Lesson One Reflection Story Mapping

 WHAT?

What happened? What went well? What was an area of weakness?

Our lesson on the story of The Garden of Abdul Gasazi by Chris Van Allsburg was a story map activity that contained learning about story elements. We began our lesson by completing and introductory activity on introducing ourselves by saying our names our favorite color and our favorite book. After this we had the students complete a sheet to fill in the emoji that best matched how they feel about reading. From here we introduced vocabulary word wall and we reviewed vocabulary words that are in our story. We then went over and introduced the four Ps which our students knew so they conducted this part of the lesson very well. From here we began to introduce story elements using our anchor chart that we had characters, setting, plot, and theme. Each student was able to give a definition of each story element. As we moved on to read the story we had students identify story elements as we read. Once we finished we began to work on our story maps as a whole. The student easily remembered and were able to call back to the story elements. Particularly having the anchor chart as a visual I think helped the students define the story elements in the story. As we filled in the story map we discussed which element we were filling in for instance when we filled in the Beginning, middle, and end I wrote out what we discussed on the White board and the students copied the white board. One of our students took a little longer than typical to copy down the sentences but other than that there were not any major weaknesses. One minor weakness was that we did finish our lesson exactly at the one hour mark with 10 minutes to spare so we reviewed the vocabulary words from our word wall and we told the students what we would be doing next week so they are prepared and know what to anticipate next as well as read a very short book that we had.
Maddy reading the story. Students engaging in the story map.

Which objectives were met?  What is the evidence? Which students did not meet objectives?  Which students exceeded objectives?  Why?

Students met the object of standard RL.2 : Retell stories, including fables, folktales, and myths from diverse cultures; determine the central message, lesson, or moral and explain how it is conveyed through key details in a text. When given there exit ticket at the end of the lesson they were able to match the story elements to the elements from our story. They did so with 95% accuracy which proves how well they understood the story elements and comprehended the story. We have two students in our group they each got the same amount of story elements correct. The visual aids such as anchor charts and asking questions through out the story helped the students understand what story elements are.

Story Element anchor chart 

SO WHAT?

What was learned from this experience? Evidence of teacher candidate learning

From this experience I learned how important it is to have visuals for students specifically having anchor charts on the story elements it provided the students ability to understand the story elements and there definitions and what they are and what look for while reading. As we finished at the one hour mark with 10 minutes to spare we had to come up with a idea fast to keep the students attention as I mentioned before we recapped what we had learned regarding story elements and we told the students what topic we would be learning for the following week. We also had a spare story with us that was very short to read. We came prepared with that extra story which I think proves teacher candidate learning that sometimes when left with extra time it's important to come prepared. 

NOW WHAT?

How will this experience influence my professional identity? 

This experience in the practicum setting will influence my professional identity in the aspect of knowing what works during lessons and what might not work depending on the students levels, needs, and efficiency. For instance with visual learners charts, picture, and color help visual learners learn best. In particular in this group having visual strongly helped the students so now we will use them in our future lessons. 

How will this experience influence how I plan/teach/assess in the future?

This experience with my group has no given me a understanding on what levels each student

is on and what works best for our group I think a big one was having my mini white board to help the students write there sentences. I definitely plan to have that for the future as well as my anchor charts depending on what lesson we are working on having a big colorful visual helped the students.  

  

Vocabulary Word Wall