Tag Archives: Unit Plan

Microteaching Analysis, EDUC 315 Debrief, & Henderson Discussion: Upadte for Monday, 31 October 2011

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Here’s all the news that fit to print about today’s class:

Microteaching Analysis

Dave and I want you to complete the analysis task in a partnership.  Please watch the video of your lesson with the following analysis questions in mind:

Your answers to these questions can be a part of any end product that you desire.  The key is that you cover all the questions thoughtfully and that your responses are clear to the reader.  For instance, if you were to create a collage, you would need to include a one-pager of writing explaining how the collected images represent answers to the analysis questions.

This task is due on Monday, 7 November 2011.  Please submit it to the instructor who saw your original presentation on the 24th.  Remember that Dave was in room 204 and I was in room 207.

EDUC 315 Debrief

We started by asking you to complete a 3-2-1 on your practicum experience to this point.  We took some time to discuss the 3-2-1 results, and then touched on the following Tuesdays Practicum items:

– Timetable: Please submit your teaching timetable to your FA ASAP

– EDUC 315 Lesson You’ll Teach:  Please submit a lesson plan to your SA and FA at least 24 hours in advance of the plan’s implementation.

You may use whatever planning outline/format you would like but make sure you have included all of the components of effective lesson design.

The one non-negotiable for your lesson plans is this – you must include a “Teacher” and “Student” column for each stage/component of the lesson.  This will help you to avoid long spells of student (relative) inactivity that may not be obvious if your plan focuses simply on what the teacher is doing.

– Classroom Observation Task: Please continue to gather data to support the completion of this assignment.  It’s due on Monday, 14 November and can take the form of an end product of your choosing.  Please submit your task to your FA.

– Unit Plan Topic for the January Prac:  Please talk with your SA about the subject and topic you’ll be teaching during your Two-Week Prac in January.  This unit plan will be a sequence of 6-10 lessons and it should focus on one or two PLOs.  I suggest you and your SA nail down which specific PLOs you should cover ASAP.  The more clarity you have about your objectives, the easier the planning process becomes.  Trust me on this one.

Henderson Article Discussion

Now I realize most of you weren’t born when Paul Henderson scored this 1972 Summit Series winning goal against the USSR in Moscow on 28 September 1972 (Heck, I was only 2!) but I’m sure you’ve all seen the iconic photo above and heard Foster Hewitt’s famous call of the goal.  What’s that?  You’re not familiar.  Well, click below to hear all about it:

Oh, and I mocked Bob Cole while I praised Foster Hewitt.  Colesy did have his day.  Check out this collection of clips for some great calls:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npkQlbPOJbM[/youtube]

Oh, were was I?  Yes, the article.  We focused on the four problem solving approaches outlined in Chapter 4:

  • Academic Problem Solving
  • Empirically Sound Problem Solving
  • Intuitive Problem Solving
  • Historically Aware Problem Solving

After giving you some time in a small group to refresh your memory on a particular P.S. stance, we asked you to consider the problems presented in a case study – Kelsey Cheats – from the perspective of that particular stance.

Then, you had a chance to role play a team meeting at which solutions to the problems of Sonja – the teacher in the case study – were discussed.  Feedback from the Henderson Exit Slips indicated that the role plays were an effective way to consider different approaches to solving a common problem.

Reading #3: Article of Choice

For Tuesday, 1 November 2011, please use the Vista site to post an entrance slip with some thoughts on one of the inquiry projects posted on one of these sites:

Due Date Rundown:

Here’s an image of the upcoming due dates that we presented in class:

– Lawrence

 

 

 

LLED 320 – Martha Game, WHERETO Tableaus, Unit Sharing, & D.I. Readings: Update for Tuesday, 8 March 2011

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WHERETO

After a few drama activities to get you warmed up – Zip, Zap, Bop, Bang! and the Martha Game – we played with WHERETO, an acronym that summarizes the key elements that should be in your learning plan / lesson sequence.   Here’s the WHERETO information package we worked with:

The WHERETO task was as follows:

  1. Form a group of 4-5
  2. Choose a WHERETO letter from my Boston Bruins hat
  3. Read the section of the handout relating to your chosen letter
  4. Come up with 2 or 3 key ideas related to your section.   Ask yourself, what do my classmates really need to know about this section?
  5. Design and rehearse a tableau (some movement was allowed, if needed) that visually represented the key ideas from the section
  6. Present and explain your tableau.

