When I Was Teaching Students About Making Counterclaims,

In everyday life arguments happen quite frequently. In Thank You for Arguing by Jay Heinrichs, the author tries to go a day without persuasion or arguing and fails miserably. “For the time being my detector has nothing to say. But my cat does. She jumps on the bed and sticks her nose in my armpit. As reliable as my watch and twice as annoying, the cat persuades remarkable well for ten dumb pounds of fur. Instead of words she uses gesture and tone of voice- potent ingredients of argument.” (Heinrichs page 7) If kids are experiencing and using the argument skill from day one, then it should be the teacher’s job to refine and expand upon the skill. If

I feel that I've grown intellectually in the aspect that I am now able to formulate coherent arguments and assessing evidence. To discuss these matters, this class has taught me how to strategically piece together an argument based on nothing more than a few articles that had little significance prior to the conception of my overall view on such subjects. Specifically, in the second week of class I was instructed to find an article that related in some way to issues raised in The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Initially, I thought this task would be an exercise to see how issues in the book related to modern-day society. However, as the weeks progressed, we as a class began taking such articles, filtering through them, identifying issues, and consequently composing strong arguments relating to how we view such problems. Then, upon the posting of Week 8's tasks, I was assigned to analyze the content of "callingbullshit.org", which truly showed me how to assess evidence, just as our assignments prior to this one had when filtering through articles. Together, both of these assignments significantly aided me in constructing an argument from an ostensibly nonexistent foundation, preparing me for my future endeavors in the realm of argumentative

Encourage students to think back to this lesson when they are reading text. “If you come across one of these words or a new word that you do not know, use the sentence or sentences around the word to figure out the meaning.”

During my observations, it is clear that Ms. Minor prepares well thought out lesson plans for her third grade students. Lesson reflect both the state adopted curriculum and the instructional needs of the students she serves. She prepares lessons that increase student engagement. Ms. Minor’s lesson also incorporates culturally responsive strategies. Her selection of instructional resources demonstrates an understanding of the diverse

315-317) was used throughout the lesson in order to give the students an example of how to use the strategies that were taught. Before children would work on assignments alone, the teacher would model exactly what is expected of them, and keep examples of what was modeled during the lesson so the students could look back to it if they need to. Read-alouds (Cooper, 2015, p. 37) were used in this lesson to really help children to focus on certain topics of the text. “Sometimes the best way to help children understand a particular piece of text is to read it aloud to them and discuss it with them” (Cooper, 2015, p. 37). Think-alouds (Cooper, 2015, p. 30) were incorporated into this lesson when trying to explain how to use the strategy of character mapping. Think-alouds are a great way to explain to students how to use a specific skill or strategy so that they can have a better time comprehending it. Semantic maps (Cooper, 2015, p.83) were used in this lesson for brainstorming ideas from the text to later reference when making illustrations and creating short responses to the text. This strategy is also a great tool for second-language-learners because it helps to narrow down the specific parts in the text to help create more details of the topic being taught. Cooperative “popcorn” sequencing(Annenburg Learner, 2015) was used in the lesson to allow a variety of students to participate in the

Prior Student Knowledge: The class is composed of 12 students, with 8 girls and 2 boys. Most of my students are of Hispanic descent. Most of these students speak Spanish well, but cannot write it. These students are all reading at grade level, except for one ELL student. In order to make the lesson relevant to them, we will discuss chemical changes more relatable to them, such as rust that is found in everyday

Some of the students have a low level of English in this group however so I make sure that concepts are fully explained and groups are mixed so as the low level English speaking students do not group together.

One of the U.S. educational challenges of today is meeting the educational needs of the English language learners. This growing diverse population of English learners has to simultaneously learn to build their English language proficiency and the content area within their grade level standard. This makes it a double challenge for them and their teachers. After observing a lesson based on a video simulation of a classroom, I will discuss five components: comprehensible input, ongoing specific and immediate feedback, grouping structures and techniques, building background and vocabulary development and student engagement that were integrated into the lesson. I will then discuss what methods and techniques should be utilized when

Mrs. Nappier had me work with one student in her reading SIT group. He was having a hard time following along with the rest of the group. I had him practice writing his word family words. I told him an ending and he put different onsets onto the beginning to make new words. He did a good job working with me. I think having the one on one time helped him focus on the task given to him.

One aspect of my lesson that I felt went well in the implementation of my lesson was the information being grasped by the learners. Before I began my lesson, I asked the learners some questions about the fun phonics letter. I started off by asking the children if they knew what the fun phonic letter for the week was, then I asked them to tell me some words that begins with the letter “Dd”. Next, I read a story called “Harry the dirty dog”. Throughout the story I asked some questions to keep the learners engaged. I asked them questions like “what words that begins with the letter “Dd” did you hear?” I can tell they were engaged because their answers were never off topic. The learners were so excited about the end result of their letter “Dd”

I have never been an excellent student and perennially struggled with English, Math, and Science growing up. These subjects would cast a pall over my day and school work. Anxiety would well up inside of me which often resulted with me passed out across my desk sleeping through parts of class. When I would return home at day’s end, I rarely completed my homework. When I did try to complete homework, it often ended in tears of frustration or the hurling of a book across the room. Taking this class has helped to quell a portion of that anxiety and frustration. It was a grueling class, seemingly impossible at times, but taking this class has given me the confidence to know that not only can I finish the class if I work hard but can also excel! Writing is something that I will exercise throughout my college curriculum and my life. It will help to convey my ideas to the instructor, peers, bosses, and co-workers. In my college curriculum, it will also show my instructors that I’m learning the information provided and how to apply that knowledge appropriately. It will allow me to complete assignments, discussions, and reports, and I will also apply writing in basic communication when necessary.

Since I was unable to help the children with their understanding of the new concept, I spent extra time going over it with them again. The students began to connect previous knowledge to the new concept using descriptive words, sensory words and emotions. As they worked in groups, they were able to think up different points of view for different characters. They played with creativity while giving human characteristic to objects. Students showed a good understanding of the material. One group in my first class gave me a great idea. As they stood up to share the point of view of a specific object, they did not tell us what object they had until the end of their writing. This made the class guess what the object was. I noticed all the students attention became more focused on what they were saying as their brains were churning. Since this was such a fun experience, I decided to continue it with my next couple classes. I was pleased with the outcome of the second lesson and how much the class not only learned from this lesson, but also how much fun they had doing

In determining a topic for my research paper I began to think about what struggles I faced as an eighth grade teacher. I currently teach general education, an integrated co-teaching (ICT) class, and an ESL class in a widely culturally diverse school in Queens. In the last two years I also taught honors classes. I notice that the biggest challenge facing students from all my classes was reading comprehension. It was evident very early on in my teaching career that many struggling students who can technically read quite well don’t understand what they are reading. Their ability to decode words is far greater than their ability to make sense of the words. Without meaning, words are just words!

 But the better students are those who would be able to recognise and point out

If teachers have prior knowledge of the subparts of the English language, as well as knowledge of the diverse cultures he/she is instructing can help the teacher create and blend a comprehensive and student-inclusive lesson plan and curriculum. Prior knowledge influences how the teacher and students interact with the learning materials as both individuals and a group. (Kujawa and Huske, 1995) Prior knowledge assists in segue of appropriate instruction and retention, because it is a foundation from which to build from and facilitates the idea of making sense of the educational experience.