Department of Teacher Education & Learning Sciences

Elementary Education Program

Formal Observation Reflection

Directions: Complete the reflection questions and submit your response to your observer prior to having a post-
conference to discuss the observation. If a conference is held immediately after the observation you will submit
your responses to the observer the following day via email.

Name: Katherine Hill Date: 11/13/17

1. To what extent were learning outcomes appropriate and achievable to your students?
The learning outcomes were achievable. By the end of the lesson, students knew that
landforms were physical features that define a region and they could identify characteristics
of specific landforms.
2. How effective were your instructional strategies? What changes would you make in
your instructional approaches if you taught this lesson again? Why?
I think my instructional strategies were effective. I forgot to have students draw a
representation for each landform on the chart so that is something that may have helped
them when forming with the Playdoh but I think they still had enough information to make
landforms. If I taught this lesson again I would have been more clear about the task with the
playdoh and expectations when students are done. Many students made a landform then
changed their mind and made another or they did not discuss the features of their landform.
Students were very engaged and on task with the Playdoh so I think the activity was
successful. I was not able to compare and contrast student creations because one of the
students I was going to used destroyed his landform before I had a chance to pick it up.

3. Evaluate the effectiveness of your oral and written communication with students.
(Consider how well you communicated learning objectives, clarity of directions, use of standard English, quality of
questions and effectiveness of discussion techniques.)

I think oral communication during while filling out the chart was good. Students seemed to
comprehend the task and if they did not I felt I appropriately addressed their confusion. I feel
like I could have better addressed expectations with the Playdoh, I felt all over the place a bit.
However, students did very well with the Playdoh so my expectations came across in some
way. As far as directions for the task, I should have been more clear. I dont remember
specifically what I said but I should have laid it out this way: choose a landform to create (tell
them they may not change their mind because they will have an opportunity to recreate later),
create the landform, wait for partner to finish, guess what your partner made, then explain
how you incorporated the characteristics on the chart into your creation, after you have done
all of that, you may make a new landform. For the second round, I think I did a little better in
communicating directions however some students still did not listen so I could have improved
in some way. Overall, I feel like communication of the content was good and students met the
desired learning objectives.
 4. Evaluate the level of student engagement in your lesson . (Consider how you presented the
content/skills, the activities and assignments for students, grouping of students, and structure and pacing of the
lesson.)

I think students were very engaged in my lesson. Student interest was definitely more
elevated when working with Playdoh but I did not see any obvious disinterest when filling out
the chart. I do not think I would do anything different in this category. I think the content was
presented in an interested way and both activities took up the appropriate amount of time.

5. How effectively did you use instructional materials, resources, and/or technology?
I think materials and technology were used effectively. There were no slip ups that I recall. I
think I should probably practice writing neater on the Smartboard.

6. To what extent were your assessment strategies effective? What changes would you
make in your assessment approach if you taught this lesson again? Why?
I think I was able to effectively assess students because I talked to each student specifically
while they were creating their landforms. I had them identify defining characteristics to me
and all students were able to in some way. There was no concrete type of assessment, I did
not think that was necessary in this lesson. Through talking with students, I was able to
identify if they were understanding the content.

7. To what extent was your feedback to students accurate, substantive, constructive,

specific, and/or timely?
Feedback was immediate. If a student represented a landform incorrectly, I talked through it
with them and reminded them to refer back to the chart. One specific distinction I had to
make was that an island and peninsula are not the same thing. Many students were saying
that a peninsula was an island surrounded by water on 3 sides. I made this clarification to the
entire class. All feedback was constructive and helpful to students.

8. To what extent did the classroom management and environment contribute to student
learning? (Consider your classroom procedures, your use of physical space, and the students conduct.)

I thought that overall classroom management and the learning environment contributed to
student learning. As mentioned above, miscommunication in directions caused some
confusion among students but I do not think it was detrimental to learning. I think
expectations with Playdoh could have been clearer but we had no slip up with that so I dont
interfered with student learning. At the beginning of the lesson, I directed students to not sit
past a certain desk and two students did not interpret them at all. I had to ask one student
multiple times to come to the carpet, I do not know if she could not hear me or if she was
confused but I felt bad that I had to call her out a little bit. I do not know if you noticed this but
that is something I could not understand why it happened, I thought my directions were clear.

9. Did you make modifications to your lesson plan during the lesson? If so, what were
they and what motivated these changes?
I was unable to compare and contrast the landforms with students because there were only
two students who made the same one and one student destroyed his before I got there so I
just wrapped up the lesson with my final thoughts.

10. Was your Teaching Behavior Focus goal met?

I think I was somewhat withit but I could improve. I was sick on this day so I really did not
feel with it in all areas but I tried my best to be energetic and attentive to students and their
learning. There were not many instances where I had to think on my feet. One example
would be at the end when I could not compare and contrast and I think I reacted OK to that
situation. I kind of had to be with it when students did not follow directions but that did not
affect the lesson too much, we just did not have as good of a discussion as I thought we
could.