Phase II: Reflections on Lesson Implementation

INSTRUCTIONAL DECISIONS/TEACHING

• Overall, I felt that my lesson went well.  One thing that I struggled with was treating my fellow peers like they were 1st graders.  I feel like because of this I struggled a little teaching the "new concept" since they already know it now.  But other than that, my activities went well and went according to plan.  I am glad that I decided to do a class example on the forest ecosystem because I think that it helped the students create their own because they then knew what I was looking for.  I am also glad that I decided to read the book about the desert.  I think it gave the students an idea of what kinds of plants and animals they could use and if they remembered, they could use what they saw in the book instead of trying to come up with them on their own.

• I feel that I kept my alignment to the objectives and standards throughout the lesson.  We all stayed on topic and did not stray away and I feel we ended up learning what I wanted the students to learn.  As I started teaching the lesson I decided to add a journal assignment in order to better the students understanding.

• A modification that I made during the lesson was I added a quick journal assignment in the beginning of the lesson to get the students thinking about the topic and see if they would develop the other questions to ask during the lesson.  I feel like doing this worked out better than just asking them what they knew about each ecosystem in a class discussion.  It allowed them to think on their own and I could see what they knew before we started so I could adjust my teaching.

MECHANICS

• Technologies that I used during this lesson were the SmartBoard and the students' computers.  On both of these technologies I used Pixie.

•  I used the SmartBoard to do the class example of the forrest ecosystem and how to give them a brief overview on how to use Pixie.  The students used their personal computers to write their quick journal assignment and to create their own desert ecosystem. 

• My lessons in the correct time frame because it was 30 minutes.  I was able to manage my time well and the students would have been able to add onto their assignment if they finished early which worked out well because no one was sitting around waiting and no one did not have enough time to finish.

ASSESSMENT OF LEARNING

• Artifacts of students learning:

Journals: 

Desert Ecosystems:

• I think my students succeeded in achieving the objectives and standards of the lesson.  They were all able to compare the different plants and animals within the desert and forest ecosystem and learn how they are different.  The only thing was one of students (the top picture of the desert) is an example of how students can misinterpret the two different types of deserts.  For example, in the Arizona desert there are no camels.  But this is something that can easily be taught again.   

• I think I was successful in teaching this lesson.  My overall feedback from everyone was good.  Someone said I could have taught how to use Pixie better, but I showed them what they needed to use on their and when i asked for questions no one had any.  So I feel like I ended up doing fine on that.  I also stated in my lesson that this was not the first they were using Pixie.