In doing this task, I was trying to model one way to use drama as a means of working with content.

Unit Plan Sharing

After asking for suggestions on how to approach the unit plan sharing piece, we decided to do the following:

  • Identify the subject and topic of each unit plan
  • Meet in subject and / or topic groups
  • Share any interesting ideas, activities, or assessments in the unit itself

I asked you to consider what you were considering through the WHERETO lens.  In the post-sharing debrief, many of you mentioned that you had picked up some great ideas that you could weave into your own planning.  Success!

Differentiated Instruction

The T in WHERETO stands for tailored; how will we tailor learning to varied needs, interests, [and] styles?

Pre-and During-Reading:

Things got pretty meta here as I differentiated my instruction on differentiated instruction.  I provided you with a selection of articles (DI – content) and suggested that, as you read, you could make sense of the text in a way that worked for you (DI – process).  Some noted that they would take notes in the margins, others were going to mind map the text, others were going to summarize each paragraph, and, well, the list went on.

Here are the articles we were working with:

Post-Reading:

When the articles were read, I urged you to engage in an activity that would allow you to consolidate your understanding of the reading (DI – process).  Some chatted with a peer while others took notes on how they could use the ideas from the texts in their own practice.  To end, I aimed high, as I asked for any epiphanies you had while reading.

That’s all for today.

– Lawrence

LLED 320 – Practicum Seminar, A Long Talk About Prac, and Lit Circle Comprehension Strategies: Update for Thursday, 3 March 2011

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Practicum Seminar

Many thanks to Rod Brown, Elementary and Middle Years Prac Coordinator for presenting his Long Practicum Seminar.

After the session, you had lots of questions so I spent quite a bit of time taking them up in class.  Teaching loads was one topic that was addressed.  Below you’ll find a graphic organizer – Overview of Teaching Assignments for EDUC 419 – that shows you the percentages that you should (approximately) be teaching at during each week of the prac and allows you to indicate which subject you’ll be teaching and when:

Just a reminder that the percentages on the form indicate the percentage of your SA’s load that you’ll be assuming.  For example, if your SA teaches in a school with 6 blocks per day, teaching 5 of those 6 blocks per day is a full load.  So…

  • 1 block = 20% of a full teaching load
  • 2 blocks = 40% of a full teaching load
  • 3 blocks = 60% of a full teaching load
  • 4 blocks = 80% of a full teaching load
  • 5 blocks = 100% of a full teaching load

Task & Book Collection

I collected any Lit Kit books yet to be handed in, gathered hard copies of your Double-Entry Journal and accepted any good copy haikus that were still floating around.

LLED 320 Integrated Unit Plan Due Date

On Tuesday, 8 March 2011, the task’s due date, I asked you to please bring:

  • a hard copy of all elements of you LLED 320 unit plan OR
  • your laptop to display your completed plan

Lit Circle Resources

I pointed you to the following resources to utilize as you teach reading in your classroom:

Here’s one resource I didn’t show you because I just found it moments ago.  It’s selected bits from a book by Lit Circle guru Harvey Daniels and Nancy Steineke, Mini-Lessons for Literature Circles.  Here’s the link to portions of the text.  Also, here’s Harvey talking briefly about his conception of LCs:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-2rhRYB4hk[/youtube]

Concluding Brownlie’s Comprehension Strategies Video

We wrapped up by finishing the video (found at this link) and discussing a few things that stood out for you in it.

That’s all for today.  Enjoy your weekend.

