Level IV US Observation#3 Reflection

The essential question of my lesson was: “How can understanding the characters and how they change in the story help you determine the theme of the story?” Students learned how to analyze the characters more deeply and realized how important this is when determining the theme of the story. In order to analyze the characters, the students created a “selfie” of the main character in the story which was Humphrey. First, they had to plan the selfie and they were given a template to do this with. On this template, the students needed to write the setting they would draw their character in, text evidence to support the setting, the character’s mood, and text evidence to support it. Once they finished that, they could move on to drawing their character’s selfie. I know that students learned because of how well they did on this activity. They used text evidence with quotes and page numbers and they really gave me their best effort.

One thing that went well in my lesson was the questioning. I asked the students higher-level questions in order to really get them thinking about what was going on in the story and to enhance their comprehension. For some of the questions I took hands after a few seconds of think time, and for the other questions I did turn and talks (one was done at 9:59 in the video). After I gave each couple time to share, I asked a few of them to share what they had discussed. One thing that I could have done better was more positive praise and more feedback when students answered questions. Instead of just saying good job or repeating what they say, it is good to tell them you liked the way they used text evidence or did something else. For example at 15:19 in the video, a student answered one of my questions and I could have told her that she did a great job pulling out that detail from the text.

This was a connected lesson so my next step was to do a lesson on theme the next day. I wanted the students to see how analyzing the characters’ actions and thoughts in the story and how they change can help them determine the theme. After they completed their character selfie, they also completed a character cube. After that, they did the final piece which was the theme. The students were given a graphic organizer. The top three boxes were character’s thoughts, actions, and how the characters change, respectively. Underneath that was the theme and lastly the students answered how they could apply what they learned from the story to their own lives. After checking over their work, the majority of the students understood the theme of the story and were able to make a connection. There were only one or two students who confused theme with main idea and I made sure to clear that up.

What I am discovering about my teaching is that it is becoming natural. When teaching in the beginning, I really had to think about every step I was going to take. I would have my lesson plan by my side and made sure to reference it often and had to think about each step. Now, when looking back at my video, I can see that some of the aspects are things I just know how to do now. For instance, at the beginning of the lesson I always state the objective and give students a purpose for learning. Also, I make sure to go back to the objective at least one more time in the lesson. Another thing that has become more natural is the questioning. Before, I had to make sure that I had my questioned planned out but now, I can easily come up with some higher-order questions for my students on the spot. Seeing how much I have improved in my teaching from two years ago makes me feel very proud and excited for what’s to come.