In the case of my prior knowledge of lesson and unit plans the prophetic quote “ignorance is bliss” is exceptionally true. My ignorance of what was involved and how to create lesson plans was a blessing, because I came at the new task with childlike interest and want to discover. Watching my grandmother teach seemed to come to her with fluidity and ease, but knowing what is behind the scenes make me appreciate her and my teachers more thoroughly. Stepping into my General Teaching Methods course was one large meta-reflection within itself. This course has challenged me to take everything I have learned about student behaviors, cultural sensitivities, assessments, creating positive learning environments, engaging students, and helping them discover themselves and the world and place it neatly within two pages to four pages of lesson/unit plans. How it is done is a magic art that I need to keep practicing. But, whether or not I succeeded with many stars does not down play the fact of the journey.
As a masters student I have learned how to become “teachable”. It is a hard skill to not stick with what you know and how you want to do things, but to let others mold you into a more productive and effective teacher. After each of our four lesson plans we had time in small groups to do some peer-editing on our teaching methods, our physical appearance, and our transparency with directions as a teacher. Each of these peer editing sections helped me grow. The most useful pieces of advice I was offered was how I need to spend more time on my PowerPoints(PP), and also needed to narrow the amount of information within each lesson. Being a visual learner myself, I know it is important to have visually stimulating PPs for students, and the fact that I over-looked that part of my lessons was an interesting thing to reflect on. Also, using technology in the classroom has to be there to help aid students not only the teacher. As for narrow my information, it is most important for students to comprehend what I am teaching them and be able to apply it in other situations so they can store it in their long-term memories. By throwing too much at students they will never be able to keep up. Becoming aware that I need to judge how much information I can give to my students during one lesson by how the group of students responds was eye opening to me. I can modify throughout my day of five periods depending on the different needs of the classes. It is an everyday search for new solutions to problems in understanding, flexibility, and speed.
The four things that I really took a lot from in the process of making lesson and unit plans was the arts of classroom management, objectives, grouping, and family involvement plan. If done correctly, lesson and unit plans are classroom management plans. By keeping students engaged with the lessons by keeping lecture short, using more hands-on activity, relating objectives to real-world applications, and getting involved with students keeps them interested and so the actual need to be a “babysitter” should go away. Students will be actively participating in good lesson plans and their excitement to discover will knock out bad behavior.
As for objectives, I would have loved more of those in my schooling experience available for me. One thing that my peer editors seemed to like was the that I started each class day with the objectives up on the board in student friendly “I can…” language, which we would read together as one bell-ringer activity. This I find keeps students on track because they know what they are supposed to be gleaning from the lesson at the beginning, middle, and the end of it. With the transparency of lesson plans students will not waste time thinking “what is the point of this activity/lecture/homework,” and they can spend more time getting to the meat of the lesson.
Grouping students was another particle of the lesson plans in which I was partially unaware. I knew keeping students in well-thought out groups was important to the work they produced and the knowledge they gained from other group members. Although, I never thought about how grouping actually comes to fruition. Since there are no magic wands available for teachers, the act of placing low and high achievers in same groups, with keeping students comfortable so they can learn is an interesting dichotomy which I have pondered more and more through the four lesson I have produced this quarter.
Lastly, letting parents know what is going on within the classroom has become an intricate part of my lesson planning process. All humans need people behind them for extra support, and sending home “What’s Coming Up” parent letters can only help students get that needed support from their parents, siblings, or the designated guardians.
Professionally, I have learned my weaknesses and strengths through the unit and lesson planning procedures. One of my weaknesses is that I do not spend any time reading about the new advances in applicable teaching instruction, lesson planning methods, OPSI standards, teacher/student friendly technology, and the gossip on what is going on with the unions. I keep myself out of the loop because it seems too overwhelming to start. As a growing professional in the education field it is important that I keep myself informed and to grow and try new things. Another area of my professional growth that I need to spend time on is what students are required to learn and the standards that are set for them. I am not competent in all the areas of secondary writing and reading EARLS and GLEs, which I need to be.
My professional god-given talents that will help me grow in the education field are my ability to relate to others and my want to help students. I want to understand where people are coming from and so I have a general interest in my students, their passions, their dreams, and their struggles. What comes along with that want to understand my students is my want to help them learn to help themselves. I am a strong believer in, in most cases, students being facilitated not indoctrinated with knowledge. In my language arts classes, we will get to spend a lot of time reflecting novels, and in-turn how we relate to those characters, conflicts, and scenes. I want to give my students the tools they will need in order to take any piece of written work and understand the intended meanings, let them be able to interpret, and write real-world, professional writings.
This quarter in this General Methods course I have developed more insight into the teaching profession as well as an integral part of teaching: lesson and unit plans. While striving to create safe classroom experiences, positive learning environments, and students who are engagement with material and concepts I will use my strengths and work on my weaknesses so both myself and my students become greater informed, thoughtful citizens. I look forward to the adventure.
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