– Lawrence

LLED 320 – Group Presentations, Day 1: Update for Tuesday, 8 Feb 2011

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Group Presentations

Thanks to all those who presented this afternoon’s engaging presentations.  Here are the titles along with the supporting files.  The handouts should provide a valuable resource during practicum, as you look for ways to engage the learners in your classes:

1. Talk Show – Sarah, Amber, and Tyrel

2. Structured Academic Controversy – Leanne, Christian, and Andrew

3. Brainstorming – Kat K, Sally, and Jennifer

4. Exquisite Corpse – Maria, Lou, and Farisha

5. Find Someone Who (People Search) – Caitlin, Amanda, and Melanie

Unit Planning Conferences

Here’s a copy of the updated schedule (current as of 11:55 pm on Tuesday, 8 Feb 2011):

The goal of this conference is for you to get a chance to talk one-on-one about any ideas, questions, concerns and what not you have with respect to the unit you’ll be planning for the LLED 320 Integrated Unit Plan task.  To get the most out of our meeting time, please have bring the following to the meeting:

  • Subject and topic of your unit (Science & Water systems, for example)
  • Key PLOs related to your topic
  • Desired Results / KUD (Knowledge, Understanding, and Do/Skills) for your unit
  • Rough ideas on assessment for your unit.
  • Ideas on how you might be able to integrate some aspect of LA – writing, representing, reading, viewing, speaking, or listening – into one of the unit’s lessons

In addition, you might want to bring along a resource or two that you plan on using as you teach the unit.

That’s all for today.

– Lawrence

LLED 320 – Unit Plan Conferences, KUD, Performance Tasks & DI: Update for Thursday, 3 Feb 2011

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Well, today’s class didn’t go quite as I’d envisioned.  In my mind, I spent too much time talking and, as a result, we didn’t get done all that I had hoped we would.  Anyway, here’s what we did accomplish:

Writing Tasks In

I’ve collected the pieces and will mark them over the next two weeks or so.  There’s a lot of them!

Assessment Q&A

I took some time to address some of the assessment questions that you had posed on exit slips at the end of a previous class.

Unit Planning: Individual Conferences

I’ve cancelled class on Thursday, 10 Feb 2011 to set aside some time for 15-minute conferences about your unit plans.  Also, to ensure that I had times set aside that suited everybody’s schedule, I also will be holding meetings on Tuesday, 15 Feb and Thursday, 24 Feb.  Here’s the schedule (as of 3 Feb):

In preparation for this meeting, please prepare the following items and bring them along to the conference:

  • Subject and topic of your unit (Science & Water systems, for example)
  • Key PLOs related to your topic
  • Desired Results / KUD (Knowledge, Understanding, and Do/Skills) for your unit
  • Rough ideas on assessment for your unit.
  • Ideas on how you might be able to integrate some aspect of LA – writing, representing, reading, viewing, speaking, or listening – into one of the unit’s lessons

Unit Planning: Goals, Performance Tasks, and Differentiated Instruction

I attended a Pro D Workshop last Friday with Cindy Strickland from ASCD.  She is a Differentiated Instruction guru doing work playing with and extending the DI thinking of Carol Tomlinson.  Seeing as the information I picked up was very relevant to our work on unit planning, I thought I’d share it with you in this class.

Here were my goals:

  • Demonstrate a way to outline a unit’s goals using a KUD framework
  • Show how performance tasks can be developed as a means for students to show their attainment of the KUD
  • Illustrate how performance tasks can be differentiated to better meet the needs of all students
  • Allow you to apply your understanding of performance tasks and differentiation to a unit you’re developing for the long practicum.

After showing a short PPT on clouds – Clouds PPT Slideshow– to get you up to speed with what information the students working on this weather unit had been working with, I showed you an example of three summative performance tasks for the weather unit and asked you to determine, by looking at the tasks, what you thought the KUD of the unit was.  In other words, what did the teacher expect her students to Know, Understand, and Do that was related to clouds?

After that, you thought of other final product scenarios that the students could complete that would show their KUD but tap into different student interests and abilities.  This is where the differentiation piece came in.

