LESSON
Planning
Lesson planning is the third and most utilized practice in terms of planning for instruction. Lesson planning refers to the detailed and in depth breakdown of instructional plans that is utilized not only prior to instruction, but also during and afterwards to inform reflection on what worked and did not work during a given lesson. See below for the ways that I implement daily and weekly lesson planning within my classroom.
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Once I complete my long term and unit planning, the final step in the planning process is the lesson plan. Daily lesson plans ensure that everything I do within my classroom is intentional, strategic, and meaningful. When planning daily lessons, I constantly refer back to the end goal of each unit plan in order to identify what I'm doing that day that will ensure student success for the essential standards of the unit, and in turn, the school year. This is also where I apply my pedagogical expertise as far as how to deliver content.
The Lesson Plan
This lesson plan is for our unit on how authors use reasons and evidence to prove their points. I plan each unit to consist of two weeks of implementation. In the first week, students develop knowledge and understandings necessary to meet the standard with success. In the second week, they apply that knowledge to relevant, real world questions that will not only enhance their critical thinking skills, but also remind students that ELA skills and strategies have meaning other than just a grade. This specific lesson is the final day of our knowledge week. Due to this, students are expected to demonstrate their knowledge of the identification and analysis of author's point, reasons, evidence, facts, opinions, and any bias that comes through in their writing.
*Quick Note: We have been using the acronym PREFOB to organize student thinking. It represents Point, Reason, Evidence, Facts, Opinions, Bias.
Introduction of the Lesson
I started the lesson by explaining the expectations in a whole group setting. We discussed the end goal, which included a completed paragraph as well as a completed PREFOB chart, using the paragraph as the source of information. We also went over our academic talk anchor chart to ensure that all students actively participated in the activity. Right before I set students free, I counted down to one and reminded them that they are competing against the other students to create a sense of fun and excitement in the activity (you can almost hear me saying "don't touch the orange papers until I say GO!").
During the Lesson
Below are pictures of this lesson in action. Students were given eight sentences and tasked with putting the sentences in order to make a cohesive paragraph. Once they completed that task, they needed to demonstrate their understanding of how writers use reasons and evidence to support their points by identifying the point, as well as two reasons and corresponding pieces of evidence to prove that point. In order to ensure engagement, I turned this into a competition where each pair raced the others to be the first pair to finish. Hover over the pictures to see an analysis of each in regards to the successful implementation of this lesson.
This image depicts students as soon as I said "ready, set, GO!" They are quickly reading through each sentence and collaboratively crafting the passage.
While the group in the far right has the majority of the passage figured out, the two in the middle are struggling with identifying the beginning sentence, which is negatively impacting their movement towards the end goal. The students on the far left are also struggling to identify the correct introductory sentence, which is impacting the speed with which they get to the PREFOB portion.
This is a great place to tell your story and give people more insight into who you are, what you do, and why it’s all about you.
One pair of students are looking back into their interactive journals to identify each element of PREFOB to determine what order the sentences go in to make a cohesive paragraph.
Once they identified the PREFOB information in their interactive journals, this pair was the first to arrange the given sentences into the correct order to craft the paragraph. Here they are celebrating!
Accommodations & Differentiation
In a sense, collaborative learning is in itself a method of accommodation, because students are able to utilize their partners for additional supports if they need them. As I circulated, however, I noticed that one pair had the correct order of sentences for the paragraph, but they were having problems organizing their thoughts as far as how the passage correlates with our PREFOB notes and practice from the week. I stopped and discussed this with them, and asked them to tell me what element of PREFOB each sentence represented. Once they told me, I wrote their answers in dry erase marker on the desk in order to allow them to think deeply about how to explain their answers instead of having to remember them. In doing this, I was assisting them with organizing their thoughts in order to focus on the deeper level thinking: actually having to explain their answers.
Results
Out of the sixteen students who participated in this activity, all eight pairs were able to correctly order the sentences into a cohesive paragraph. Seven groups were able to populate their PREFOB organizers with the correct information, while one group got about half way through the PREFOB organizer with the time given.
These students demonstrated understanding of the opinion passage they created by identifying the point, which was that Christopher Columbus should not be celebrated on a national holiday. They were also able to differentiate between the reasons that support the point, and the pieces of evidence that support the reasons. They were also able to identify one fact and one opinion. For the next week, they will be reading primary sources and identifying each element of PREFOB within them.
These students were also able to demonstrate understanding of how an author uses reasons and evidence to support their point. Both students worked together to give examples of reasons and evidence to support the point that Christopher Columbus should not be celebrated. They will also move on to the application project in which they will analyze the elements of PREFOB in two primary sources.
LESSON PLAN
Reflection
With 87% of my students demonstrating mastery of the identification of each element of PREFOB, I am ready to move on to our application week. The two students who did not complete their organizer demonstrated a sufficient amount of understanding of each element to be successful in the application week, where they will continue to practice identifying and analyzing each of the six elements.