Justice Berumen

Professor Ogden
TED 534
October 25 2021
Commentary: Differing Perspectives from Malcolm X and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

● Describe and justify why your instructional strategies and planned supports are
appropriate for the whole class, individuals, and/or groups of students with specific
learning needs.

It's extremely important for every lesson to be adaptable to a number of different factors
regarding a student’s conditions for learning. In this lesson, there are a number of different
strategies and supports that are incorporated to help student learning.
Because the lesson is primarily focused on the analysis and comparison of two primary
sources, it was extremely important to make sure the primary sources themselves were properly
structured to enable the most accessibility with students. The speeches used for this assignment
require a lot of understanding of the context the speeches were given in; something that cannot
reasonably be taught in a tight content schedule. Thus, the speeches were cut down to aid in
student understanding and focus. For example, Malcolm X’s speech talks a lot about religion.
These sections were removed to help student’s focus on what was the key focus of the lesson:
Malcolm X’s overall approach to the Civil Rights issue of this time period. This relates to a more
general effort to chunk the content out so that it gets to a manageable amount of reading, as both
speeches combined add up to twenty plus pages total. Other things such as side comments made
during the speeches, and interjections from the audience were cut as well to avoid confusion.
The other critical component of the lesson is the questions. While they of course seek to
make students think about the reading, the questions also serve as support for the more difficult
questions at the end of each reading section and at the end of the assignment. These beginning
questions focus more on understanding the content of the reading material, which is typically an
easier task, while simultaneously giving students more tools to help them answer the later, harder
questions. The beginning questions also mostly require some reference to the text, meaning that
students have something to “look” for when completing the question.
The overall design of the lesson is also made to accommodate for a variety of skill levels
and class situations. When done in class, the lesson is conducted in pairs, which allows for
students to not only discuss the content together, but for both of them to work together to
navigate the reading. In this way, students act as support for one another. In the case that a
student must complete the assignment by themselves, they will typically be given more time to
process the readings and answer the questions to make up for not being able to work with a
partner. Students with other specific learning needs, such as those provided in a 504 or IEP can
also use more time to work through the writing.
● Describe key misconceptions and potential roadblocks about teaching the key concepts,
content, skills AND how you will address them.
Due to the nature of these primary sources, it is important that the lesson and the goals its
trying to accomplish are as clear as possible. However, there are still some things that can
potentially be misunderstood or confusing for students. One thing that should be mentioned of
course is that this can change depending on the students. Other roadblocks or misconceptions
may come up because of this fact.
In terms of key concepts, the biggest potential roadblock is that the general idea of
comparing and describing the different approaches covered in this lesson might be difficult for
students to put into words. As mentioned earlier, the questions and reading were designed to help
mitigate those problems, but students might still struggle to see what is meant by each figure's
approach. The plan to address this is to put special emphasis on the questions dealing with the
approaches when a student’s understanding is checked both during and after the lesson.
Content wise, the biggest problem is probably going to be with Malcolm X. Though
things have certainly changed over time regarding his perception in academia, Malcolm X is still
mainly known for his early anti-white viewpoints. This might put some students off from
wanting to read about him. The best plan to deal with this is one that actually starts much earlier,
which involves having students interact with historical figures and content they may not
necessarily “like.” However, dealing with it in the moment is also extremely important. The plan
in that case is to have students consider why Malcolm X may have once held those views using
the readings and what they know regarding the mistreatment of black people before and during
this time period.
The biggest skill obstacles will come from students lacking the proper writing and
argumentative skills necessary to adequately answer the questions. In the case that a student
really struggles with answering the questions, an option to write the answers in more presentable
terms will be presented. Students could write bullet points instead of complete sentences.
● Describe how the formal and informal assessments provide evidence of how students will
USE the content & concepts in the lesson AS WELL AS inquiry, interpretation, or
analysis skills to build arguments or conclusions about historical events, a topic/theme,
or a social studies phenomenon
The formal assessments, which take the form of the numerous questions students will
have to answer in order to “complete” the lesson, demonstrate how students will use the content
from the lesson as well as how they will use analysis skills to create conclusions about this
period of history. For the questions at the end of each reading, the first two task students with
finding information within the text, and then citing a piece of the text that supports their answer.
These questions force students to identify specific content examples from the text while also
forcing them to use the text to support their answer. These first two questions then lead into the
last question for each section, which has students describe the approach of each figure based on
the reading. This question serves as a mini summative assignment for each primary source. It
requires students to have an understanding of the content and tone of each speech, and then use
that information to make a greater argument about the overall approach of the speaker. Students
then use these formed conclusions to answer another set of questions that look at both sources
comparatively. This set of questions forces students to consider both the content and their
interpretations of the sources side by side. One of the key questions of this section requires
students to choose an approach and reason as to why they like that approach more than the other.
These sets of questions have the students use the content of the sources to help interpret the
attitudes of the respectives speakers. They then have to make a series of conclusions based on
this content and their interpretations.
 The informal assessments, which take the form of verbal check-ins during and after the
lesson, seek to confirm and expand upon what the students are expected to know for the formal
assessments. In terms of content and concepts, these check-ins make sure students are actually
reading and understanding what is going on in the readings. For example, a check-in that would
do this would involve having the student verbally restate what the basic idea or ideas are behind
a particular reading or section of a reading. This helps make sure that students are not just
reading for answers, but reading for comprehension. Most of the informal assessments at the end
of the lesson would focus on confirming and expanding the numerous analytical skills necessary
to build arguments about the reading. An example of this is having students defend some of the
positions they are asked to take in the questions at the end of both readings. While students are
not going to be expected to provide excellent counters to the challenge, they will be expected to
consider other points of view and interpretations on the same subject.