Approaches to Lesson Planning
Understanding by Design is a new concept for me. Unlike Student Learning Objectives, I have no previous knowledge of this particular approach. After reading in Chapter 4 of our book about this style I have come to like it but I am more comfortable with the learning objectives approach. The style seems to be very simplistic. Stage 1 of planning is to identify the desired results of the lesson. What is the main idea and/or information that we want to be the most memorable to the students? This is also when the planner would determine essential questions to be answered and then can begin to organize the topics. I like Stage 1 of UBD (Understanding by Design) because when the planner understands what it is they want to teach and what they want the students to absorb then the first major hurdle of planning is reached. Stage 2 is to determine how the students new knowledge will be measured. Typically, this would be one of the last items I would work on and in the past it has been one that I have had the hardest time planning. Stage 3 is to plan the objectives and methods to be used.
Performance Assessments
Performance assessments are, in my opinion, incredibly necessary for the development of students and teachers. While I was student teaching, at my last college, the final part of my lesson was always to assess the students. I would be able to ensure that I did my job teaching and that the students were able to learn and retain the topic taught. While I was teaching a lesson on renewable and non-renewable resources I handed each student a post-it note. Each note had a resource or man made object written on it. I wrote three sections on the board and one by one I had the students walk up and put their note under the appropriate heading. After viewing all of the students I was successfully able to see which students fully understood and which students would need extra attention. Performance assessments are also very important for teachers. I recently was talking with some of my teacher friends and one of them had her assessment done by the principal. She was very excited and boastful in telling us that she received "highly effective" on a few of her results. While I was listening I was excited for her because I thought this sounded like a great achievement to receive from the principal. However, one of my other teacher friends responded that she had once been told that as a teacher you do not want all of the highest scores in your assessment. I think what she was trying to say is that to be highly effective that means you were close to perfect in that area and you have the data and information to back that up. If a teacher is receiving highly effective in all areas then that means you are meeting all requirements at a higher stand point. There are so many changes in the academic world that there should always be room for improvement and change. To achieve highly effective should be extremely hard to do with so many things in consideration; diversity, academic levels of the students, co-workers, administration etc. Assessments are key to educators and students growth.
Multimedia Technologies in Schools Today
I found this section of Chapter 9 to be very familiar. I taught a lesson, that I planned, to a 4th grade classroom on the water cycle. I was able to incorporate how much or how little technology I wanted in my lesson. I used a document camera to display lyrics to a song that we sang about the cycle. I made a PowerPoint presentation that also included a short YouTube video. Then we did a few other worksheets, and a hands on experiment with ice in a mason jar to view condensation that had formed on the lid. After reading this section of the chapter I have thought of ways that I could have incorporated more technology into the lesson. If the classroom had access to computers I could have the students build their own PowerPoint. If I had a digital camera or camcorder the students could have recorded their hands on experiment. The students could have also used their own video clips and pictures to make their own Animoto. As the lesson planner I think it would have been fun to also make a Prezi that I could have shown to students, possibly instead of a PowerPoint. The students could have the opportunity to the view the Prezi at home as well.
Water Cycle Prezi
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