Professional Documents
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Professional Learning Sample
Professional Learning Sample
Evelyn Lashley Week One: February 3rd February 7th 1. How did you spend your time this week? This week I taught all five of the English I classes and part of the Multicultural Lit period. All of the lessons I taught were planned in collaboration with Emily but organized by me. In Multicultural, I led a read-aloud and response worksheet/discussion on a short story from the textbook. They have been introduced to their first summative assessment, which will be a narrative essay about their own cultural identity. In English I we are beginning our Romeo and Juliet unit, of which I will teach the majority. We started the week off with a teen problems activity (that Emily has used before and really liked) to brainstorm issues teens face today. They worked in groups and then put a list of top ten on the board. I went around and circled the issues that R and J face in the play. Students were surprised at how much they could still relate to those issues! I watched Emily teach the lesson twice and then I got to do it for three blocks the next day. Then we started a short research project on eight topics from the Elizabethan era to give students some background on Shakespeare and the time period. They worked in groups and then presented information to the class on their separate topics. At the end of the week, we took notes about the play to give them a foundation for the characters and vocabulary. 2. What were your most satisfying and challenging experiences? My biggest challenge is Multicultural Literature right now. The class is very quiet and made up of upperclassmen, so it has been difficult to get them to participate. Emily and I plan to do an evaluation to ask the students what they would like to get out of the class to hopefully find out their interests and get more participation. The class is an elective, so we cant figure out why they would choose
to take the class and then slack off. It is discouraging that they dont give much effort, and about half the class is skipping every day so we cant get all of the students on the same page. My most satisfying experiences have been getting to know my English I students. Since I have taught their classes all week, they are beginning to see me as a teacher. I have had some rowdy classes, but for the most part I think I am gaining their respect and having some good conversations with them. It is fun but also very tiring to deal with ninth graders! 3. What are the plans for the upcoming week? Next week we will begin reading and watching Romeo and Juliet through various activities. This is the students first experience with Shakespeare so we will have to work through it rather slowly. Emily already has a schedule for the acts and scenes she wants them to read and the ones that we will just watch in the movie. She has taught the unit before so I will take her advice and then add my own adaptations for activities. I think things are going really well so far, and I have been working together with my data team since we have a great relationship already!
3. What are the plans for the upcoming week? On Monday and Tuesday we will read and watch scene five in English I. I have planned an engaging love song activity for the end of Act One. I have chosen four songs and included the lyrics and response questions. Students will work in groups with one of the songs and compare the lyrics to the play. They will say who would be singing the song, to whom he/she would be singing, whether those two characters have a positive or negative relationship, and three lines from the play they can relate to the song. I think it will be fun! Multicultural will be starting their new unit, and I still need to do some planning for that. We had very low attendance on Friday (8 out of twenty-something students), so we will probably have a lot of catch-up to do.
today about it, she said, The students are learning a lot from you. That was a difficult test, and you passed. Im very proud of how things turned out, despite the fact that it was a very difficult situation. 3. What are the plans for the upcoming week? Conferences are next week, book reviews were due today, and two unit summative assessments will be due next week, so I have a lot to prepare for. I have been grading for about 7 hours now, and am finally up to date. Now I am preparing myself for the flood of book reviews in to my email! Next week will be mostly work time for all classes finishing up summative assessments. I cant believe I only have four days left!