How can we, as teachers, provide varied opportunities for students to show us what they know?  As we answer this question, we can start to find ways to differentiate our instruction and our assessment in ways that are responsive to the needs of all students.

Here’s the handout we used in class:

Unit Planning: GRASPS Peformance Tasks

Performance tasks are summative assessments that are:

  • personalized
  • open-ended
  • complex
  • based on real-world work
  • aimed at an identified audience

The Understanding By Design (UBD) unit planning model we’ve been working with in 310 class promotes the design of performance tasks based on the features suggested by the acronym GRASPS:

  • G=goal
  • R=role
  • A=audience
  • S=situation
  • P=product, performance, & purpose
  • S=standards & criteria

We analyzed the cloud unit performance tasks through the lens of the GRASPS aspects and then did one of two things:

  1. Looked at other performance tasks to see how they demonstrated the GRASPS elements
  2. Developed a GRASPS based performance task for a unit you’ll be teaching on the long prac.

Here’s a handout with all sorts of info related to performance tasks, including a handy dandy list of Possible Student Roles and Audiences in addition to Possible Products and Performances:

Haikus Handed In

As a ticket out the door, I collected your 3 haiku poems.  We’ll be revising these in a future lesson seeing as we ran out of time this class.

– Lawrence

LLED 320 – Housekeeping, Unit Planning Intro, Brainwarming, and Haikuing: Update for Thursday, 27 January 2011

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We started with some housekeeping items:

Temperature Check
Here’s the accompanying Kingpin video clip:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUSLiR0ZmbQ[/youtube]

Writing Assessment Task Q & A
This task is due on Thursday, 3 February 2011.  Please submit it in one electronic package via email or as a complete paper copy.

Authorfest Info

Class is cancelled on Tuesday, 1 February to encourage you to attend Authorfest from 4:00 – 5:30 in Wood 2.  I handed out a bibliography of the attending authors.  It’s also available here:

Integrated Unit Planning Task

I handed out the task sheet for the LLED 320 Unit Plan task due on Tuesday, 8 March 2011.  You can find the handout here:

Also, here’s the resource evaluation sheet you’ll need:

To get a visual sense of what’s expected, here’s a sample from a few years ago:

Writing in the Elementary / Middle Classroom

I had some guiding principles for the teaching of writing to share but, before then, I wanted to play with a pre-writing / warm up strategy.  Here’s the info

Brainwarming

Just as athletes get warm up their bodies before game play or practice, writers need to warm up their brains.  To this end, we worked through a Brainwarming activity designed by Julie Ferguson of Beacon Literary Services.  As a part of the Hillcrest Middle School staff, I took a workshop with her last year, enjoyed it, and I thought I’d pass along what I’d learned about improving the quality and quantity of the writing students do.

Here’s are some of the key pieces in Brainwarming:

  • Your favourite word
  • Power Words
  • Power Triplets
  • A 5-Winute Write
  • Writing quickly
  • Harnessing the power of the creative right brain
  • Supporting the diversity of learners –  from Gifted to LD – in your classroom

The PowerPoint below is the one I used in class to guide you through the exercise.  You can find more info at Julie’s website, if you are interested:

12 Guiding Principles For An Effective Writing Program

We used the Ranking Ladder strategy followed up with Inside / Outside Circles to process 12 guiding principles related to writing instruction.   The conversation was vigourous.  Here’s the handout:

Engaging in The Writing Process

I struggled with the idea of how to present an interactive lesson on entire writing process in just over an hour.  In the end, I settled on a lesson that involved the writing of haiku poetry, a form often used in elementary & middle school poetry classes.  We started to follow the Writing Process (as envisioned by writing teacher Diana Cruchley.  I took a workshop from her 2 years ago) –

A Writing Process

and, to that end, engaged in a variety of pre-writing activities.  The activities were:

Modeling

We looked over a dozen haiku, determined our favourite, and developed a list of key features for haiku poetry.  Here’s the list of poems we looked at:

