Emily's Inquiry 3 Notes

I feel my guided lead teaching was overall successful. Most of my students were able to meet the goals I set for them with academic vocabulary, high frequency words, and with amazing words. My biggest issue was time constraints, throughout my teaching there were field trips, holiday parties, and special testing. Therefore several days my normal allotted time was reduced so I had to compress my lessons to accommodate. None the less, I was able to meet all the common core standards that I had hoped to touch on. Also a large majority of my students met the goal of my objectives in relation to vocabulary.

            Throughout my unit my students as learners gained a few skills that they did not previously had. Throughout the year my students have been working on using academic vocabulary in relationship to stories such as genre, setting, plot, and character. Before my unit they were able to use the academic vocabulary with the support of my mentor teacher or I however, after my unit my students have begun to use this academic vocabulary without the support of my mentor or I. Also my students learned ten new high frequency words, which include the words she, play, take, my, come, way, on, in, what, and up. Student are now able to recognize and read this words . Some of my students are also now capable of spelling the high frequency words without the assistance of the word wall. In addition the majority of my students are now also able to use the amazing word from the unit within oral context.

            Now that my official unit is over I plan to keep teaching the same portions of Reading Street, continuing to focus on academic vocabulary, high frequency words, and amazing words. Also now my students are starting to do weekly spelling tests that contain ten spelling words and two high frequency words. My goal is to start more explicitly focusing on the spelling list vocabulary not to only sure that my students are able to produce the spelling but are able to actively use the spelling word vocabulary orally and in written language.

            I had originally planned to use a post-assessment to assess my students, however due to time constraints I was unable to use my prepared post-assessment so instead I used weekly writing response to the main selection that I had presented. My students provided a three sentence response to a question about the week’s main selection. The question used academic vocabulary and my students were encourage to use high frequency words within their writing. The rubric I used was a 3 point system, seeing if students answered the main question, provided details to support their answer, and used proper spelling, capitalization, spaces, grammar, periods, and word use. In the first week sixteen students received 3 out of 3 points,  two students received 2 out of 3 points. No students received less than two points during the first week. In the second week fifteen students received 3 out of 3 points,  four students received 2 out of 3 points, one student received one out of three points. In addition I used worksheets that my students did informally to base my conclusions on. These worksheets mostly had students fill in blanks within sentences with high frequency and spelling words. Most of my students were very good at this, regularly only three students needed assistance to complete this worksheets. This show that a majority of my students could read and put high frequency/spelling words into the correct context of a sentence.

            There were a couple things that I learned about my students literacy practices that I had not noticed before that weren’t within my goals. Throughout the school my students have been working to indentify the meaning of author and illustrator, however a majority of the time they seem to mix the two up. During my unit my students seemed to concretely realize the difference between author and illustrator repeatedly. Also my students my students really began to understand the use of graphic organizers. During two of my lessons I used a web to build background knowledge and my students were able to help me fill in the graphic organizer with ease and with a high amount of participation.

            One alternative way to interpret one of my students learning process and products can by looking at her progress she has personally made. The student I am referring to is low and is significantly academically behind her peers. While she needed help to complete informal assessments, it was less help than she has needed in the past. Also she normally struggles with getting ideas onto paper and the first week on her assessment she got 2 out of 3 points and the second week her response was much more detailed and she was awarded all three points. Clearly her learning process is a little bit different than her peers and she was often her taught throughout my unit she was in the end able to create a quality product.

            I am placed in a first grade classroom, my students are normally learn in a whole group setting and discussion takes place in a very structured way. During my unit I allowed my students more time to think and discuss more freely than they have in the past. This may have allowed this student more opportunity to use the given vocabulary and other concepts before being tested, also she was able to hear the given vocabulary and other concepts from her peers and not just from a teacher, which may have increased learning.

            The events within my unit were a little bit different than the typical events taught by my mentor teacher. My students were able a little bit more freedom to try and experience on their own. Unfortunately I was forced to teach the exact curriculum with as much fidelity as possible. This  created obstacles and didn’t allow me to try many different learning styles to reach my students, however the little tweaks I made helped create for success for my students. This was problematic because I had no idea how to make Reading Street my own while still keeping fidelity in place.

            Overall I was able to find success within my target area. However, it was done with the restrictions and demands of Reading Street. I need to continue to find ways to reach the target area of vocabulary without the aiding and restrictions of programs such as Reading Street. Also I would like to continue to like to learn about using graphic organizers within the teaching of literacy.