Math Lesson Reflection

I come from a family of critical thinkers and problem solvers and ever since I was young I was put in situations where I had to use my critical problem solving skills or had to answer any questions my mother threw at me. Some of these questions would be the application of math in real life. I would have to calculate change and taxes on things my mom bought or calculate the sale percentage on an item. As a kid, I thought these were another one mom my mother’s ploys to my life about learning. When I look back I wish I could go back and tell my 8-year-old self to pay attention because this real-world application of math is something I wouldn’t explicitly learn in school. Throughout my primary and secondary schooling math and I would have a love hate relationship, often being a class dreaded though sometimes offering a sense of wonder and excitement.

My time spent in the Clinical setting, so far, has been extremely inciteful as to how to become a better educator in a classroom setting. Through the data I collected I was able to connect Borich’s Seven Variables of learning to the students. By being in the clinical setting for nearly two months, I have been exposed to new ways of thinking when it comes to structuring a classroom and instructing a classroom. Within this reflection you will find out how I would better plan an effective lesson for the pupils in my future classroom. You will also discover what I will do about certain issues in the classroom and how I will address/fix them.

Due to time, the student’s opportunity for free exploration was cut short, which forced, at times, the students to get detracted from the task at hand. Additionally, depending on the future practicum lesson plan objective, I would like to highly consider completing the practicum in small groups, opposed to the large group of twelve children. Splitting into smaller groups will offer students more of an opportunity to learn at their own pace, decreasing the amount of pressure they feel from students who have already completed the task at hand. More so, having smaller groups will decrease the chance for students to copy one another’s work; forcing the students to make the connections for themselves, connecting a mental image of the manipulative to the mathematical topic. Finally, for future practicums, if the topic and manipulatives allow, I would have the students document their discoveries on a more guided worksheet. For this particular practicum, the students were to record their findings on a blank piece of paper. Due to the fact that the blank piece of paper did not offer any guidance or instruction for specific documentation from the students, many did not record their findings. Suppling a more guided worksheet might help students record their findings, in turn helping them learn and recognize the points of the lesson, and help us, as instructors, better assess the students complete understanding of the practicums lessons

The unit test covers material all from this unit. Students will be asked questions where they have to find the reference angles, conterminal angles, and quadrants from given angle. They also have to convert angles from radians to degrees or degrees to radians. They will also be asked for the exact values of trigonometric function. Students will be asked questions that require them to identify the amplitude, period, phase shift, and vertical shift of a trigonometric function and graph. Students should also be able to sketch the trig graph given an equation and create an equation based off the graph.

During the observation time I was placed in a first grade classroom. Walking into the class I began to look around and smile, there was so much color all over the classroom I could not help but feel happier. The teacher immediately stopped the class and told us what they were doing that morning and had each student introduce themselves to us. They went around and stated their name and then went back to their math workbook. When they were finished with their math worksheets they were then able to pick something to do around the room. That included reading on their own, getting to use the iPad, working on the computer, etc. Some students were together while others chose to work on things independently.

A third consideration I gained from this course was regarding my beliefs about young students being exposed to issues about of race, privilege, and power. Prior to our class, I did not think it was appropriate for elementary students to discuss, address or explore topics about race, stereotypes, biases, and privilege. However, my feelings have changed because I realized I was underestimating the power young children in the classroom. Wolpert (1998) argues that young children are very much aware of racial differences. The literature on multicultural and cultural responsive (Gay, 2002; Souto-Manning, 2013) elaborate about student voices in the classroom. In fact, it is through this exploration that I recognized how as an educator I could wield the power and privilege. My beliefs that young children could not engage in anti-bias curriculum or racial issues encourage me to ignore suck topics them in the classroom. However, not anymore because I believe there is great positive power in making these conversations visible in my classroom. I plan to engage students in anti-bias conversations because it is through these experiences that “children learn to be proud of themselves and of their families, to respect human differences, to recognize bias, and to speak up for what is right” (Derman-Sparks & Edwards, 2010, p. 1).

and whole numbers, Susan will draw and choose a picture that best fits the fractions specified in a word problem in 3/3 days and at least 4/6 occassions.