I also shared a few of my favourite Redneck Haiku.  They can be found here.   If you’re yearning for more, check out these Zombie Haiku:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pd1Ws9QnmZY&feature=PlayList&p=332A297059FDF20E&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=9[/youtube]

or Biff from the Back to the Future Trilogy with some funny haiku songs:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwnqUmmJ-zE[/youtube]

Criteria Development

The haiku criteria we developed were almost bang on with the criteria outlined in the text I took this lesson from, Wordplaygrounds by John S. O’Connor.  His criteria are as follows:

Haiku poems…

  • Are short

Typically 3 short  lines with a maximum of 17 syllables.  They may follow a 5-7-5 pattern but need not.  Here’s a one line haiku by Lee Gurga:

trying the old pump a mouse pours out

  • Have a Twist (Internal Comparison / Juxtaposition)

Most haiku have two images, one on either side of a break in the poem.

  • Have a “Haiku” moment in time

They capture moments of epiphany or discoveries about the world and our place in it.  To best capture the immediacy of the moment, haikus are generally written in the present tense and benefit from an economy of language.

  • Focus on nature, including human nature, shown concretely

Haiku avoid figurative language (similes, metaphors, personfication and the like) in favour of direct and specific descriptions of the world around us.

  • Are 5 senses specific

Powerful haikus are based on vivid imagery based on the five senses.

Pre-Writing

In an effort to make those criteria as clear as possible, we engaged in a variety of short writing tasks:

Word Seasons (handout: Word Seasons Word List)

I showed a list of words and asked you to associate each one with a season.

Sandwich Poems (handout: Sandwich Poems Examples)

These are three-line poems in which the first two lines and the second two lines form a different compound word.  Here’s an example:

fire

alarm

clock

Drafting Based on an Image Pool

I gave out the first line of a haiku:

Halloween night —

then asked you to visualize your most memorable Halloween night and share a few images to create a class image pool.  After that, you generated a haiku of your own and many examples were shared with the class.  Unfortunately, I neglected to collect any of the Halloween haiku for publication on the blog.  If you have yours handy, please feel free to write a comment containing your three lines.

We ran out of time for the scheduled nature walk aimed at gathering information for a haiku.  So, your homework for next class is as follows:

  1. Go on a nature walk
  2. Gather 5 sense information on the back of your Sample Haiku handout
  3. Write 3 haikus that fit with the key features of haiku that we explored in class
  4. Bring your 3 haikus to class on Thursday,  3 February 2011.

See you on Tuesday at Authorfest. Please remenber that our regularly scheduled class is cancelled so you can attend this event.

– Lawrence

5 Classroom Management Skills & More: Update for Wednesday, 1 December 2010

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Well, Movember is over and so is the term.  Here’s how we wrapped up:

Nonverbal Communicative Intelligence for Classroom Management

Seeing as management is a concern for all beginning teachers, I wanted to address the topic in some manner before you headed out to your 2-week prac.  That said, the topic is huge, so I wanted to keep the session short, practical, and focused on skills that you could use on the morning of Tuesday, 4 January 2010, if need be.  Thus, I focused on five nonverbal skills:

  • Choose voice
  • Pause
  • Frozen hand gesture
  • Incomplete sentence
  • Freeze body

that research has proven to be very useful in creating effective learning environments.

Here’s a link to the Prezi I created to introduce the topic:

Also, here’s the full article on which today’s class was based:

We used the Learning Stations strategy to process the skills-based content of the article. Stations are a great way to allow students to set the pace of their own learning.  Here are some links to sites with info on LS:

After the station work, I took a few questions and provided suggestions for how management skills can be stacked – done simultaneously – to increase their effectiveness.

