Australian Professional Standards for Teachers

Part A: Explanations
4.1: Maintain a supportive and safe learning environment for students:
Support student participation:
"Identify strategies to support inclusive student participation and engagement in
classroom activities."
The focus area for this standard is to support student participation. This is
accomplished through the inclusion of students within a supervised activity. The
lesson plan places students within a cooperative, team work based activity which
has students work towards the same goal. By having all students work together
to try to reach the same outcome they will be supportive and inclusive of each
other. At the end of the lesson plan students are invited to share how they
personally solve problems and then articulate to other students what their
process is. This supports students individuality and allows them to express this in
an inclusive environment. This standard is successfully used in the lesson plan to
achieve its focus area.

3.2: Plan for and implement effective teaching and learning: Plan,
structure and sequence learning
"Plan lesson sequences using knowledge of student learning, content and
effective teaching strategies."
The focus area for this standard is to plan, structure and sequence
learning. This is accomplished in the lesson plan through the sequencing of
activities in a logical manner throughout the plan so that each activity provides
scaffolding for the next. After the students have had the problem explained to
them the method of solving the problem is broken up in chunks and approached
in steps one at a time with a visual aid using hula hoops. This ensures that
students understand each step in the solution individually before undertaking the
question as a whole. With the newly gained knowledge the lesson plan then has
the students apply the knowledge by working out a similar problem as a team.
After this problem has been solved the students are then faced with a harder
version of the problem to solve. By using logical sequencing students can more
effectively understand, apply and master new content.

2.3 Know the content and how to teach it: Curriculum, assessment and
reporting
"Use curriculum, assessment and reporting knowledge to design learning
sequences and lesson plans."

The focus area of this standard is curriculum, assessment and reporting

which ensures that the content being taught in the lesson plan is relevant to the
learning needs and required outcomes of the students. At the beginning of the
lesson plan links to outcomes from the Australian Curriculum which the plan
fulfils are provided as well as a description of what these outcomes are. By doing
so the relevance of this lesson plan can be validated as being necessary for
students to learn as well as meeting the outcomes of which are required. By
doing so the plan ensures that students will be granted all of the knowledge
needed to undertake this task and that the knowledge granted from this task will
allow students to undertake future tasks as well. This focus area is important for
ensuring that students learn all of the content which is required.

1.1 Know students and how they learn: Physical, social and intellectual
development and characteristics of students
"Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of physical, social and intellectual
development and characteristics of students and how these may affect learning."
The focus area for this standard is to know the physical, social and
intellectual development and characteristics of students. The lesson plan
accommodates for students at different points in physical, social and intellectual
development by approaching this content with various strategies and difficulty
levels in order to meet the needs of a broader range of students. By first working
as a large group students who are more developed intellectually and more
confident socially may take charge while others may not. In order to account for
this the problem is then approached in just pairs and with a less difficult problem
in order to meet the needs of students who may be more shy or have more
difficulty understanding the content. By applying a range of methods for
teaching the same content the content is more likely to be understood and
engaged with by a greater range of the students.

("Standards | Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership", 2016)

Part B: Report
Section 1:
The selected focus areas from the lesson plan, "Problem Solving Lesson:
Traffic Jam!" (Sing, 2013)i, cater to the learning needs of students as they cover a
large range of issues which may be present with students as well as providing
the flexibility to find and cater to new learning needs. The plan accomplishes this
by knowing students physical, social and intellectual development
characteristics, by planning and structuring learning in a logical way, by

