Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Esther Boner
Regent University
PLANNING, PREPARATION, INSTRUCTION AND ASSESSMENT 2
Introduction
One quote always comes to mind when I think of planning. This happens to be one that
is often used in the military and was said many times while growing up in a military household.
Fail to plan, and plan to fail. This can’t be truer in teaching as well. Without proper planning
the key parts of a student’s growth might be missed and that would be a huge disservice to our
youth. Planning is where it all starts and from there, we can prepare lessons that are engaging,
excited and filled with depth. Furthermore, as a teacher I am able to check how well I am
teaching as well as how much the students are retaining through assessment. This all links right
back into planning. Planning for the month, or week ahead and being flexible in changing plans
Rationale
Two very important artifacts in this competency are my pre and post assessment. Both of
these were given in an online format through quizizz. I chose to use this technological resource
because I find that the students respond well to the competitiveness of it and seem to be having
fun while testing which takes the edge off of them. The students in this class did very well on
the assessments with a few students needing extra guidance throughout the week. I gave the pre-
assessment the first day I introduced main idea and supporting details. I used the data from this
assessment to modify the lessons I had made for the week. I added small group practice time for
my students whom showed that they needed extra guidance. When in small group I had task
cards that we worked on as a group. These cards are also provided in this competency as an
artifact. The task cards were different each day but gave the students the opportunity to break
down main idea and supporting details and truly understand the topics. The post assessment was
given at the end of the week. The students had a few minutes to gather their thoughts and go
PLANNING, PREPARATION, INSTRUCTION AND ASSESSMENT 3
over definitions of main idea and supporting details if they needed to. This was taken
I have also provided the lesson plans as well as a spreadsheet with data taken throughout
the unit. The lessons are detailed and include plans for use of specific data in the following day.
Each plan has careful consideration of SOL’s for fifth grade and are adapted from the curriculum
guide Virginia Beach Public Schools provided during collaboration. These are the SOL’s that
needed to be focused on in Non-fiction text. The spreadsheet includes data taken over the unit.
This included the pre and post assessment as well as an informal assessment in the middle of the
week. The highlighted scores are ones that I kept an eye on and gave small group instruction to.
The green scores are the scores that showed growth from the first assessment to the final
assessment.
Reflection
Teaching is a roller coaster with many highs and equally there are lows. With careful
planning, continuous change in instruction and relevant assessment the highs can absolutely
outweigh the lows and bring a sense of peace to a classroom environment as well as less stress
on the teacher. In a book review in NATE Classroom teacher, Rachel Yarrow, professed that
while reading she came to understand that when we plan, we also need to take into consideration
learning styles, seating plans and classroom displays. (Yarrow, 2011) These are the things we
often leave out that could save both the students and us as teachers a lot of stress.
Assessment is important in driving forward plans. “An Essential act of our profession is
the crafting of curriculum and learning experiences to meet specified purposes. We are also
designers of assessments to diagnose student needs to guide out teaching and to enable us, our
PLANNING, PREPARATION, INSTRUCTION AND ASSESSMENT 4
students and others to determine whether we have achieved our goals.” (Wiggins & McTighe,
2005) As teachers it is a no brainer that part of our job is to be creative and craft plans and ideas
to help our students. In our careful planning and consideration of creativity we are always
looking to a goal. With assessment we can find the definition of our goal and test to see if we
have achieved it. We can also use assessment to check what the student already knows. This is
important for showing growth as well as making lessons as relevant as possible to all students. If
ninety percent of the class has background knowledge of a topic they are likely going to be bored
Preparation and instruction is simply driven from planning and assessment. The plans are
made with standards in mind the assessments are created to collect data on whether the standards
were taught well and understood by the masses and the preparation and instruction that happens
in between assessments are the moments when lightbulbs are lit, excited happens, and aha
moments can occur. Instruction should be flexible, and change based on the needs of the
students. It should not be one size fits all. Students need to be engaged through platforms that
excite them and knowing their strengths and what drives them and adapting lessons to this
Students and teachers need planning and preparation for different reasons but in the end it
all leads to less stress for the teacher, and a learning environment that is the best for student
success. Goals, assessment, and flexibility are large parts of the planning and implementation
process that should be considered while creating or crafting engaging lesson plans. Teachers
have the means to create students whom are world leaders as long as we can plan and prepare
Bibliography
Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by Design. Upper Saddle River: Pearson
Education Inc.
Yarrow, R. (2011). The Complete Guide to Lesson Planning and Preparation. NATE Classroom,
79.