For this lesson, I based it off what the students in the clinical are learning throughout the year. I mainly see my students during their math intervention, and all of them have been focusing on diving multi digit numbers with and without remainders. The students have had difficulty with this subject when first being introduced to it, but as each week progresses, they are becoming more comfortable with diving. I believe my lesson would be beneficial for students to “wrap up” a division unit, and practice their skills on being able to divide numbers with and without remainders. Students ideally would have already seen problems in the Jeopardy game already in homework or practice problems that they have performed in school.

The lesson was and remains the basic form of the organization of the educational process. The essence of the lesson is the organization by the teacher of a diverse work of students in the assimilation of new knowledge, skills, and development. A modern lesson in math is a lesson in which the teacher skillfully uses all possible forms of organizing the cognitive activity of students. My cooperating teacher is a perfect example of it.

In today’s society, it is important for educators to know the problems taking place in the classroom and outside the classroom. The two class readings encourage exploration of these ever changing ideas. Both novels complement each other in educating emerging teachers about these controversial topics. The key topics and main themes that reoccur in both texts are gender roles, stereotypes of teaching and lastly, race and racism.

Drama, as Heatchote ( Wagner, 1999) put it, is not special . It is something that people do everyday for different purposes , in a complex process that involve their emotion, imaginations, and intelligence. People recreate ( re-live) a past event or visualize ( pre-live) an upcoming role that they have to cope with . If it does not happen visually for other people to see, then it may occur only in our minds . One close example of this mental imaging activity is the act of lesson planning by teachers. When planning a lesson I often imagine what I will do in a class to make sure that I would do it properly . I will think how to begin : what ice breakers I will use to build up a case and how I will deliver them. As I think of core activities to have in a class, my mind also wonders about what jokes I will tell when students show signs of boredom and how I will deliver them. At times, my mind brought me to the memories of past incidents or successful teaching events and have all them mashed up with the plan. Soon as I have them organized, these staged plans are stored on writing forms , but many of them are just stored in my memory.

I found the parent panel very informative – I loved being able to hear from parents about their opinions on important school related subjects such as new teachers, multicultural education, and homework. Personally, the most interesting aspect of the panel was listening to the parents speak about their thoughts on multicultural education. All four parents expressed that they did not see the importance of multicultural education being included in their child’s school curriculum. One parent explained that her daughter’s school has a culture night where families can come dressed up in clothing specific to their culture and bring ethnic food dishes. However, this parent said that she is fine with that being the only multicultural aspect in her daughter’s school. I found these statements interesting due to another class I am currently taking – ED 525 – whose sole purpose is the implementation of multicultural education into classrooms. In the class, the professor stresses how multicultural education is one the most important aspects of a school’s climate; I was surprised to hear from parents who did not agree.

“During our last lesson we learned about how the built environment affects health. Today we will continue to learn about health disparities and what you can do to advocate for a solution to a health issue in Washington, DC.”

Teaching can be a challenge, you never know what to expect and each classroom will be unique. However, you will always have to be prepare for teaching in a situation you may not be comfertable with. Educating students and practicing proper knowledge on subjects such as race, class, gender, sexual orientation and disability are vital in creating a safe and respectful classroom for all. School is often looked upon as a place of security for students and it is our job as teachers to help maintain that status.

Considering my science lesson is part of a new unit, the preceding lesson is unrelated due to the subject involving heredity. The new unit focuses on Earth’s place in the universe while the first segment teaches students about the different components of the universe. Students should have some prior knowledge on Earth’s environment and weather from previous years, which would allow them to identify Earth from other planets. However, if a student lacks knowledge in that area, my science lesson will also cover Earth’s characteristics.