Oral Communication
I chose the vocabulary as my effective lesson for speaking because it was the most outstanding out of the few Listening/Speaking standards I did on my lesson plans. The students responded quickly the name of the photo I was showing them using my iPad. In this lesson we were studying “What Makes Puerto Rico Unique?” and we were exploring different topics such
as music, traditions, celebrities, places and many more that have made Puerto Rico’s culture unique and beautiful. Since it was a theme that the students know well, their responses were excellent and they were active the whole lesson because they knew about the topic in discussion and that was what engaged them. Now, for my least effective lesson, I chose the last show and tell I gave my students. Why? Because only a handful of students actually did their oral speech. The rest of the students claimed that they forgot or that they didn’t have anyone at home that knows English to help them. I was disappointed because their excuses were not acceptable for many of them, it was their third show and tell. They knew already how it worked. Some students even claimed that I didn’t gave that homework and when I checked a student’s notebook it was given with more than one week anticipation and I reminded the activity every day.
Written Communication
For my outstanding writing lesson I chose “Create Your Own Fable”. This activity was the best I had in the semester with my students. I let their imagination run wild as far as the story goes but they had to select a character, setting and moral from a worksheet I gave to them. Their task was to write an original story using those pre-selected items. I wanted to make it easier for them, so I decided to that. The activity was in groups of three or four and this part was a bit tricky to get them under control and focused but that is part of putting students into groups. The stories/fables they came up with were hilarious, fun and overall original. The character that it was chosen the most was the dog. Now, for my least effective writing lesson I chose was when I did a PP presentation on the writing process. After giving the five steps of the writing process, I wanted to make an example with the whole group just so that they could understand what they were going to do. Some students got some of the steps but the rest was lost. Only three students got the first step right, brainstorming, right. The rest didn’t comprehend what I was asking them. I asked to give me words so we could use to later form a story but they kept asking “what?” I was
highly frustrated and I didn’t know what else to do to get them to the point I wanted them. My objectives for this day were definitely not met at all.
Reading Comprehension
My outstanding lesson in reading comprehension was reading the fable “The Lion and the
Mouse�. The students loved reading this fable, mainly because of the characters. They were fascinated with the fact that it was about a lion and a mouse. Before reading the fable, I asked them what do they think was going to happen in the story and everybody said that the lion was going to eat the mouse. As we entered reading, the students were in awe at how the mouse was offering his help for the lion if the lion sparred his life. When we finished, they couldn't believe that a little mouse helped the lion of being caught by the humans. I liked reading this fable with my students they liked it so much and that is why I selected it as my most outstanding lesson. Now, for the least effective, I chose the story of "The Keeping Quilt" by Patricia Polacco mainly because most of the students would get lost in the plot. Since it was an immigration story, the students didn't like it very much but that was the selected reading from the Unit 3.2. I tried to look for other books/readings that would be more appealing to my students but most of them I had to buy it. So, my cooperating teacher said to look for the readings that were in the books she had and we found that. I tried to do different techniques to try get the reading more appealing like reading in a circle on the floor, in pairs, etc. It made reading the story a bit fun but, I had to stop constantly and translate the story because they wouldn't understand.
Integration of Technology
For integration of technology of four classes I gave using PowerPoint presentations all were outstanding but if I had to select one, it would be the lesson where I presented the vocabulary words for the story "The Keeping Quilt". The students loved the presentation because I made the presentation interactive. When every vocabulary word was going to appear, the students had to push an imaginary button on their desks and the word would appear. At the end of the presentation, I integrated a little vocabulary game where it would appear a picture and they had to say which vocabulary word was that picture.
Importance of Lesson Planning in TC's Development
In my opinion, it is very important to make lesson plans because it is the document that guides you through everything you are going to do in class. Writing lesson plans is not an easy task when you are first submerging yourself in this whole new world of lesson planning. It wasn't easy for me at first, I would say that it was a tedious experience at first because writing objectives was the hardest part of writing the lesson plans. Finding the right objective and how to put it correctly it wasn't easy. I wish that lesson planning was given more in previous courses because it's one of the essential things in practice teaching. If I got to do this all over again, I would have said in preparatory education courses to give more practice in lesson planning. Now, I don't consider myself and expert just yet but I'm getting there. What helped doing the lesson planning more easily was to do it weekly instead of every day. With weekly planning you have an outline of what are you going to do the whole week and if you need to change it a little bit, it is easier than changing it for the next day. Now I know for sure that going into class without a lesson plan is a recipe for disaster. Unless you're a veteran in this field, but for being a rookie it is not good. I remember those first weeks in practice when I started giving the class and I would go to my cooperating teacher and tell her that I felt that my lesson plans weren't good enough. She told me that they were good but I needed to re-write the objectives because they were not clear. Then she gave us a little crash course on how to write lesson plans effectively and everything became clearer. Finding the time to write lesson plans is a bit chaotic if you have other responsibilities too, like a job and taking a class in the university. I would recommend to not take a course if you are in practice teaching because it can get a little overwhelming. In summary, lesson planning in TC's experience is highly important because it is the foundation of
your career. That is the document where you expose what you are going to give to your students and how.