Well, I had several power outages at my house on Wednesday. It was rather windy and lots of lightening but no real down pour of rain. I got kicked off the classroom twice but managed to get back in. I think these new text we are reading out of is much more technical. I think I actually heard someone in class mention that and I really agree. For me, it is not as inviting as the previous text book we were reading. It is jammed full of information though, so I suppose that is the only thing that matters. I enjoyed working with Kaci and Amanda in our initial group activity. It was nice to brainstorm and pull ideas together. The emailed "house" activity was a blast. I had the role of a client looking at purchasing the home and I went as far as drawing a diagram of all the levels. I finally came to the conclusion that having so many windows in your home is kind of mute when all you have are 8' shrubs to look at. Also, all the bathrooms were on the third level- no thank you. Haha. It was a fun experiment and activity once we all got back in the main room to discuss our thoughts. The third activity, with the differing comic strips just furthered the concept of interpretation. It also went right along with the text, exposing the importance of common knowledge and comprehension.
I started observing with my cooperating teacher and it was an awesome experience thus far. I go back in a few more time next week then I will be leading a lesson on formulating and writing up paragraphs for a research paper along with opportunity to research over the web. Should be pretty fun. My cooperating teacher has her students researching an inventor/discoverer/artist who invented/discovered/created something that has been of great importance and impacted our society. I am looking forward to working with these 5th grade students more next week.
Sounds like an awesome lesson to teach. I am overwhelmed with Brit Lit as of right now but I did research and talk to my cooperating teacher about my lesson plan this week as well.
ReplyDeleteI also agree about this text book, the technical terms lose me a bit and I have to look some words up to gain a clearer understanding. This text will be a good one to have front-loaded. :)
You ladies are off to a great start with your observations and lesson plan idea. I agree about the books as well.
DeleteWow you sound like your a busy lady! I love your take away's from the individual perspective emails that she sent us. It is crazy to think that most of us have heard the saying, "if you could walk a mile in my shoes" I feel like that is kind of what Dr. Steffes had us do tonight. She let us all explain our findings before revealing which perspective we were observing from. To many times I think that teachers don't try to understand their students lives any further than the classroom, but we are made whole by all our life experiences not just work, home, or school.
ReplyDeleteI am so glad the activity was insightful for you! I am eager to hear about your observation experiences!
ReplyDeleteKatie I too enjoyed the discussion and perspective once we returned to the main room to discover each of us had a different lens for the house activity. Yes, the reading has changed in the current text and is very packed with information and how to... I am in hopes I can grab most of it, tuck it into my little brain, dust it off when needed and put it to good use in the classroom in the future.
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