Reflections- Emily

Lesson 1

What did students learn and which students struggled with the lesson?
My students first opened the class with a discussion about "How can we learn to appreciate the talents of others?". They were great with coming up with ways that they appreciate the other talents of students in our classroom, as well as members of their family. They were even more enthusiastic with volunteering ideas of their special talents. My students learned the comprehension skill Cause and Effect. They were great with placing together the idea that an event might have more than one cause, and could possibly have more than one effect. One thing they struggled with was when we actually read the story, figuring out the cause and effect relationship if it was implicit or explicit and they relationship. Students understood the cause of the event but some had a hard time piecing together what directly or indirectly caused it if it wasn't in the same sentence. While they were able to breeze through the introduction because they were creating their own events of cause and effect, but putting it into a real story that they haven't read before presented to be more difficult for them.

What are alternate reads (interpretations) of your students’ performance or products?
My students were seemed very engaged during the lesson during our concept talk. They sure love to talk, and definitely talk about themselves. I knew they were engaged because almost every hand was raised, and we also ran over my estimated time for our discussion. Each student also had to answer two questions after they read their small books, and I did receive a 100% of the students work. I was able to evaluate the written work and see the progress they made with understanding cause and effect. Some students that I thought were struggling were able to put it into works nicely while others couldn't get their thoughts to written words.

What did you learn about your students’ literacy practices that extend beyond your objectives?
I learned that students that can read fluently have higher comprehension levels and were able to understand Cause and Effect more easily. The more fluently they read the higher level of understanding they had. Many students used strategies like having a piece of paper and moving it down each line they read, others used a finger. Students also had the opportunity to read with a  partner, some students struggled more with reading aloud than reading silently individually.

When and how will you re-teach the material to students who need additional support?
There were a few students that I could tell were really struggling with the concept of cause and effect, and I actually pulled them individually for a one-on-one conference during SSR time. I meant with each student to just go over one more time with 2 short stories I found with more obvious cause and effect relationships. The students seemed to be more focused when it was just them and myself. They were able to ask more questions and I was able to have attention on them and their needs with understanding.

If you were to teach this same lesson again, what would you do differently and how do you think the changes would improve students’ learning?
If I were to teach this lesson again, I would chose a different story than the one that Reading street provided because It really wasn't a good starting story for introducing cause and effect. The relationships were more implicit rather than explicit. The small books were great with the questions they provided for text-text connections and text-self as well as text-world for the cause and effect strategy but it would be helpful to have a better starting point before.

What did you learn so far about implementing your ‘core practice’ and what do you need to do to continue your professional learning?
I learned that there are so many ways to implement strategies for comprehension. Even little tools as working on fluency and different ways of understanding what you are reading. I would like to learn more strategies and learn more about how the 'core practices' intertwine.

Lesson 2

What did students learn and which students struggled with the lesson?
In this lesson students first learned vocabulary words that are used throughout the story for the week. This is helpful for their comprehension because most of the words they do not know, but then using context clues can figure it out (we show them a picture of the word, have them give their own personal definition, then someone reads the book definition). Then we discussed the genre of the story which the students excelled at and were able to have some text-to-text connections with other books we have read of the same genre. Then we started to read the first half of the story, pausing throughout to think about different things, questioning out loud, figuring out cause and effect. Many students were able to understand that it is good to have questions while reading, and it helps them understand more. The students that struggled the day before seemed to understand Cause and Effect better, and this story also did a great job of allowing time for higher level thinking and critical questions throughout about cause and effect.

What are alternate reads (interpretations) of your students’ performance or products?
For the vocabulary I was able to see how the students understood the words, because we did an interactive vocabulary game on the "smart board" after introducing and defining the words. The students did well with the words and with the game, constantly raising their hands to participate. During the story I was able to see which students were following along and which ones were day dreaming, because I was circulating the room and first drawing sticks for students to read (and keep them accountable to be reading with the group), then switched to volunteers.

What did you learn about your students’ literacy practices that extend beyond your objectives?
Again with the comprehension I was able to see how they read their books and how they followed along. Some students used their fingers, others had their books propped up. We also did a lot of questioning during the story, we paused and would question the author. There were a few moments I had planned for students to pick up on possible text-to-text connections from different stories, and they picked up on 2 out of 3. 

When and how will you re-teach the material to students who need additional support?

At the end of the class I asked if there was any questions over the story or the vocabulary words. Students were given the opportunity to stay inside during recess to receive additional support. There is always time during SSR as well. In this lesson, there wasn't any students that stayed in for help. 

If you were to teach this same lesson again, what would you do differently and how do you think the changes would improve students’ learning?
If I were to teach this lesson again, I think I would just read the entire story in one day. Reading street called for us to break it up into two days, but the story was fairly short and would have been beneficial to cover in just one day. The flow of the lesson and story would have been smoother and easier for the students.

What did you learn so far about implementing your ‘core practice’ and what do you need to do to continue your professional learning?
My 'Core Practice' was comprehension and the skills around it. Again I learned about how broad comprehension truly is, with so many different aspects going into the deep understanding of stories and the reading of anything. There are also a variety of different ways that students learn best, from audio to visual to even hands on and these are all things to take into account when planning lessons. Some students may need more hands on activities to really understand "Cause and Effect" while others just need definitions written in text.