4 Lesson Plan and and 1000-Word Reflection Essay
Hello, Everyone!
Completing the Benchmark and Practicum requirements for the class may seem a little confusing to you, so I am creating this document to guide you through the process step-by-step. I hope it helps! Please review the information below and if you have additional questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to message me or post in the Questions to the Instructor Forum. Also, please make sure you review the sample Benchmark Assessment located under Resources and then Add Ons. This will also help provide you with an idea of how a lesson plan should look for the Benchmark.
Now, let’s talk about your Practicum:
At the beginning of the course, you should have received a copy of the Clinical Verification Form in your student portal or email. This is the form you will submit to your observing teacher to record your observation hours. This form must be uploaded with your Benchmark Assessment. Here are some steps to take if you run into difficulties with the form.
If you did not receive a form, you need to contact your advisor to help you with this. If it is towards the end of the course, you will need to manually download a copy of the form that is located under Resources and then Add Ons in the classroom. You will need to print the form and submit it to your observing teacher to sign and then scan it into your computer and upload it with your Benchmark Assessment.
If you received the form, but your observing teacher cannot open it. You will need to contact your advisor who may refer you to Tech Support. If all else fails, you will need to print out the form and have the teacher complete it manually. Then, scan into your computer and upload it with your Benchmark Assessment.
If you received the form, emailed it to your observing teacher, but you did not get a response and it was not returned. Please don’t wait until the last week of class to check on this. Don’t assume the observing teacher has it and that all is well. Check with the teacher. Communicate and make sure the teacher is able to complete the form. Find out when the teacher will return the form to you and then be expecting it. If it doesn’t arrive on time, email or phone the teacher. When all else fails, download the form from the classroom and take it to the teacher and then once completed, scan it into your computer and upload with your Benchmark Assessment.
What if the file size is too big to upload? You will need to contact Tech Support to help you with this. It can be done. They can help. Please contact them. The form has to be submitted for you to receive credit and not have an Incomplete for the course.
The key to success with the Practicum and Observation forms is to not wait until the last minute. We are no longer using Taskstream, so please do not upload your document to that database. You can find information about the new Document Managing System in the Student Success Center. For your convenience, I have uploaded a blank document within the classroom under Resources and then Add Ons. Please do not wait until the last minute to get this information together. Things can go wrong. Stay proactive and make sure you are successful with this.
The number of hours you must submit for observation is twenty. Don’t submit anything less. You must have twenty hours of actual observation in order to pass the class without deductions or an Incomplete.
Please don’t post your observation hours in the Individual Forum or email them to me. You have until the last day of the class to submit your work. Please do so before the class ends. I cannot accept assignments posted in the Individual Forum.
Also, please know the classroom dropbox allows you to upload more than one assignment at a time. You can upload multiple documents. You just do not need to click submit until you have all of them attached. When you try to submit your observation forms to TurnItIn.com, they may error out. This does not mean they aren’t submitting to the classroom. It just means that TII cannot read them.
Now, let’s talk about the Benchmark:
For this assignment you are to try to assess some students on one or more components of literacy. The content areas we are focusing on and building lesson plans on are as follows:
Fluency and word study
Phonics and phonemic awareness
Vocabulary
Comprehension
In your observing classroom, you will work with the teacher to administer a pre-test and post-test to a group of students. This assessment will be based on one or more of the components of literacy listed above. Once you have administered the pre-test, you will create lesson plans that address the needs of the students from analyzing the results of the assessments. Ideally, you will teach the lesson plans and once completed, you will administer the post-test. It can be the same assessment for both pre-test and posttest. The goal is to measure the progress in the students.
If you are unable to administer your own test, you can use one the teacher administers and just chart the progress between the pre-test and the post-test. Some teachers do not want you to teach in their classrooms or they may have certain techniques and assessments they use. That is fine. Just use what you have to complete the assessment.
Once you have the data from the pre-test and post-test, you will create a chart that shows progress between the two, if any was made. The students may have increased in learning, or they may stay the same, or they may become more confused and their scores may be lower. You will provide the chart within your reflection essay and discuss it within your writing. The reflection essay and chart and data are all a part of one document that tells the story of your experiences within the classroom. You will not provide actual students’ names due to privacy, but a copy of the assessment along with the chart will be sufficient.
The other part of the Benchmark is to actually create the lesson plans, one focusing on each of the components of literacy. You may not be able to teach them, but create them as if you were able to teach them. You will use one of the approved lesson plan templates under the College of Education on the GCU website. The SIOP, EEI, and GCU lesson plan templates are all good; however, I am not fond of the UbD lesson plan and I suggest you stay away from it unless it is your favorite.
Please remember you need to fill in each component for the lesson plan and you will be submitting four separate lesson plans. Here are some of the components that are very important:
Differentiation-Providing adapted activities for special needs students is part of the rubric and should be included within the lesson plans under Adaptations or Differentiated Instruction
Anticipatory Set/Motivation-This is the part of the lesson plan where you introduce the topic and you “hook” the students. This should be exciting like a game or commercial or small drama, but you should be doing the work. The students are there to volunteer, but they shouldn’t be required to take part. They should not do any work in these sections because you have just introduced new material and have taught nothing about it yet. You cannot make them work when you have not taught.
Teaching/Modeling-This is what you do. You teach. You do the work. You walk through and complete examples. You read and model reading. You discuss the activities and work through an example. It is about You, You, You. Students are there to watch and learn and not participate because they haven’t been taught this information before this point.
Practice/Application: This is where the students take what they have learned in the Modeling/Teaching and they put it into practice. You may begin with guided practice and I recommend it, where you can work with the students or place them in pairs so they can work with each other. That way you can see who has mastered the information and who has not. Independent Practice can provide you with a way to assess the student, such as a worksheet or project. You can measure informally through group work and individual practice.
Closure/Reflection-Many times I receive lesson plans where the teacher does not provide a closure or reflection. This is a sad mistake. Students need to come together at the end of the time period to understand and reflect on what they have learned.
Assessment-This can be very informal all the way to a paper test. That is up to you. Just make sure that your assessment and what you are trying to measure end up being the same thing.
Any worksheets or additional sources-these may be provided in separate documents.
The Standards-These are at the beginning of the lesson plan and there are many other parts that are just as important like: objectives, title, etc.… that must be filled in, but I want to say don’t overcrowd your lesson plan template with too many objectives. You cannot teach so many objectives in this one lesson. You may touch on more than one, but none of them are going to be mastered in just one day’s lesson plan.
Some students have asked me if they can group all four lesson plans into one template. I have allowed it in the past, but I am going to discourage it because the only way to earn the correct points on that is to complete four different instructions in each category of the lesson plan template. You would have Monday, Tuesday Wednesday, etc. or Day One, Day Two, Day Three… in each section of the lesson plan template. Every section would have to be filled in to address the correct lesson plan. Every section would have at least four sets of instructions. Each section would have complete instructions for teaching all four components for four days. I think it is more confusing and every time a student tries it, they miss something and lose points. So, I would suggest using four lesson plan templates. It is easier.
So, let’s review:
We will upload our completed Benchmark Assessment with four lesson plans, the reflection essay, our worksheet or assessment, and our completed Observation Form.
Now, I hope that helps to break it down and to explain many frequently asked questions. If it does not help or you have additional questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Best Regards,
Instructor
