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The competent teacher differentiates instruction by using a variety of strategies that support critical and creative thinking, problem-solving, and continuous growth and learning. This teacher understands that the classroom is a dynamic environment requiring ongoing modification of instruction to enhance learning for each student.
The Day the Crayons Quit Writing
For my writing methods course I created a lesson based off the book the day The crayons quit. In my lesson students had to understand the use of voice in writing and then write their own letter from a crayon. This was to gauge student understanding on what voice was and how it is used in writing. This is part of the knowledge indicator 5A
“understands the cognitive processes associated with various kinds of learning” (IL knowledge indicator 5A). For this lesson I had to understand if students mastered and fully gasped that concept of voice.
First read about it, then we discussed examples, then we wrote our own letters as crayons to show understanding. I was really impressed with how my 2nd graders did with this. In discussion, examples and modeling I should students many ways we can use voice in writing. This followed performance indicator 5L “develops a variety of clear, accurate presentations and representations of concepts, using alternative explanations to assist students’ understanding and presenting diverse perspectives to encourage critical and creative thinking” (IL performance indicator 5L). Having many modes of learning the same thing will help all students reach mastery and grow in understanding. This is why I try to incorporate many different ways of learning in my lessons.
Flipped Classroom Project:
Rationale for lesson: This lesson plan contains visual slides to teach students, not only what a clock is and used for, but how to read one. It includes the many uses of time in everyday life and the importance of the sun. The lesson teaches about some history of why we have time, like the fact that day and night come from the position of the Earth in relation to the sun. And they are 24 hours in a day because that is how long it takes the Earth to rotate. The lesson shows both math and science aspects of time. It also explained AM and PM or day and night hours, and that 12:00 is the halfway mark of a day. The lesson also adds on why we need to use time to schedule our lives in an efficient way to get things done. After students understand the relevance and use of time, the lesson continues on how to tell time. It shows time visually with color coordinated hands and words and faction like clocks to show how time is divided. The lesson stresses that an hour is 60 minutes and a minute is 60 seconds. This is an important thing to remember and help the student best understand time. Next we went over hands and what positions mean what. This again was shown visually with words to help the students mentally and visually remember it. When teaching minutes and counting the number, again visually is shown with colors and my moving of the mouse. It also notes the use of digital, standard and tick marked clocks, to teach students a wide variety of clocks. The lesson ends with some together work to help the student practice. The goal of this lesson is to help students better visually understand and execute telling time on a regular clock.
The state standards used to create and make goals for this lesson follow “1.MD.3 Tell and write time in hours and half-hours using analog and digital clocks” (Illinois State Priority Learning Standard 2020-2021 First grade). To start this lesson a first grade standard was used, as a way of review. If you ever taught a kid time they need to hear how many times, so this was used as a review. However the first grade standard wasn’t just for review but to help the kids who maybe didn’t learn it in first grade. The lesson covers which hand is which, and it’s meaning, and what hours and half hours look like. It was included mainly for a new way also with showing time ---as fractions of an hour which is a third grade math skill. This was taught to ensure students would understand the main goal which was telling time, by hours or minutes given. Plus it is easier for new time tellers to see visually. Like for example if the hour hand was at 6 and the minute hand was at minute 32. The student could see that the hand was close to a half hour, but not there using the learned fraction or an hour skill in the lesson. Just like the third grade standard used “ 3.MD.1-1 Tell and write time to the nearest minute and measure time intervals in minutes” (Illinois State Priority Learning Standard 2020-2021 Thirds grade). This implies that once students understand hours, they can go to minutes. Which is exactly what my lesson does and why it includes first and third grade standards, because it is easier to teach and learn time sequence or steps. The lesson plan shows first hours and half hours being shown in fractions, then minutes. To teach time by minute the lesson shows students to count by 5’s for each number, because 12 x 5 = 60, there 60 minutes in an hour. Students are reminded that there are 5 minutes between the 12 numbers and to count the closest one to the minute hand. They are taught to watch the minute hands positions using fractions, but also with not so clear times. Like 12:23 students can see the hour clearly and see the hand is away from the 4 (meaning 20) but not quite at the 5 (meaning 25 and round to 23 using counting. Students will be learning how to use and set clocks for given times. They will understand the meaning of the hands on the clocks and their many positions after the lessons. Students will not only be able to tell time on any clock with hours and half hours, but to the minutes accurately.
This is a life skill for students and will help them learn and be more efficient in and out of the classroom. As a teacher I learn that creating artifacts such as this lesson, are important and need to be clear. The lessons being visually exciting, not only makes it more fun to build and teach, it makes it more effective in teaching it especially virtually. I also learned that it’s best to explain things like why the clock is 60 minutes and the sun's relation to time. Doing so helps the student understand the value and why this is the way they are. Sometimes students wonder “Why do I need to learn this anyways?” Telling them can help them be engaged. Time is used for everything, therefore important to life. I also learned that having examples to go through helps explain and solidify the concept in the students brain and mine while I teach how to do it. Overall creating this lesson was a great learning experience.
Visuals for Math Review
During student teaching I learned new ways of teaching math, which is different from how I learned it as a kid in some cases. To review with my students I would model for them how to use a model array (pictured). This process is about using multiplication to solve for division and model the missing number. I followed along with my cooperating teacher teaching the students this to better understand. I understand where and why they may be confused; however it is a good practice to solve division problems without doing long division. This follows knowledge indicator 5B “understands principles and techniques, along with advantages and limitations, associated with a wide range of evidence-based instructional practices (IL knowledge indicator 5B). As a teacher I need to understand how methods and practices work and their many benefits but also the negative pieces and how students can get confused.
Knowing how students may get confused or lost can help me plan and prepare strategies to help them better understand. Monitoring students progress on a new strategy in math or other subjects can help me to plan to review or move on. This is a part of performance indicator 5J, which “monitors and adjusts strategies in response to feedback from the students” (IL performance indicator 5J). As a teacher I need to constantly monitor and readjust my plans based on data and feedback from students. This is to help them learn to get to mastery. I plan to do that as much as possible and have data from formative assessments to support my planning.
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