What surprised you in your lesson?
Teaching this lesson, made me realize how difficult some teachers have it on a daily basis. While teaching my lesson, there were many interruptions. The classroom phone rang, a teacher and the guidance counselor came to the door and the office asked for a student over the intercom. As I watched my video, I noticed that despite all the interruptions the students were able to complete their task. At 10:18 the teacher from next door came in to speak with a few students. The students who opened the door talked to the teacher and then came back in and went right back to work. While the students were working with their samples, at minute 13:10, the phone rang. None of the students even noticed the phone ring because they were so engaged in the lesson. At 13:24, one of my ESE students began to have a moment and my CT was able to jump in and help him calm down before he became a distraction to the rest of the class. No students were off track when this happened. At 17:08, when the office called for a student, who was in the other class, one student got up out of their seat went next door and came back quickly. He was able to get back to work as if there was no disruption. I was very surprised at how the students in the classroom handled disruptions without it affecting their work. I did notice that at minute 22:44, there was a knock on the door and one students opened the door, however, he stayed at the door and waited for our guest to leave. This is something that we need to have a conversation about because it did become a distraction for him and he missed filling in one of his samples. Despite all the disruption during my lesson, I felt that it went smoothly and the students were able to gain information about classifying rocks and minerals.
Consider the extent to which you provided opportunities for your students to ‘do’ science. What process skills/practices were embedded and discussed in the lesson?
I feel that during this lesson, the students were given opportunity to use different process skills. The students classified their sample as a rock or a mineral (minute 4:18). However, I did not discuss with the students that we are classifying and now for the next lesson I teach I will makes sure I explain to the students which process skills we are going to be using during our lesson. At minute 4:30 I explained to the students that they were going to be given either a rock or a mineral and that they need to observe to determine which one it is. They need to observe the physical properties of their rock or mineral. Once they have observed their sample and decided with their group on whether their sample is a rock or mineral. I asked them to infer as to what type of mineral they had based on the properties they observed. The students had to use the information in their LDC books to help them classify their samples. I know for further lessons, I need to explain to the students more about what process skills are going to be using during the lesson. I know I cannot expect them to know what skills they are going to be using during the lessons. I did include these in my lesson plan but I should have included that I need to verbalize these skills to the students using exact vocabulary. For example, “When you are given your sample, you are going to observe the sample. Once you have located the properties you are going to infer whether it is a rock or a mineral.
Identify an individual or group of students who did especially well in this lesson today. How do you account for this performance?
One pair of students who stood out to me during this lesson because they were prompt and able to move through the samples quickly and correctly identify each sample. They were very eager to start, at 6:51, they asked if they could go ahead and get started. I noticed at minute 7:18 the two students were talking to each other and using their hand lens correctly to help them classify their sample. Again at 8:30 they were talking to each other making sure they had the correct answer and explained to me why they chose to classify it as a rock or mineral. At 9:07, when they were stuck on their sample, they were not afraid to ask me for help. This shows me that they wanted to be successful during the lesson.
I believe that these two students could complete this task because they followed along with reads and raised their hand to answer questions during discussion. They were the first two to be done with each sample they were given. Towards the end of the lesson, I had to ask them to wait because all the samples they needed were with other groups. Throughout the video, no matter where I stopped, they were working with each other, observing, and talking about their sample while other students were out of their seats and talking to students who were not their partner. I believe these two students work well together because the girl is a leader but looks to her partner for help. She is not afraid to take charge and makes sure the work gets done and I believe this rubs off on her partner. Both students enjoy being hands-on during science which made this lesson very enjoyable to them.
Teaching this lesson, made me realize how difficult some teachers have it on a daily basis. While teaching my lesson, there were many interruptions. The classroom phone rang, a teacher and the guidance counselor came to the door and the office asked for a student over the intercom. As I watched my video, I noticed that despite all the interruptions the students were able to complete their task. At 10:18 the teacher from next door came in to speak with a few students. The students who opened the door talked to the teacher and then came back in and went right back to work. While the students were working with their samples, at minute 13:10, the phone rang. None of the students even noticed the phone ring because they were so engaged in the lesson. At 13:24, one of my ESE students began to have a moment and my CT was able to jump in and help him calm down before he became a distraction to the rest of the class. No students were off track when this happened. At 17:08, when the office called for a student, who was in the other class, one student got up out of their seat went next door and came back quickly. He was able to get back to work as if there was no disruption. I was very surprised at how the students in the classroom handled disruptions without it affecting their work. I did notice that at minute 22:44, there was a knock on the door and one students opened the door, however, he stayed at the door and waited for our guest to leave. This is something that we need to have a conversation about because it did become a distraction for him and he missed filling in one of his samples. Despite all the disruption during my lesson, I felt that it went smoothly and the students were able to gain information about classifying rocks and minerals.
Consider the extent to which you provided opportunities for your students to ‘do’ science. What process skills/practices were embedded and discussed in the lesson?
I feel that during this lesson, the students were given opportunity to use different process skills. The students classified their sample as a rock or a mineral (minute 4:18). However, I did not discuss with the students that we are classifying and now for the next lesson I teach I will makes sure I explain to the students which process skills we are going to be using during our lesson. At minute 4:30 I explained to the students that they were going to be given either a rock or a mineral and that they need to observe to determine which one it is. They need to observe the physical properties of their rock or mineral. Once they have observed their sample and decided with their group on whether their sample is a rock or mineral. I asked them to infer as to what type of mineral they had based on the properties they observed. The students had to use the information in their LDC books to help them classify their samples. I know for further lessons, I need to explain to the students more about what process skills are going to be using during the lesson. I know I cannot expect them to know what skills they are going to be using during the lessons. I did include these in my lesson plan but I should have included that I need to verbalize these skills to the students using exact vocabulary. For example, “When you are given your sample, you are going to observe the sample. Once you have located the properties you are going to infer whether it is a rock or a mineral.
Identify an individual or group of students who did especially well in this lesson today. How do you account for this performance?
One pair of students who stood out to me during this lesson because they were prompt and able to move through the samples quickly and correctly identify each sample. They were very eager to start, at 6:51, they asked if they could go ahead and get started. I noticed at minute 7:18 the two students were talking to each other and using their hand lens correctly to help them classify their sample. Again at 8:30 they were talking to each other making sure they had the correct answer and explained to me why they chose to classify it as a rock or mineral. At 9:07, when they were stuck on their sample, they were not afraid to ask me for help. This shows me that they wanted to be successful during the lesson.
I believe that these two students could complete this task because they followed along with reads and raised their hand to answer questions during discussion. They were the first two to be done with each sample they were given. Towards the end of the lesson, I had to ask them to wait because all the samples they needed were with other groups. Throughout the video, no matter where I stopped, they were working with each other, observing, and talking about their sample while other students were out of their seats and talking to students who were not their partner. I believe these two students work well together because the girl is a leader but looks to her partner for help. She is not afraid to take charge and makes sure the work gets done and I believe this rubs off on her partner. Both students enjoy being hands-on during science which made this lesson very enjoyable to them.