If you feel like kicking it old school, watch the classic training video below – “Maintaining Classroom Discipline” – to see how Mr. Grimes teaches and manages his Math class:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHzTUYAOkPM[/youtube]

Bits & Pieces:

Writing this heading reminds me of Kibble and Bits and that product’s TV commercials.  Check it out as we skip down memory lane:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NP9dn3j6uDk[/youtube]

Now, where was I?  Oh, ya, bits and pieces:

– 2-Week Practicum Observation of Your Teaching

  • Bob and I will see you teach once during this practicum
  • We’ll drop by to see you and set up an observation time

– Practicum Binder

  • Please set up a practicum binder to house paper copies of your prac-related paperwork
  • Please have your binder handy at all times for your SA or FA to flip through
  • Here’s the required Table of Contents for your binder:

– LLED 320 Writing Samples

  • Please collect 4-6 samples of student writing (photocopies are fine) to use in your Term 2 LLED 320 class.
  • The samples should reflect the range of writing abilities you find in your students.
  • The writing samples could be from lessons you teach or from work your students do with your SA.
  • We will be completing a writing assessment task in LLED 320 and the best samples to work with for this assignment are:
    • Short stories
    • Paragraphs
    • Poems
    • Essays
    • Reports

Here’s the first page of a sample writing sample:

Pre-2-Week Practicum Letter

  • Bob and I will send out a letter to both you and your SAs to outline expectations some point in mid- to late-December.
  • Please read the letter thoroughly and be in touch with any questions.

Unit Planning

  • The unit plan you’ll be using in January is due a email to both your SA and FA on Monday, 6 December 2010.
  • Your advisors will look it over and give you feedback
  • Please revise the unit with the feedback in mind.
  • You cannot start teaching in January until both your SA and FA have viewed and approved your unit plan.

Inquiry Task One-Pagers

  • Thanks for handing in the one-pager with your inquiry question on it
  • As you teach, your question will likely evolve
  • We’ll delve deeply into the inquiry task in 310 class during January and February

That’s all for now.  All the best for a relaxing holiday.

– Lawrence

Unit Plan Conferences: Update for Monday, 29 November 2010

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Thanks to everyone for being so prepared for today’s 2-Week Prac Unit Planning Conferences.

I mentioned the BC Performance Standards several times in my meetings so I thought I’d post links to the resource here for easy reference.

What are the Performance Standards?

The BC Performance Standards have been developed for voluntary use in B.C. schools. They describe the professional judgments of a significant number of B.C. educators about standards and expectations for the following key areas of learning:

Why use the Performance Standards?

The BC Performance Standards are intended as a resource to support ongoing instruction and assessment. Teachers can use these standards to:

  • monitor, evaluate, and report on individual student performance
  • identify students who may benefit from intervention
  • develop a profile of a class or group of students to support instructional decision-making
  • prompt discussions with parents, students, and other teachers about student performance
  • inform professional development activities
  • collaboratively set goals for individuals, classes, or schools
  • develop evidence for school growth plans
  • provide models for designing performance tasks

How to use the Performance Standards?

Performance standards describe levels of achievement in key areas of learning. Performance standards answer the questions:

  • How good is good enough?
  • What does it look like when a student’s work has met the expectations at this grade level?

The BC Performance Standards describe and illustrate the following four levels of student performance in terms of prescribed learning outcomes:

NOT YET WITHIN EXPECTATIONS

  • the work does not meet grade-level expectations
  • there is little evidence of progress toward the relevant prescribed learning outcomes
  • the situation needs intervention

MINIMALLY MEETS EXPECTATIONS

  • the work may be inconsistent, but meets grade-level expectations at a minimal level
  • there is evidence of progress toward relevant prescribed learning outcomes
  • the student needs support in some areas

FULLY MEETS EXPECTATIONS

  • the work meets grade-level expectations
  • there is evidence that relevant prescribed learning outcomes have been accomplished

EXCEEDS EXPECTATIONS

  • the work exceeds grade-level expectations in significant ways
  • the student may benefit from extra challenge

In fact, the Performance Standards include a variety of rubrics and exemplars for the assessment of student work.  Here’s an example of a simplified rubric, called a Quick Scale, from the Grade 8 Reading Performance Standards:

Don’t, ahem, reinvent the wheel!  Use these rubrics and save yourself some time and frustration (a good rubric is really hard to develop.)

See you on Wednesday.

– Lawrence