Lesson Plan Reflection 6

This was my last lesson with my student. I had my student write her very own Thanksgiving story. I found out this was a great way to engage my student. First, we picked out the main character in the story. Next we came up with the time and place the story was to take place in. And lastly we decided what the plot and the conflict of the story was. My student did have trouble using her creativity and coming up with the rest of her story. I feel maybe instead of the game I used to create the Thanksgiving characters, plot time, place, conflict, and plot I should have had the student come up with that on her own and maybe she could have been more creative from the beginning. The student eventually was able to come up with the rest of her story on her own with a few prompts from me. It was interesting to me to see what my student was able to come up with. After she had her story written I allowed my student to draw a picture of what her story was about or what was going to happen next in the story. My student chose to write a picture about what was happening next in her story. I enjoyed seeing my student get excited about her story.
Over the course of working with my child it was interesting to me to see her strengths and her limitations. This was a good starting field experience for me. I enjoyed this experience because I have chosen to add a literacy minor.

Lesson Plan 5 Reflection

I feel like I have finally got my student engaged in our lesson plan! 😊 This makes me happy because I was getting the feeling I was boring her and not engaged her mind in our lesson plan and during our time together. In the past I have expressed concern about not finding activities that engaged my student enough or challenged her enough. What I discovered is my student is very "book" smart. What challenges my student is thinking outside of just the fundamentals or creating her own work. For example, during the story we read together today I tried to ask her questions that got her creative juices flowing. This makes me excited for our next lesson plan together where she has to come up with and write her own story. My student was able to quickly answer questions that had a specific answer such as what happened in the beginning or the ending of the story. We played a game that required her to change the end of the story The True Story of the Three Little Pigs. This stumped her, which made me happy! I could tell she really needed to dig deep and use her higher order thinking skills to answer this question because there was no clear right or wrong answer. As a bonus, she also got excited about her alternate ending! This makes me very excited for our next lesson plan together because she gets the opportunity to create her own story herself. I wish I would have discovered this information sooner but I'm just happy I finally did!

Lesson Plan 4 Reflection

During this session with my student she was given the Writing Vocabulary Words assessment. I was shocked on how many words she could write and the length of some of them! The word that she wrote that surprised me the most was the word 'nineteen', thats a long word for a five year old! I actually enjoy doing this assessments with the child because she always seems to surprise me on how much she knows and it really is a good tool to find out what my child knows.
With my actual lesson though I still wish I could get my child more engaged in the lesson. I really tried to bring things she was interested in, for example the Pete the Cat book and I brought a vocabulary bingo game this time but she still seemed very relaxed and not engaged. I wonder if this is just her shy personality or if it is me not being able to reach her yet. Regardless, I will continue to try my hardest and get her more engaged and excited about learning!