Phase I: Plans Instruction

First and foremost, I have a many standards aligned to this introductory lesson. My target group is 5th grade and within the Arizona Common Core Standards are the standards:

Strand 1: Concept 4: PO 3. Identify the impact of the following individuals on the Revolutionary War: Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Patrick Henry, Thomas Paine, King George III 

Grade 5: Informational Text K–5: Writing: Research to Build and Present Knowledge: 7. Conduct short research projects that use several sources to build knowledge through investigation of different aspects of a topic.

 
My objectives are clearly stated by describing what I expect students to complete and be able to do by the end of this lesson:

Students will

• choose  a famous person in American history (specifically within the Revolutionary War strand)
• use online research skills to collect information on the lives of their important historical figure.
• create a Facebook page for their historical figure through the use of a Google Docs template.
• describe the contributions of their historical figure and assess their impact on the time period and major events occurring in the United States.

I feel these goals are appropriate for students and will keep their interest. The Facebook page will make the typical research lesson more engaging and since most 5th graders have experience with Facebook, it will be working with something they know.

Phase II: Assessment of Learning

• 
  
   
  My assessment was done through having students create and solve division problems. These problems tell me what students understand as being division. I would need to support the last student since they created a subtraction problem as division. This gives me clear data to look at when trying to find student understanding. Students did very well for the most part. I would have liked to get more of these examples. More time would have been good.
  
  
  My reflection indicates this success. I thought the lesson went very well. The lesson itself could have taken more time with students first learning this material, but given my audience, I scaffolded where needed. In implementing this in a third grade classroom, I would plan for more time, more support, and overall MORE TIME. Introducing a concept may take the half hour, but the work I asked for after (creating problems) would take more than the allotted time.
  
  
  Classmate feedback was also overall positive for my engagement of students (having them all participate and having them look at other student examples) and creating a safe environment. Some constructive feedback called for more individual time with students, more wait time, and more time explaining how to use the SMART board. Overall, more time, which reflects some of my concerns with time I stated previously. This lesson would probably be best for a bit longer time period such as 45 minutes.
  

Phase II: Instructional Decisions/Teaching

Implementation of the lesson went very smoothly, probably based a great deal on the fact that I was teaching 3rd grade math to college students. The one thing I had to change for sake of time and due to seating arrangement was how much involvement I planned for my students to have in the SMART Board activities. I was able to have them follow along on SMART Notebook on their computers, however, I feel this took away from the lesson. My plan was to follow the I do, We do, You do format, and I feel my We do section suffered because students were following along and helping me solve the problem rather than being able to also do it themselves. Basically, they weren't able to write anything down on the board or on paper which I think detracted from their understanding.

However, this little bump aside, I think the goals and objectives were maintained. I was able to have students demonstrate their knowledge of division and different strategies to solve those problems through the problems they solved on their own:

For individual students I made many small modifications such as allowing extra time. Overall, I tried to get as many learning styles in as possible (visual through the presentation, audio through presenting, kinesthetic through creating their own problems and working with the SMART board) to prevent needing as many modifications. It was also difficult to gauge modifications since this was a 3rd grade lesson being taught to college students. I believe it was logical enough to not need explanation, but I addressed any questions along the way.