students thought that 'fun' was a base word. This identified that they understood how to find base words, but in this case 'funny'+'ny' is not a base word + suffix. Throughout the lesson, I think students gained a better understanding of the concept.
I think that there could be alternate reads to my students' performance during this lesson. The most prominent one is if students really get the concept or if they were feeding off of me and their students for the correct answer. I had a lot of students that were not confident while giving the answer which tells me that this is something that needs to be revisited.
I learned that my students know more about literacy than I thought. They know more than just prefixes, suffixes, and base words. I learned that the students understand that a word is made up of parts and these parts can alter the meaning, look, etc. of the word. Furthermore, I learned that some of my students are stronger literacy learners than others. This is an ongoing literacy area that will be visited each week. However, I will be providing extra activities for students who continue to struggle with the material. This will support their needs and expose them to this literacy area.
If I teach this lesson again, I will provide different vocabulary words for my strong literacy students and my struggling literacy learners. This would allow for my strong literacy learners to have a challenge and my struggling students not to feel discouraged. I think that this would help the students that need extra support by exposing them to familiar words and building their literacy understanding, but still provide learning/practice for the stronger students.

Lesson #2

My students learned that the alphabetical principle is linked to the letters in a word. The students were able to realize that the sounds of letters in the words are made from the alphabetical. Some of my students struggled with time and that sometimes they may need to use both the first and second letters in the word. For instance, if there were two words with the same beginning letter they would need to use the second letter.
All of my students were able to put the words in alphabetical order. Due to this, I know that all of my students understand the alphabetical principle. This also illustrated that they were engaged in my modeling and realized the expectation I set.
I learned that my students know their word structures and alphabet. The students were able to use the letters that make up a word and link those to the alphabet to put them in the correct order. This illustrated to me that my students are beginning to build their sight words and vocabulary understanding!
I do not have to re-teach this lesson because my students didn't struggle. However, this literacy area will be revisited. I want students to be able to quickly order their words and prove that they are comfortable with this concept.
If I teach this lesson in the future, I would give the students more time to independently work and devote less time to the modeling part. I would model a few words and closely monitor to know if I need to work through more words. However, I think it would be more effective to give more time for student work because this will be a revisited topic. This would allow for my students to build up their work progress. I would begin to take away time as this concept is revisited.

Lesson #3

The students learned how to use the dictionary to find definitions. They learned that the dictionary is set up using the alphabetical principle we learned about the previous day. All of the students were able to understand how to use the dictionary and why it was important. Some of my students struggled when there were two words with the same beginning letter.

Students were able to complete the activity in the time limit and work independently. The students did not ask many questions because I provided them with the steps on the white board for them to use. All of my students wrote all 10 correct spelling words. Some students even wrote down if the word was a noun, verb, etc. on their paper.

This will be a literacy area that students will continue to get practice during the school year. We will be having 'definition Wednesday' each week using different words. I think this will help all of my students become more comfortable with the alphabetical principle and the dictionary. In addition, this will expose them to literacy resources and build their vocabulary. Spelling is a struggle in my classroom and the dictionary is a great way to expose them to correct spelling of words.

If I were to teach this lesson in the future, I think I would give students more words. This would continue thier practice, work on timing, and build their vocabulary. In addition, I would allow for a time to just explore with the dictionary for practice. The students are learning more about the guide words in the dictionary verses having to flip from page to page. I think this could improve if students just explored and became more exposed with the dictionary and not just on Wednesday.

Lesson Plan Reflections

Lesson 1: Delicious Words

What did students learn and which students struggled with the lesson?

Students learned how to pick out interesting, or “delicious” words from a poetic text. These words may have been nouns, adjectives, or verbs that helped to create a “picture in the reader’s mind.” Thus, students learned how to choose these words from a text and wrote them on a list to incorporate within their own future writing pieces. Overall, the students excelled throughout this lesson. They were choosing words (i.e. “hissing, swooping, magnificent, etc.) that not only stood out to them, but would stand out to any reader. Since this lesson relied more on personal opinion, I was looking to see if they were actually choosing words that were interesting and/or appealing to a reader’s mind. However, T.L., A.S., and M.B. did struggle with finding these words on their own and required teacher scaffolding and support throughout the independent portion of the activity.

What are alternate reads (interpretations) of your students’ performance or products?

After looking through the students’ lists of delicious words, one may infer that the students do not truly comprehend what constitutes a delicious word and were merely choosing “big words” or words that looked like they may fit the description. Thus, it could be interpreted that the students could not explain why they choose their delicious words and therefore do not fully understand the concept.

What did you learn about your students’ literacy practices that extend beyond your objectives?

