PHASE III

• Assessing Prior Knowledge 

a. Assessing prior knowledge is an important factor in planning a lesson plan. The students have been at this point exposed to the many different graphs. However, this time it was their first experience in making the bar graph using  technology. The first time I did not really was thinking so much about their skills in technology.

b. Now I would definitely make sure that students are familiar with using computers such as logging in (knowing their password), typing a website etc.

• Planning Instruction

a. According to our feedback, we should have linked the bar graph usage to some life experiences. For instance, how bar graphs help us in organizing gathered data. In presentations, bar graphs are a great visual tool to compare/contrast data. They are also used very often to display statistics.

b. It is crucial to link subjects taught at school to some life experiences. This helps students to relate to the content much better and they see why learning this topic is important for their future life. 

• Designing Instruction

a. Our instruction were stated and presented in a way that it was easy for students to follow and understand. The only instruction/procedure that we did not think at first was the "thumbs up/thumbs down" strategy. We have observed the groups incorporating it into their lesson and decided to use it as well.
b. I would love to use Smart Board in instruction if it is available. This helps students to interact and is more "hands-on" activity. This would allow  the students to come up to board and vote/touch the screen with their answers.

• Planning Assessment

a. The students emailed us their completed bar graph. Although, it was not technically our fault. The provided website did not support any sort of confirmation. This was very confusing to many students, therefore we should have stated this issue at the beginning of their work.
b. In the future it is crucial to take into consideration that some aspects that may not go as planned.

• Instructional Decisions/Teaching

a. Teaching with a partner is definitely a valuable experience and despite some great oral agreements. We still have come to some difficulties in our teaching.
b. Next time, I would try to go over the content of the lesson with my partner in some deeper manner.

• Assessment of Learning

a. Our rubric may have been a little confusing for students because it did not state the points.  Another great way of challenging the students would be adding some higher order thinking level questions. This would provide us even better overview of students comprehension of the bar graph - why and how it is used.

b. I think that students were on task and following directions because this was a fun learning. Having students motivated is a key in a successful teaching/learning. 




 

PHASE II

Instructional Decisions/Teaching

We stated the objectives and the vocabulary, had students to repeat the objectives and the vocabulary and record the vocabulary on their note sheets for better comprehension. This is a great instructional strategy for ELL students to hear and see the expectations and key words used throughout the lesson.  We also had the students fill out the key parts of the graph. This is a great visual tool for students to learn and retain the information. The teacher modeled and went through the whole activity first with the students before students were assigned to create a graph with a partner.

We modified for individual students by having students work in pairs. Working in pairs allows for students to help one another with the assignment and technology. We walked around from group to group to provide any individual help to those who needed it. We also meet individual needs by using the thumbs up/thumbs down strategy to check for understanding and progress. We also modified our grading scale for one student who was previously absent for another lesson, so she had the opportunity to earn all her possible points. Her absence was medical and excused.

PowerPoint Slide of Objectives

PowerPoint Slide of Vocabulary





Assessment of Learning

The students emailed their completed graphs to us and handed in their graph analysis worksheets. We graded the graphs using our rubric. Rubric categories are graph title, data table, x-axis label, and y-axis label. We knew they were successful on meeting Objective 1 (I can collect, record, organize and display data using a computer generated bar graph) when we graded each graph using the rubric. We knew they are successful on meeting Objective 2 (I can answer questions by interpreting and analyzing data) when we graded the graph analysis worksheet. Students were also graded on participation, they received full points if they followed directions, were on task, and worked well with their partners. All students were successful at meeting both objectives as shown by the grade book.

A Completed Graph

Grade Book