Mary Beth Lynn EPS 513 Fall 2012 Planning Commentary Paper 1.

Content Focus and Standards Summarize the central focus for the content you will teach in this learning segment. Describe the standards that relate to this content. As a seventh and eighth grade Language Arts teacher, literacy was the primary focus for the unit, because it was and continues to be imperative to student success in education and in life. For the purposes of this assignment, the specific focus for the unit was on numerous story elements found in diverse contexts, including short stories, books, novels, magazine articles, poetry, song lyrics, speeches, etc. The story elements taught in this unit included the following: setting, mood, characters, characterization, point-of-view, plot, theme, and conflict. The objectives for the lessons were to discover the importance of viewpoint in a text, differentiate between various viewpoints, interpret the Theme of various texts, make inferences and draw conclusions about Theme based on text evidence and experience, utilize textual evidence to plot story elements, identify the various types of conflict in literature, and recognize the point of view from which the story is told. The standard aligned to the objectives was Illinois state goal one, which required students to read with understanding and fluency. More specifically, substandard C stated that students should be able to comprehend a broad range of reading materials. Even more precisely, 1.C.3a explained that students should be able to interpret and analyze entire narrative text using story elements, point of view, and theme. Similarly, 1.C.3e suggested that students should be able to compare how authors and illustrators use text and art across materials to express their ideas. Overall, this standard suggested that students should utilize various elements of stories in order to interpret the overall meaning that the author is trying to portray.

2. Knowledge of Students to Inform Teaching a) Academic development (e.g., prior knowledge, prerequisite skills, ways of thinking in the subject areas, developmental levels, special educational needs) While observing my mentor teach a lesson on theme, I realized that many of my students were knowledgeable of story elements in general; however, they lacked the skills that enabled them to think critically about the various story elements. For example, many of my students knew that stories had themes, but they were not able to interpret the themes on a deeper level or connect them to their lives. One of the lessons I taught focused on The Political Dr. Seuss, and in the lesson, we watched a film that described many of the themes he portrayed in his stories. The students found it very interesting that The Sneetches was about World War II and antisemitism. They simply thought it was about funny looking animals with stars on their bellies. Additionally, I realized through teaching this lesson that many of my students who received special education services struggled even more so with analyzing complex texts and critically thinking about the meanings behind the words. b) Academic Language development (e.g., students abilities to understand and produce the oral or written language associated with the central focus and standards/objectives within the learning segment) Through teaching the unit on story elements, I realized that I must be extremely explicit in my instruction, directions, and expectations, because many of my students did not understand what I was asking of them. My mentor told me numerous times that I needed to explain EVERYTHING verbally and through written instruction, and no matter how many times she told me, I constantly had to remind myself to use student-friendly language and examples, due to the fact that many of my students had never heard the language before attending NTA.

Moreover, once I explained the content through written and verbal instructions, my students typically worked through the lessons and assignments. c) Family/community/cultural assets (e.g., relevant lived experiences, cultural expectations, and student interests) The expectations for the majority of my students at National Teachers Academy were quite low, only because of their personal situations. The odds are stacked against many of my students, because very few of them have the support and/or structure at home that is needed to succeed in terms of education goals, and they therefore do not make it past high school. Statistics show that only one out of one hundred students actually graduate from high school. My students (and many others that attend CPS) face very difficult home lives, and for many of them, they see violence, a lack of structure, low socioeconomic status, and no support when it comes to education. For example, one of my students cares for his four younger siblings every day when he goes home from school, which leaves very little time for studying and homework, not to mention extracurricular activities. d) Social and emotional development (e.g., ability to interact and express themselves in constructive ways, ability to engage in collaborative learning, nature of contributions to a positive literacy learning environment). During the unit, the interaction amongst my students was very much mixed. Some days they were able to communicate and work together very well, while others days proved to be much more challenging. Something I realized through this experience was that their ability to collaborate was very much based on the uncontrollable, including whether they ate breakfast, slept well the night before, and/or had something else on their minds.

One of the students in my 10:00 a.m. class struggled daily with staying awake, and it came to my attention at a later date that she was scared to sleep at night because she was physically abused at home. Those factors were and still are very difficult for me to comprehend, but as her teacher and regardless of her struggles, I realized that I must not feel sorry for her and instead provide her with the tools to be successful in life. e) Learning strategies: what instructional and learning strategies have been effective for your students? How do you know? Effective instructional strategies for the unit included Think-Pair-Share, Small Group Collaboration, Elbow Partners, and Turn-and-Talks. I knew the strategies were successful when students were able to reiterate what their partners had said and even more when they were able to elaborate on and apply the information their peers communicated. It varied greatly during direct instruction, because more times than not, the students were not able to state, more less comprehend, what I had just taught, thus suggesting lecture was not an appropriate teaching method for my students.

