Samples:
Sample 1:
What Do I See?
Whenever
one surfs the net, they will find a wide variety of quality of the information
available. This is true with lesson plans too. For example, the
lesson plan "Color Words" (CW) lists an objective whereas "First Grade,
First Grade What do You See?" (YS) lists none. YS has no time allotment
given, while CW clearly states realistic time allotments and even warns
to "be prepared to stay with this project." CW allows for instruction
and modeling of the use of software (I pretended that use of the computer
hardware was covered with the software) while the YS just tells the teacher
to scan the page "that best represents their region." Instruction and modeling
of the use of the software for completion of the CW project is clearly
listed. There is ample opportunity for each student to become familiar
with the software used in the CW lesson. With the YS lesson, only the teacher
uses the computer. The CW lesson is also very organized with the use of
the computer resources and with the manila envelopes to keep completed
work in.
The
creation of a book utilizing technology with the CW lesson is a multi-faceted
learning experience for the students. They will reinforce color recognition,
the spelling of different colors, language arts (writing sentences) while
they use clip-art and data- processing software. The CW lesson plan
allows for all the students to experience success with their work in having
it "published" in a book, while the YS has the teacher scan and "publish" one
winning project on the internet. This level of "publishing" would
be a great sense of success to the winner, but it might really discourage
other students.
The
YS lesson plan and the CW plan are both grade level appropriate. The YS
plan is very creative and could be modified to be a great technology-based
language arts lesson. If computer usage was taught and modeled,
the students could write their sentence using a data-processing program.
Their pictures could be scanned onto the computer, or computerized clip
art could be used. Each student would create a page for a classroom book
that could be "published" and displayed for a special parent visit such
as Open House. This would turn this project into a community-building,
collaborative project where all the students could experience a sense of
success. As with many recipes, instructions and now, lesson plans,
I take the best of what is presented and augment, delete and modify to
create a strategy or procedure that will meet the needs of the moment. What
do I see?--a chance to develop an idea into a really interesting lesson.
***Rubrics with grades and the lesson plans are shown on the following pages.
Sample 2:
The first lesson "Greek Gods and Goddesses Power Point" I consider to
be a good use of technology. The lesson asks that students pick
a god or goddess and design a slide show presentation. Their objective
and essential information are clearly stated and there are samples for
students to explore. The references are very broad and include reference
books, magazines, electronic bulletin board, audio and media presentations,
and the internet. They are encouraged to find clip art, graphics,
charts, maps, and diagrams. The students will also be given a copy
of the assessment rubric at the beginning and will be asked to do a self-assessment
of their project.
Using my rubric to assess this lesson I would rate this very high. In
the area of reference you could easily find four or more technical sources. By
using the internet, power point, Word, and clip art. Under creativity,
the possibilities are limitless. The students can easily find original
materials and use visual and audio effects in their presentation. Again,
in interest level this a great project because you could make this a fun
entertaining presentation by asking the audience questions to test their
knowledge. In the essential question the lesson plan states to describe
the gods domain, family background, symbols etc. I applaud the teacher
here she does not burden them with too many details and lets the students
come up with their own information. The only advice to the teacher
would be to encourage the students that if they wanted to do charts or
graphs that Excel is a good program to use.
The second lesson "The
Perfect Performance" I consider to be a poor use of technology. The
author of this lesson is asking students to design the perfect performance
by answering questions in essay form and then present it to the class. At
least this is my understanding of the lesson. He expects one person
in the group to be a web researcher. Well that is great for the
one student to learn about technology but what about the other two students. Why
not ask for three areas of technology to be explored. For example,
why not ask all to explore different areas of putting together a performance
on the internet. One person could look for sheet music, songs, melodies
etc. The other could look for background information about the music
like who wrote it, when, the genre, etc. The third could look for
places to have the performance like concert halls, amphitheaters, stadiums,
etc. Then to finish off this project it could be put together in
a power point or slide presentation. The students could have pictures
of the performance place, music, and give background on who wrote the music. They
could even include an audio of the music playing in the background. This
would be a much more all-inclusive lesson. Because someday they
may actually have to find a place to hold a concert or need sheet music.
Using my rubrics I would give this lesson a very low score. The only
reference for technical use was the internet. Which if they were able
to find multiple websites I would give them points but only one person is
doing the work. The essential question was very lacking giving
only two examples of questions and not giving much in the way of what the
teacher expects. In the summary it states that students much answer
questions in essay form. This might be hard for students without a
little more information. Especially, when in the learning content
it discusses using this lesson to teach proper etiquette in any performance. But
in the questions the students are to answer it does not mention this. This
assignment asks for very little creativity. In the assessment plan,
it states that each group will present their Perfect Performance to the class
and that the stage areas will be displayed on the walls of the room but gives
no guidelines. The interest level is very weak. It gives no
encouragement for audience participation or originality.
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