Culminating Experience Part 4B: Written Reflection 

The Culminating Experience provided me a space to use my skills and 

knowledge learned throughout my time here at St. Edward’s to solve an inquiry or 

question related to my discipline and reflect on that process. For me, this included the 

Action Project assignment that I completed as a part of my seminar course grade that 

serves as the inquiry that I investigated.  

In the first SLO, I used appropriate evidence from mentor observations and 

self-assessment of teaching behaviors to identify a vexing instructional behavior to 

change. My mentor teacher, Ms. Maudlin, pointed out that sometimes in activities it’s 

difficult to gauge how much time to give because of the varying levels of abilities in the 

classroom. After an observation of a Spanish 3 class I taught, she noted that sometimes 

it’s good to move on even if some are still working on the activity if some people are 

done with it. In that particular class, there are several native and heritage speakers 

who often work through assignments quickly or have other challenge areas that other 

students do not. My supervisor, Mr. Estrello, also observed this class another day and 

mentioned to me that I should work to find a way to keep these students engaged and 

learning. After receiving these notes from these observations, I started to think about 

ways I could keep students engaged. The open-ended question I explored was “how do 

I engage students with varying levels of ability?”. I thought that creating extension 

activities to deepen the learning when students finish the original assignment would 

help bridge this gap. In my action plan, I outlined my plan to implement extension 

activities which included adding a section to my lesson plan, asking other teachers in 
the department, and creating a classroom procedure & routine. My goal is to make 

extension activities part of the regular everyday and that students will think of 

extension activities as a way to deepen their learning. In Chapter 4 Element 9 in the 

“Art and Science of Teaching”, Marzano states that effective practice is crucial to help 

develop fluency because “it involves students gradually learning and then shaping the 

steps of a process” (Marzano 65). These extension activities will hopefully over time 

extend students’ thinking of the topic. 

The second SLO focused on the synthesis and application of my skills and 

knowledge that I gained from the curriculum which is evidenced by my electronic 

portfolio. This electronic portfolio had all of the standards listed by the state of Texas 

with evidence for each of the dimensions as well as a written explanation for why that 

evidence showed competency in the dimension. The evidence ranged from lesson 

plans to activities to reflections depending on the dimension. The example I used in 

my presentation was Dimension 2.5 Monitor & Adjust. I choose this as an example to 

show to the class because it was a good example of how I applied my skills and 

knowledge to student teaching. In this example, I had been working with the Spanish 1 

students for a few weeks and had them attempt an assessment for Ser vs. Estar. A 

handful of students showed competency on the assessment, but the rest of the class 

was still struggling with how to differentiate between the two. Because of the results of 

this assessment, I decided to adjust the lessons to follow in order to support students 

in their learning and ensure comprehension. I created this assignment that had 

students slow down the work a little bit, so that I could understand where the 
confusion was for students. It had the students define the vocabulary word highlighted 

because I thought it might because students understand the words in the sentence and 

were therefore just guessing which verb to use. Then, after defining the vocabulary 

word, students had to decide the characteristics it fell under based on the acronyms 

they learned. This would help me further monitor students and adjust after 

understanding where the confusion lied. Element 13 in Chapter 5 of Marzano discusses 

the importance of collecting informal assessment information in order “to anticipate 

student needs and make helpful resources immediately available” (Marzano 104).   

In SLO 3, I evaluated the results of my inquiry about extension activities 

through a written reflection and progress report assignment that discussed the 

effectiveness of behavioral changes to instruction to improve practice. In the Action 

Plan part 2, I discussed how it went in the actual classes. In the smaller classes, the 

extension activities went well because I was able to remind students of the procedures 

and encourage students to reach the learning goals by completing the extension 

activities. However, in the larger classrooms, it was difficult for the procedure to 

become routine because I wasn’t able to remind students and encourage them to 

complete the extension activities as much. I was much more focused on students 

completing the original assignment and ensuring that they all had the same level of 

understanding of the concept. I then discussed on my slideshow how I also reflected 

upon how I might change things in the future in order to better implement extension 

activities in my classroom. I discussed changing the assignment, so that it was a long 

term assignment or so that the assignments connected in some way. I also talked 
about how setting the procedures and expectations at the beginning of the year would 

likely be easier than trying to implement them in the middle of the year.  

In Chapter 8 Element 33, Marzano reminds me how important rules and 

procedures are because “research shows that establishing rules and procedures 

results in a decrease in disruptive behavior” (Marzano 235). I think this will greatly 

increase the functionality and usefulness of extension activities if I introduce this 

routine at the beginning of the year. In Chapter 10 Element 41, Marzano also says that 

identifying your expectation levels of your students is crucial because the goal is to 

demonstrate value and respect for reluctant learners. In order to do that, I have to 

identify my differential treatment of reluctant learners because they tend to be praised 

less. I want to create an environment where every student feels valued and respected 

and where every student is held to high expectations, in this case completing the 

extension activities or doing your best to attempt the activity to further your learning. 

Ensuring that my expectations are clear and equal will help make the extension 

activities be implemented better. Element 1 in Chapter 1 also provides evidence that 

backs up my claim given in Action Plan Part 2 that communicating clear learning goals 

will enhance the intrinsic motivation of students to complete the extension activities.