3. Supporting Student Learning a) Explain how your understanding of your students prior learning, experiences and development guided your choice or adaptation of learning tasks and materials, to develop students' abilities to successfully meet lesson segment outcomes. In order to accommodate my students and their learning needs, it was important to choose materials that were culturally relevant, but at the same time, I wanted to push them to think outside-of-the-box and their comfort zones. For example, I used works by Langston Hughes, who was an African-American author, as well as information related to prejudice and segregation, because those were topics all of my students were able to relate to.

On the other hand, I pushed them to think about topics such as socialism and capitalism, which were not theories they were necessarily familiar with. The important piece of the unfamiliar lessons was not necessarily the content per se, but it was rather to make connections to what they did know. b) How are the plans for instruction sequenced in the learning segment to build connections between students prior learning and experiences and new content skills and strategies? In order for my students to build upon their knowledge, I crafted lessons that introduced new information and built upon prior content. For example, I taught theme after doing two days of plot and plot development, because I felt it was fundamental to understand the various components of the story before recognizing and comprehending the message the author was trying to convey. c) Explain how, throughout the learning segment, you will help students make connections between skills and strategies in ways that support their abilities to deepen their content learning. So as to help students connect skills and strategies throughout the unit, I often reviewed the prior topic at the beginning of each lesson, most frequently in the Do Now or when reviewing the daily objectives. Additionally, much of the homework associated with the unit included assessments that required students to display an understanding of the prior content. As an example, the lesson on conflict required students to identify textual evidence from the plot to explain which type of conflict existed in a particular text. Not only were they required to use textual evidence, they were required to annotate and explain the reasoning behind their thinking.

d) Describe common developmental approximations and misunderstandings within your content focus and how you will address them. Common developmental approximations within the unit were the students abilities to think critically in regards to various story elements. For example, when I taught plot diagramming, the students had a lot of trouble thinking about the protagonist as anything but the good person, when in fact the protagonist in a story is the individual who is trying to achieve something. For many of the lessons, I thought I would only have to review the main points, but in actuality, I had to teach, model, and reteach concepts so the students could retain and apply the information in diverse contexts, hence the need for daily review of prior lessons and concepts. e) Describe any instructional strategies planned to support students with specific learning needs. In order to accommodate and support all students, I designed lessons that included various educational levels. I also facilitated learning by doing strategic grouping of both high and low achieving students. To group students, I utilized their RIT bands so they were able to work with peers at similar instructional levels. Additionally, I accommodated student learning by circulating and conferencing during independent and group work time.

4. Supporting Student Understanding and Use of Academic Language a) Identify the key academic language demand and explain why it is integral to the central focus for the segment and appropriate to students academic language development. Consider language functions and language forms, essential vocabulary, and/or phrases for the concepts and skills being taught, and instructional language necessary for students to understand or produce oral and/or written language within learning tasks and activities. For my students to grasp the contents presented in this unit, it was essential for me to not only define yet explain and model each concept before the students could apply the information.

For example, although my students knew what conflict was in general, they needed explicit definitions and examples of the various types presented in pieces of writing and literature, such as character versus character, character versus self, character versus nature, and character versus society, in order to apply the information to critical contexts. b) Explain how planned instructional supports will assist students to understand academic language related to the key language demand to express and develop their content learning. Planned instructional supports such as anchor charts for each story element were imperative for student success during this unit. I didnt expect the charts to be as supportive as they were, but throughout the unit, I realized the students relied on and utilized them frequently. They also served as a great review before the assessments. At the end of the unit, the room was literally decorated with anchor charts!

5. Monitoring Student Learning a) Explain how the informal and formal assessments you select and/or designed will provide evidence you will use to monitor student progress toward the standards/objectives. Consider how the assessments will provide evidence of students use of content specific skills and strategies to promote rigorous learning. In order to assess student learning during the unit, I utilized informal assessments such as verbal checks for understanding, thumbs up, and fist of five. These methods were used after each portion of the lesson, including the I Do, We Do, and You Do. I also utilized exit tickets, homework assignments, pop quizzes, and two unit assessments. When designing the dissimilar assessments, it was vital for me to consistently connect the questions back to the initial objectives, because I realized through trial-and-error that it was easy to make the test about one thing when in essence it did not even address the learning objective that was taught in the lesson.

Another practice I utilized when assessing student learning was comparing each topic to that which was on the standardized tests my students take each year. I personally found it useful to develop assessments based on the ISAT Coaching book, because that is what my students need to know in order to successfully complete the academic tests that are weighed so heavily in todays public education system. b) Describe any modifications or accommodations to the planned assessment tools or procedures that allow students with specific needs to demonstrate their learning. All of the assessments created were modified for students with specific needs, including verbal instructions, multiple choice questions versus extended responses, extended time, and a word bank for fill in the blank questions. It took several opportunities and revisions to create quality assessments to account for all students needs, especially those who had specific educational requirements, and with that, I disposed of one question on each unit assessment, because I realized that my students did not understand the question in the correct context. Throughout this process, I realized that as a teacher I must be very specific when creating assessments, as to not write questions that have multiple interpretations or relate to items not specifically discussed during the lessons. Although I would have liked my students to be able to infer meanings about various concepts, it was an area that many of my students struggled with, so now I know it is an area that needs to be explicitly taught over the remainder of the year. Once I know my students can infer meanings within various contexts, I will know I have been successful at teaching!

