Domain C – Artifact Literary Review 1

Domain C – Artifact Literary Review

Kimberlie Ramirez

National University
Domain C – Artifact Literary Review 2

Abstract

This essay will focus on the selection of Artifact #2: Student Work Wall and how this relates to

TPE 5: Student Engagement and TPE 6C: Developmentally Appropriate Practices in Grades 9-

12. I will explore the different ideas of TPE 5 and how student engagement is continued in a

successful classroom and TPE 6C how the lessons can connect to student’s real life. Artifact #2

demonstrates different learning and routines used in the class.

Domain C – Artifact Literary Review 3

Artifact #2: Student Work Wall

Artifact #2 is my classroom wall and all the work the students completed during the reading of

City of Beasts by Isabel Allende. The book was read in five weeks and was divided into four

chapters per week, which may be very overwhelming to some students. In order to maintain

student engagement, many different activities and routines were done. These routines helped me

“monitor student progress toward academic goals as identified in the academic content

standards” because many of them called for deeper thinking, connections to the text and real life

and also explanation of literary devices within the text (Cal TPE). Students completed activities

from character analysis to literary analysis to chalk talks that discuss facing different difficult

situations. This wall also connected into TPE 6C because many of the activities also established

“intellectually challenging academic expectations and [provided] opportunities for students to

develop advances thinking and problem-solving skills” (Cal TPE). After the students completed

each thinking routine or analytical activity, I provided them with feedback which helped me

determine if the students were really engaged and thus moving towards their academic goals.

This feedback also helped students with their problem-solving skills because they would have to

find solutions as to how they can demonstrate deeper understanding and make deeper

connections with the text. Through the first chapters, it was difficult to maintain student

engagement as the reading muscle was being developed and it was also difficult to get students

to engage with the text and be vulnerable as the course was starting, however, the more feedback

I provided, and the more specific it was, the more effort students put into the activities and the

book. As stated in The Challenges of Defining and Measuring Student Engagement in Science,

“research shows that multifarious benefits occur when students are engaged in their own

learning, including increased motivation and achievement” (Sinatra, Heddy and Lombardi). I
Domain C – Artifact Literary Review 4

believe this to be true. The more my students demonstrated engagement with the book and the

activities the more their motivation increased to finish the book and the more achieved they felt

as they received positive feedback. Students also began to make connections from the text to real

life, to the learning targets and the even further to the state adopted standard that was being

targeted with the use of the text. Students began to be more aware of their end goal and were

more driven to put more effort into the assignments. They began to do deeper thinking, look for

the underlying causes of each event and look for connections that gave them lessons for real life.
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Resources

Commission on Teacher Credentialing (2013, March). California Teaching Performance

Expectations. Retrieved from https://www.ctc.ca.gov/docs/default-source/educator-

prep/standards/adopted-tpes-

2013.pdf?TSPD_101_R0=084e6f7cb6ab20004be28235b693a6b7c6bbd6d051d9426ddd1

5fe954e869283ca7e03a9a1c19b3208fc1a12ed143000f48f50c5ae5245aa2997ed6a6b5711

457b9277e57cdb8f3e51c8a626ef13894cec8dee816e9fce686f089cc20e0ca77e

Sinatra, G.M., Heddy, B.C., Lombardi, D. (2015) The Challenges of Defining and Measuring

Student Engagement in Science. Retrieved from

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00461520.2014.1002924