From this lesson, I learned that my students’ oral listening skills (when given a task) are impressive. I was shocked to see how well they remembered delicious words from the Pumpkin Eye text after I was finished reading. I barely had to go back and reread the words in order to jot their memories as we were creating our list.

When and how will you re-teach the material to students who need additional support?

Although I believe that my class generally understood the concept, I feel that giving them another opportunity to find delicious words would benefit each student. This skill can improve with practice, is something that can be used in each genre of writing, and can be incorporated into reading, as well. This is why I will continue to encourage the students in writing down delicious words as they are reading and remind them to transfer these words as they are writing new pieces. For my students that required additional support, I will pull them during independent writing during a future Writers’ Workshop. This time will allow me to focus on the content and give me time to once again model the skill. After I model how to find these words, I will have the students find them in delicious word-rich texts (that I have previously chosen) as I scaffold their experience.

If you were to teach this same lesson again, what would you do differently and how do you think the changes would improve students’ learning?

If I were to teach this lesson again, I would change the set-up of the lesson. Initially, I would introduce the delicious word concept, provide examples, and then read Pumpkin Eye without giving the students the task of picking out delicious words. Then, I would have the words to the text written on a chart paper, so we could find the delicious words as a class while reading the text over. This would give the students more of a visual and provide a better model for how to discover delicious words within a piece. Additionally, when students offer suggestions of delicious words, I would have them explain to me why that word is delicious to them. This would show me whether or not they understand the concept. It would also improve the students’ learning by allowing them to analyze their own thinking and ask themselves the question, “how does that word create a picture in the reader’s mind?”

Lesson 2: Adjective/Noun Combinations

What did students learn and which students struggled with the lesson?

Students learned the terms adjective and noun and how to create adjective/noun combinations that help to create a “picture in a reader’s mind.” To focus the lesson, students wrote adjective/noun combinations that were geared toward descriptions of the winter season and events that take place within this time. Since the students were paired for this activity (“higher” students paired with “lower” students), there were not many students who struggled. I walked around to make sure that both members of the group were contributing and was very happy with the progress that I viewed. That being said, I did notice that one student, L.M., was struggling with the concept of adjectives and nouns. Some of his sentences did follow the adjective/noun pattern, however, he did have a couple that included verbs and pronouns.

What are alternate reads (interpretations) of your students’ performance or products?

After looking through the student’s list of winter adjective/noun combinations and understanding the set-up of the partnerships, it may be interpreted that the “lower” level students (especially my focus group) did not understand the concept. It could be seen as the “higher” level students produced many of the combinations while the “lower” level students did not contribute and therefore do not comprehend the lesson’s content.

What did you learn about your students’ literacy practices that extend beyond your objectives?

Through this lesson, I learned that my students’ vocabulary is high (in terms of the second grade level.) I was amazed with the terms that they incorporated within their pieces and how well they applied to their writing topic. For example, students used terms such as “hibernating bear” and “dormant trees.” I also learned that a possible focus area for my students might be spelling. There are some students whose spelling of words does not make phonetic sense, whereas many students are misspelling harder words. To help bridge this gap, focusing on spelling would benefit all students. As of now, though, I’d rather have them attempt harder to spell words than leave them out for words with which they are familiar.

When and how will you re-teach the material to students who need additional support?

To re-teach L.M. this lesson, I will make sure to conference with him as the students are writing their “Hello, Good-bye poems.” Since these poems also incorporate the adjective/noun combinations, it will be a perfect time for me to reiterate the definitions of adjective and noun, provide explicit details, and scaffold him in the process in producing his own combinations. I will scaffold him but first giving him an example (red leaves), and then giving him a noun(s) and having him provide an adjective(s). Lastly, I will have him create his own combinations.

If you were to teach this same lesson again, what would you do differently and how do you think the changes would improve students’ learning?

If I were to re-teach this lesson, I would provide fewer examples that relate to the writing theme that the students are going to use. During my mini-lesson, I used mostly fall terms as examples; however, when I told them their directions for the activity I included four examples about winter. Then, as I was walking around, I noticed that numerous students were using my ideas. Thus, if I used less examples of the winter, it would improve students’ learning by allowing them to think and create their own adjective/noun combinations that are original and unique. This would also support my assessment of this activity, as I would be able to see whether or not they understand the concept through their own words.

Lesson 3: Introduction to Hello Winter, Good-bye Fall Poem

What did students learn and which students struggled with the lesson?

In this lesson, students learned how to apply the adjective and noun combinations that were introduced on the day before. They did this by describing winter and fall attributes in the “Hello, Good-bye” format (Hello (adjective/noun combination describing winter), Good-bye (adjective/noun combination describing fall.)) Thus, they also learned this type of poem format. The students who struggled with this lesson were L.M., T.L., and A.S. Much of the support they needed was because they “couldn’t think of anything to write.” To support their learning, I asked them questions that prompted to think of words and phrases that they could include in their poems. For example, “What kind of things do you do in the winter? What is the weather like? What kind of clothes do you wear?”