supporting student participation and by using the curriculum, assessment and

reporting.
The plan caters to students on a full class and individual level as it applies
teaching approaches from both of these levels. Standard 3.2 "plan, structure and
sequence learning" is effectively applied as the lesson plan teaches its content in
a logical manner. The content is first explained on a whole class level with the aid
of hula hoops as a visual guide, this caters to students who may find an aural or
visual explanation easier as it makes use of both. Once each step has been
explained and the initial problem has been solved as a class students are then
placed into pairs and made to solve an easier version of the problem. This caters
to linguistic and cultural needs of students as those who may be having difficulty
understand the teachers explanations may find the content easier to
comprehend when it is explained by one of their peers who likely uses language
in a form they may be more used to.
This use of logical sequencing also applies to standard 1.1 "physical, social
and intellectual development and characteristics of students" as by breaking
students into smaller groups and having them work out an easier version of the
problem it caters to students who may be less socially and intellectually
developed as other students. By placing them in small groups with an easier
problem students who may not have understood the initial class explanation will
have an easier time understanding the problem when it's on a smaller scale, this
caters to students needs on an individual level. By placing students in this small
groups it also caters to individual students who may not be as socially confident
or more introverted as these students may have difficulty participating within the
large group example but will be more comfortable as part of a pair.
The use of various group sizes ties into standard 4.1 "support student
participation" as students who may not have the confidence to participate in the
full group problem will at least then be able to participate in the pair activity.
After the pair activity has been completed the plan then gives the whole class a
more difficult version of the problem to solve together. By approaching the
content in this sequence students are ensured to all have participated with the
question and to understand the content so that they have the skills needed to
participate in this final problem. Once the problem has been solved the lesson
plan calls for students to discuss they're own strategies for solving the problem.
Once again this caters to cultural and linguistic learning needs as hearing
explanations from their peers who likely share similar cultural or linguistic
aspects can be an effective means for some students to comprehend the
content.
Standard 2.3 "Curriculum, assessment and reporting" caters to students
learning needs as it ensures that the content which the students are being
taught applies to their required outcomes. This is achieved in the plan as it
provides links to the outcomes from the Australian Curriculum which the plan
fulfils. By doing this it is easier to ensure that students have already undertaken
the outcomes and content which may be required before attempting the new

content delivered in the plan. By recording which outcomes are addressed in

each plan it is easier to keep a record of the literacy, numeracy and other skills
of students to ensure they are ready for this task. The plan could be further
improved if previous assessment results were examined to see how students
have performed in previous outcomes. By doing this the learning needs of
students can be more effectively catered to as the skills which may require more
work or the effectiveness of previous teaching methods can be examined and
applied to this lesson plan to enhance it. By applying this the individual learning
needs of students can be identified and catered for.

Section 2:
By reflecting upon the peer feedback I received on my draft explanations
for my standards I was able to revise the explanations based on criticisms and
then use the insight gained to guide my report. The feedback I received was
given by William Nguyen, Vincent Brian Quiaem and Kristy-Anne Peterson.
Generally the feedback I received was positive and confirmed that the
direction that I was taking was correct. The feedback agreed with my choice of
standards and also highlighted points in my explanation which were considered
most effective. Using this feedback gave my revisions and report direction as I
could identify the strongest points in my draft explanations and further pursue
them in the report. For instance Kristy-Anne's feedback stated "The annotations
went into great detail about how each standard related to the lesson plan" and
Vincent's stated "Key areas of focus cater to student's learning needs through
recognition of gifted students in social and intellectual contexts". This feedback
confirmed that the standards which I had chosen were effective and did not need
to be changed in my revised explanations and that the standards would be
effective in providing student learning needs when discussed in part 2, section 1
of the report.
While there weren't many, the criticisms which were given in the feedback
forms were insightful and provided details of how my explanations could be
improved or corrected. For instance William's feedback said that my explanations
for standard 2.3 were not specific enough. In order to apply this feedback I
revised my explanation for standard 2.3 and included more specific explanations
from the lesson plan, this was done by identifying where the lesson plan provided
links to the Australian Curriculum.
By incorporating and reflecting on peer feedback I was able to correct and
improve on my standard explanations in Part 1 and guide my report for part 2,
section 1 of this paper.

Hayden Clark
17705484

Sing, J. (2013). Problem Solving Lesson: Traffic Jam! Australian Curriculum Lessons.

[online]

Australian

Curriculum

Lessons.

Available

at:

http://www.australiancurriculumlessons.com.au/2013/01/15/problem-solving-lesson-traffic-jam/
[Accessed 22 April. 2016].
Standards | Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership. (2016). Aitsl.edu.au.
Retrieved 22 April 2016, from http://www.aitsl.edu.au/australian-professional-standards-forteachers/standards/list