Taylor Miller February 2, 2017

Groundhog Day Lesson Reflection

On Thursday, February 2nd, I taught my first lesson at Oak Tree School to Mrs.
Thompsons first graders. Having spent the past week and a half with this class, I was eager to
teach my first full lesson. Going into the day, I was optimistic in the fact that the students would
look forward to learning about this special day, and I still believe they did find some enjoyment.
I was able to learn so much from just one lesson and post-conference with both my supervisor
and cooperating teacher following this experience.
The most important component to this lesson was the investigation. This activity was
what I was most excited to introduce to the students, and their excitement seemed to match.
Being that the worksheet was based off the scientific method, it provided many paths to teach
various skills (i.e asking questions, forming a hypothesis, testing for an answer). While planning,
I figured this exercise would be great to include because this class of students loves science
activities such as STEM challenges.
On this day, forming a hypothesis became a sub goal of the lesson and required many
teacher prompts for the students to understand. On top of the value of learning how to form your
own hypothesis or idea, the first graders got to experience a true hands-on experiment that
ultimately led to successful discoveries. When instructed to use their flashlights to find shadows
in our room, the class buzzed around and demonstrated creative thinking in how they went about
the task. As the students continued to find spots to test out their flashlights, I picked up on the
benefits of providing students time to explore and make their own realizations, as I did while
watching them at work. During the post-conference about my lesson, we reviewed the idea that
experience is key to learning in many situations. When given the opportunity, I hope to plan
more lessons that engage the students in active learning jobs. It is during moments like this that
students seem more engaged, connected to the work, and anxious to solve the answer to the
posed question.
A big takeaway for me was the importance of wait time. This is something that I felt I
struggled with today, although I know, and have been taught better than to act in any other way.
During any lesson, it is essential to provide moments for students to think, answer, and make
sense of a task. It was in the moment that I was walking through the directions of my science
shadow investigation that I realized I could have already made the instruction even better.
Instead of giving directions in a way that got the students involved (perhaps choral reading or
asking for volunteer readers) I read them aloud myself while the students touched upon each step
with a pointing finger. Looking back at this choice, I believe that I decided to breeze through the
directions because they were steps that I thought the students could follow independently. Even
with this being the case for many students in the class, I learned that it is more beneficial to
either model, or walk through most, and possibly all, of the steps before giving the students their
practice time. I was grateful that Mrs. Thompson had asked me to pause so that she could
interject and influence me to backtrack before moving forward. Her contributions really helped
guide me in the right direction by setting a more reasonable pace for the first graders. I think
moving forward I will now feel more comfortable in sharing the opportunity of reading the
directions with students to ensure engagement, but more importantly, provide clarification that
would have been lost otherwise.
In conjunction with wait time, this lesson reminded me of a teachers ability to break very
complex tasks down, such as the process of this groundhog investigation. Since it was a process
that involved complete focus and attention, I realized how necessary it is to consider which ways
you can chunk or group questions to ask or the content you teach, into parts that allow for pauses
and clarification. Rather than rushing to explain directions with a concern for time, I found that it
would be much more worthwhile to work at the same time with the students. With this idea, I
want to continuously remind myself that it doesnt hurt to break things down into small parts,
because I shouldnt expect students to remember the details of a multiple-step process when
directions were only given once through.
In terms of management, I believe that I had a nice sense of engagement and held the
attention of the kids. Despite many things that I look back on and wish to change, I felt confident
in the way that I carried myself while teaching. Furthermore, hearing from both my supervisor
and cooperating teacher that I seemed comfortable during the lesson was very reassuring. As for
managing time, I felt as though I was moving at a reasonable pace while invested in the lesson,
but am thinking the opposite now as I reflect. I was glad that I chose to introduce the topic with
the questioning through the 5 Ws, but feel as though I got worried for time after that and
eventually threw myself off. Going into the day, I had too many things planned for the forty-
minute period of this lesson because I didnt realize how deep we needed to dive into each piece.
For example, I assumed that a simple worksheet about investigating with shadows would take
just a few minutes. Realistically, that activity couldve been a whole period by itself, even
without the introduction prior. For future lessons, I plan to look more closely at my ideas and
consider which pieces I could separate into smaller, individual lessons. Just as I mentioned with
the investigation, my introduction to the celebration of Groundhog Day could have been
enhanced and expanded into a single lesson with visuals, videos, and other supplemental pieces
that would benefit learners of all styles. Perhaps, come future lessons, I can consider sticking to
one-two linked goals, rather than a few different activities around one topic.
All in all, I feel as though my Groundhog Day lesson was a decent way to begin my
student teaching experience. There were many ideas that I could learn and grow from, as the
original plan started out quite detailed and lengthy. When I write lesson plans over the next few
weeks, I would consider changing or modifying the connection of multiple activities, the
appropriate use of time for specific tasks, the delivery of my directions, and my use of modeling.
While these are just a few of the things that I was encouraged to think about to make progress as
a teacher, I know that I shouldnt be too hard on myself for taking a big step today. Considering
the science investigation was a risk at the first-grade level, I am proud that I went for it and
had the chance to gain so much insight as a result. I will continue to remind myself that playing
safe will not bring about growth or meaningful reflection, because it leaves no room for errors
to be made.