What are alternate reads (interpretations) of your students’ performance or products?

Since (some of my students) used the same adjectives and/or noun on numerous occasions throughout their poems, it could be inferred that these students do not understand the format and focus of the Hello, Good-bye poem. These students are relying on examples that they have seen and heard before my mini-lessons and during our share time.

What did you learn about your students’ literacy practices that extend beyond your objectives?

Like the previous lesson, I was amazed by my students’ creativity in word choice and vocabulary. As a whole, they understood the concept and expanded it beyond my expectations and initial objectives for the lesson. I saw many students use highly descriptive words such as vibrant and humungous and include nouns and attributes that I did not anticipate.

When and how will you re-teach the material to students who need additional support?

This lesson was only the introduction to a three-day writing process; therefore I will be able to conference with my students, who struggled with this material, during the independent writing portion of the upcoming Writers’ Workshops. To further support their learning of this material, I will continue to ask prompting questions that will scaffold them in creating their own adjective/noun combinations referring to both winter and fall. I will have students think about what they do in both of these seasons, what they eat, what they wear, where they play, what holidays they celebrate, etc. Then, I will prompt the students to think about adjectives (or describing words) that go with the nouns they have chosen. I will ask, “What’s a word that describes _____?” If needed, I will add, “Is it cold, frozen, shiny…?” Once this tactic has been successful, I will offer less support until the students produce their own combinations.

If you were to teach this same lesson again, what would you do differently and how do you think the changes would improve students’ learning?

If I were to re-teach this lesson again, I would make sure to incorporate the other aspects of poetic writing (that we have discussed) within my mini-lesson. This is because it would connect the lesson (even more so) to prior lessons and show the students that these elements can be utilized in any piece of writing, improving their learning of not only this lesson but also the entire unit as a whole. I thought of this as I was walking around and noticing that some of my students were doing this within their poems. I announced it to the class; however, I believe including it in a more formal lesson would have been more productive. It is a perfect way to show students how to better “create a picture within the reader’s mind.” When we revisit our Hello, Good-bye poems on Friday, I will definitely make this a part of my plans!

Mosaic Readings: 10/19/10

Reading comprehension and reading fluency are related in that they are crucial in the development of readers both young and old. Reading comprehension is the ability to understand the meaning and message behind a text – it revolves around the skills of monitoring one’s thinking while reading and asking questions that further promote and guide one’s thought processes. Reading fluency is having the knowledge of the letter sounds that create words. When a reader can accurately piece together letter sounds and read the words they create, they are able to read a text without focusing on decoding. As was stated in Mosaic of Thought, “children need to learn letters, sounds, and words, but simultaneously they must be learning about the meaning held in those symbols on the page” (Keene & Zimmermann, 2007, p. 22). Therefore, these terms are directly correlated to each other because if one cannot read the words they will not be able to understand. Conversely, if they are just reading the words without thinking about their meaning in relation to the story, they will not comprehend the text either.

Thus far in my classroom, I have seen both fluency and comprehension assessed in the form of the DRA (Developmental Reading Assessment). This test is administered in order to assign a “reading level” to each student based on their reading fluency and comprehension skills of a previously determined leveled text. I helped to proctor these tests and was amazed to see how much the two elements (fluency and comprehension) relate. There were many students who would read very quickly, but when asked questions at the end could not even remember a character’s name. One case I found particularly interesting occurred with one of our highest readers. He is well above grade level in terms of fluency, however, scored below grade level when his comprehension was assessed. From this experience, I learned that I can’t judge a student by how quickly he or she reads and assume that he or she has comprehended the story. By doing the DRA tests, we have a general idea of what our students are struggling with both independently and as whole.

In order to fully assess my students’ reading development, I will need to take a closer look at which aspect in particular (in regard to fluency and comprehension) they are having difficulties with. I will need to know if, for example, they are not monitoring as they are reading or have difficulty in synthesizing information. I believe the best way to gain this information is to use anecdotal records and conferring during independent reading time. Having the this time to focus on each child as they read and decipher their successes and difficulties allows for individualized goals as well as instruction.

