Tag Archives: lesson

           At this point I had helped facilitate many lessons and read many stories but had not planned and executed a complete lesson on my own. I was a mixture of nervous and excited to be teaching my first lesson to the class. The lesson was a writing lesson, which at this point is a drawing and a corresponding sentence created by the student but written by the teacher.

I began by reading the book Not a Box and having the children tell me what the rabbit in the story was pretending the box was. After reading the book I placed a small piece of painters tape on the whiteboard and informed the children that they will be changing the piece into something else like the rabbit did.

“I draw a rocketship going to Mars.”

We brainstormed several different ides, about ten, that I wrote down on the board. Next, I shared with the students that my idea was to turn the piece of tape into a fish. To connect this activity to other parts of their learning (this week they were learning the concept of a setting in stories) I asked what else I would find surrounding the fish. Answers included more fish, coral, a whale, a shark, a dolphin, and a penguin. Yes, the children took the time to critique my drawings: for example, ‘that’s not how you draw a dolphin’ to which I replied that maybe they are better at drawing than I am.

“I try to draw a fish and a shark and a whale.”

After we had completed my example I told the kids that each of them had a piece of tape in their writing book to change into something different. It was while sending them away that I learned I should have had an example of which booklet was their writing booklet or simply said it was the blue one because a few students were grabbing the wrong booklet. Naturally, there were a few students who drew the fish example I modeled however, there were several different pictures as well. The examples shown are show one that was related to the modeled example with three others having different concepts.

“This is two of the good guys trying to steal from the bad guys.”

One of the interesting features I found while doing this lesson is that of all the ideas we brainstormed there were only a few of these that some children ended up drawing. A few students drew a castle, which previously brainstormed, but that was about it. There was only one student who did not change the piece of tape into anything. Instead he drew a picture beside the piece of tape. I know it the past that when they have used their writing books they are prompted but sometimes forget the prompt by the time they are drawing.

“This is the good guy airplane and they are fighting with the gun.”

Thus, I’m thinking once he opened his writing book he decided he wanted to draw something else and avoided the piece of tape completely. Once the lesson was finished I felt exhilarated. Everyone seemed interested in the book and the idea that came out of it. Overall, it felt great to finally be in front of the class and teaching but I was grateful to have my School Adviser there to help write sentences and manage students.