My writing lesson was awesome. I was incredibly pleased with the amount of student involvement and the level of understanding demonstrated by my students. Each student had plenty of input to add to the lesson, and I think because there were only three students involved in the lesson, each student benefited from the individual 1 on 1 instruction. I could tell that students were on track with my lesson objectives as they filled out their story maps individually. I first modeled using the think aloud strategy how to fill out the story map outline when thinking about writing. The students asked good questions here, and successfully transferred my modeling to their own story outlines. It was great to see them understanding the importance of organizing your writing before you write.
I think one of the biggest strengths of my lesson was the how prepared I was to teach the students the prewriting strategy of outlining. I spent a lot of time preparing a prompts for the students, and finding a great lesson outline that they could fill in with their ideas. This level of preparation made the lesson run smoothly and helped prepare me for any questions students may bring have brought up during the lesson. The biggest weakness for this lesson I feel was the limitations of the story outline map that I brought the students to fill in. I made it clear to the students that there are more than one type of outline style that can be used, and it was really up to their own personal preferences which one they used. However, after saying this I realized that I limited their learning by not allowing them to select how they wanted to outline their story. I wish I would have thought this element through a little more in order to help meet every students need and learning strength. This limitation/weakness wasn’t the worst thing that could have come up in my lesson, but it is still something to be aware of in future lessons.
I was pleased with myself as I was teaching this lesson. I must have had a great breakfast or something, because I really brought my “A” game for this lesson. I was communicating clearly my goals and objectives for the students, and as a result they understood what I was asking and demonstrated their understanding through their outlines. I have taught a few lessons at this point, and I really feel like this one has been my best yet. I took all the other teaching moments I have had and I applied it to the construction and instruction of this lesson. I don’t think this lesson could have gone better for me. The only thing that would have been nice would have been to have had a little more time to discuss transferring the information from your outline to your draft. Now that I know this though, I could easily construct a follow up lesson to this prewriting lesson.
Looking back over this lesson, and the lessons I have taught in the past I am still a little unsure of how to transfer my lesson objectives to a great lesson. I know that I want the students to learn certain things, but I seem to struggle with conveying what students should be learning or what I want them to learn to my lessons. I think what I need to do is create a checklist for myself. This way when I create lesson plans I can think to myself “I want students to learn A,B, and C,” then I need to do design a lesson surrounding those elements to ensure that students are not only engaged, but are being educated. I think this something that will come in time, but any suggestions you have would be greatly appreciated. I look forward to teaching my other lesson, and can only hope it goes as well as this one did.
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