Readings 10-19-10

The readings this week focused on reading comprehension and strategies for students to comprehend text. There is an important relationship between comprehension and reading fluency. Reading fluency is the ability for our students to read text accurately while comprehending the text. The students need to use their decoding skills, word recognition, and more in order to be reading with fluency. In other words, reading fluency allows students to begin to comprehend text. If a student is a fluent reader they are able to focus more on the meaning of the text and how to reflect upon what they have read. Mosaic of Thought introduced seven principle comprehension strategies that can be used and focused on, "listening to the voice in your mind that speaks while you read" (Keene and Zimmerman, page 14). These strategies can be used with fluent readers in order to monitor their comprehension. The strategies revolve around students reading the text and using strategies to listen to the text and the reflections that occur within their mind as they read. In order for students to be successful in comprehension of text they need to have the bridge built, which is fluency.
Within my classroom, fluency is assessed during literacy instruction and using the Development Reading Assessment (DRA). The students have recently been asked to read aloud text with the class. This has helped my CT and I assess the students that have difficulty identifying words and if this affects their comprehension of text. In addition, we have been finishing up with our DRA testing that allows us to obtain our students levels in literacy. We have students with varying levels of fluency and comprehension. I have students who are fluent readers and able to comprehend text, while others struggle with fluency and comprehension of text. The assessments we have incorporated into the classroom and through DRA have helped us focus on students and help to develop fluency skills with students that will lead to comprehension.
In order to fully understand my students' reading development I need to know what skills are challenging for my students. I need to know if my students need more development with decoding, word recognition, sentence structure, etc. to help them have reading fluency and comprehension. To find this out, I could read individually with students to understand how they read and which areas of text they struggle. In addition, I could give students a mini-lesson or assessment that involves different reading strategies to identify which students or areas that require more support and/or development.
Reading comprehension is important for our students to be able to develop. However, in order for students to comprehend text they need to have reading fluency. The two literacy aspects are interconnected and important to develop successful readers!

Gill (2007)

This article discussed the importance of using poetry to teach children about using emotions, and the importance of selecting words in writing. It stated that often times, teachers get caught up thinking that, in a poetry unit, the most important aspect is to expose students to sophisticated poetry from a hundred years ago. The article argued in favor of exposing students to a wide variety of poetry that they will be interested in. There are several 20th century poets that are worthy of being present in elementary classrooms and this is what teachers need to be reading to their students have them value poetry.
I would definitely use poetry in my first and second grade classroom! I have always been hesitant about poetry because I never liked adult poetry. I was always told that children’s poetry was not “real poetry” so I thought I didn’t like poetry. However, after reading this article, I realize that is not true. Children’s poetry is perfect for showing students how to rearrange words in their writing and how to write with emotion. I would implement poetry into our normal writer’s workshop time. Students are allowed to write about anything, and so they could write about anything in the form of poetry one week. Poetry would be a great lesson to teach strategies of word order and word choice. It would also be helpful for getting students to use their senses in their writing. Once students developed these skills in poetry, they would transfer into their everyday writing. As a professional teaching this, I would need to learn more about how to write good poetry myself. I would need to take workshops on incorporating emotion into writing, as well as word choice.
My unit that I will be teaching is a reading unit. However, using the students’ writing samples from writing workshop can help me determine what kinds of strategies they need to work on. If I could find books that use those strategies, my students would benefit in both reading and writing from my lessons!

Gill: The Forgotten Genre of Poetry

Summary: This article focused on the importance of poetry as a genre for reading and writing. Gill discussed that many teachers expect students to evaluate and decompose poetry written by authors, but forget to emphasize the meaning of poetry. He continues to give examples of how he incorporated poetry into his classroom by modeling and allowing students to write freely. Gill emphasized that poetry is a way for students to express themselves, their feelings, their experiences through written work. He also discussed that poetry is one of the least popular genres for children's literature and that teacher should pursue to pressure publishers to print books related to children's poetry instead of adult poetry. Children should be exposed to illustrated poetry books so that the genre is never forgotten.

This was important for me to read because my classroom incorporates poetry reading every week. The students are given a poem to study all week and are required to recite the poem Monday. The students are exposed to children's poetry on a daily basis that is both within the classroom and outside of the classroom. This article helped link the Writer's Workshop material I read to how I can incorporate that with poetry. I think it would be beneficial for my students to begin writing their own poetry in their notebooks to express themselves. This would be a way to incorporate productive Writer's Workshop that focuses on the students real life experiences and promotes the genre into writing techniques and not just reading and reciting someone else's work. As a professional, I need to identify what my students know about writing poetry. I need to make sure that my students know how to write poetry that focuses on events and feelings the reader can experience. Poetry can be a way for my students to begin a different aspect of writing and focus on how to incorporate feelings and desires into their writing.

This module has helped me to think about how I can use writing as a means of assessment during my unit development. The book that we will be using can and should incorporate reflection through writing. I notice now that I can have students participate in discussions of the book and allow them to write their feelings about a book through multiple writing techniques. The students should have the ability to experience more writing during literacy instruction instead of it all being reading, short answer, and unit assessment worksheets. I think that allowing the students to write a summary, alternate ending, poetry, etc as a assessment could benefit their success in assessment.