6. Analyzing Student Learning a) Summarize student performance in narrative and/or graphic form. The students did well on the assessments, with their scores ranging from 26% to 100%. The median score was 71% on Assessment 1 and 80% on Assessment 2, which told me most students had an average understanding of the information. Assessment 2 scores were ultimately better than the first assessment, and after analyzing the data, I found that the students scores better once they were familiar with my test format. Going forward, I will make it a point to explain the test format prior to giving a test. This should never be a surprise to students or impact their scores. b) Discuss what students appear to understand well and where they continue to struggle including any misunderstandings, developmental approximations, confusions, or needs (including a need for greater challenge). The majority of students had an ample understanding of plot, plot elements, setting, conflict, and mood. Almost all of them were able to label the elements of plot, but it was a bit more difficult for them to pull the specific elements out of a story, specific rising and falling action. Additionally, many of them struggled with direct versus indirect characterization, as well as various types of characters (static or dynamic) presented in texts. In order for them to gain more clarity and become sufficient at the difficult theories, I would offer them many more opportunities to practice the skills, including modeling certain strategies and then letting them work on their own. I have found that the best way to get better at something is to do it multiple times until it becomes comfortable.

c) Consider common patterns across the class as well as groups of students with similar strengths or needs. Cite evidence to support your analysis from the three student work samples you selected. One common pattern across both assessments was that students did not write in complete sentences. They were told from day one of class that they were to always write in complete sentences unless told otherwise. It was disappointing to see them lose points for something so trivial. Another pattern was their lack of understanding in regards to explaining the types of characterization. For example, each of the three students analyzed missed question number eight on Assessment 1, which asked them to name and explain two of the six methods of indirect characterization that authors use. On the contrary, they all did well on questions 14 and 15 on Assessment 2, which asked them to read a passage and name the protagonist and antagonist of the story using textual evidence to support their reasons. Again, it was a clear testament to which theories they understood and which they did not. d) Refer to your learning progression analysis you created from your student work samples. Describe individual learning strengths and weaknesses of your high performing and your low performing student. As far as strengths and weaknesses of high versus lower performing students, it was apparent to me that the higher performing students were focused during class and then took the time to study and read through the questions on the test. This unit was a review to many of many of my students, as story elements are taught as early as first grade, so the clear distinction was that of who paid attention in class and then studied the information, versus those who did not.

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e) If applicable, describe evidence from the student work samples that demonstrate the extent to which students are able to understand and/or use the language associated with the identified language demand (vocabulary, function/form, and instructional language) in ways that develop literacy skills and strategies. It was evident that the students who understood the content were able to use the literary terms in their answers. For example on Assessment 1, Arthur was able to define Amys character type by using his knowledge of static characters and the information presented by the text.

7. Feedback to Guide Further Learning

a) Submit evidence of your feedback to the 2 focus students (e.g., written directly on work samples, in audio files, a time stamp reference for video clip(s) in the Instruction task)? If submitted via video, provide the time stamp here. *see supporting documents b) How did the feedback you provided to each of the 2 focus students address the individual students needs and learning objectives? Reference specific evidence of submitted feedback to support your explanation. On each assessment, I made it a point to write comments and questions in regards to incorrect or missing answers. For example, on Assessment 1, Mateo did not interact with the text on question 3, so I wrote the following, -1. You did not interact with the text. Do you understand what this means? Then, when I conferenced with the students after the assessment, we discussed if he knew what the question was asking and how to not make the same mistake again moving forward.

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c) What opportunities were or will be provided for students to apply the feedback to improve their work, either within the learning segment or at a later time? After the assessments, I conferenced with each individual student so they would all have the opportunity to address any questions or concerns they had with the scoring or grading, as well as any questions that I felt required follow-up or further explanation. This allowed them the opportunity to ask me specific questions, as to hopefully help them not make the same mistakes again.

8. Using Assessment to Inform Instruction a) Based on your analysis of student performance in the assessment, describe next steps for instruction for the whole class. The next steps for instruction include teaching a lesson on complete sentence responses, as well as reteaching indirect and direct characterization, and the different types of characters. I foresee myself adding these lessons into other unit content. For example, we are getting ready to study informational texts, so I will likely bring those elements into an upcoming lesson on a specific informational text. This will show the students that no matter what type of text is presented, story elements exist. b) Describe any individualized next steps for the two focus students. Prior to assessing the students again, I will do a review with the entire class and also make them aware of the test format. As far as the two focus students, I will do a pretest at the beginning of the new unit, in order to assess their current knowledge, and then I will assess them again before giving the final unit assessment. This will give the students better opportunity to succeed.

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c) Explain how these next steps follow from your analysis of the student performances. The next steps are a natural progression in the learning process, which will allow all students to succeed, and that is my number one goal as an educator!

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