Name:

Student Video Reflection Guidelines

Childhood Literacy (3rd-6th)

Directions: Using the questions below, use specific evidence from your video to support your answers (e.g.
time stamp of the lesson, what you specifically did, what the students specifically did, etc.). Write your answer
to each question starting on page 2.

1. Identify the learning experience by including the following:

a. Date and Time of lesson
b. Description of your lesson topic and central focus

2. How did you demonstrate mutual respect for, rapport with, and responsiveness to children with varied
needs and backgrounds, and challenge children to engage in learning?

3. Explain how your instruction engaged students in developing an essential literacy strategy and related
skills?

4. Describe how your instruction linked students’ prior academic learning, and personal, cultural, and
community assets with new learning

5. Explain how you elicited and built on student responses to promote thinking and apply the essential
literacy strategy using related skills to comprehend or compose text.

6. Explain how modeled the essential literacy strategy and supported students as they practiced or applied
the strategy to comprehend or compose text in a meaningful way.

7. What changes would you make to your instruction to better support children’s learning related to the
central focus of your lesson?

8. Explain why you think these changes would improve children’s learning. Support your explanation with
evidence of student learning and principles from theory and/or research.

9. List three things you think you did exceptional in and create 3 goals for your next lesson.

PUT ALL ANSWERS FOR QUESTIONS 1-9 STARTING ON THE NEXT PAGE AND MAKE SURE
YOU NUMBER EACH ONE. ALSO, SKIP A LINE BETWEEN EACH ANSWER. START EACH ONE
ON ITS OWN LINE!
NAME: Shelley Quema

1. A) Date and Time of lesson: 03/22/2022, 8:45am-9:30am. B) Description of your lesson topic and
central focus: my lesson consisted of teaching the students about plot structure and character
development, though I went more into depth about theme rather than character development. I read a
book, Those Shoes, to the students and each student had been assigned a plot structure topic that they
had to listen for and write their answer down. I then plotted the students' answers on a plot structure
mountain poster in order to show the sequence of plot structure events. The central focus aimed to teach
students about what creates a plot. Students will be taught what an exposition, rising action, climax,
falling action, and resolution is. As well as learn about how characters’ feelings can change throughout a
story.

2. To demonstrate mutual respect with my students, I laid out the rules of our activity prior to starting. I
also made sure to acknowledge each and every thing that they said to me so they knew that I was
listening to them. I think because of this, it encouraged them to veer off topic and have side
conversations so I do need to make sure that I gain their attention back and have them understand that
it’s not a talking time. I held them all to the same rules and expectations I set out. I made sure to speak in
a calm voice and not a stern voice because if I had spoken a stern voice they would’ve thought they were
in trouble. Help build rapport with my students, prior to starting my lesson I talked to them about how
their morning was going so far and just had them tell me about their week. By doing this, it increased
their comfort with me and each other and it helped them learn to trust me. At one point, Kassidy had
confided in me that she was being bullied about her height. I knew some of my students were on the
lower level of reading so in order to help them, I defined vocabulary prior to reading, gave them more
time to write down their answers, I spelled things out for them when they asked for help, I also would
give them reminders if they forgot something. About a minute into my video, one of the students said
only one of us knows what the vocabulary means and I responded saying that it was OK because it was
my job to help her remember and learn what it means. I think this helped comfort them because they
didn’t feel the pressure to know what the lesson was about. Towards the end of my lesson, I knew
students were starting to drift off and so to gain their attention back, I held up my vocabulary/student
jobs and tried having them guess what the vocabulary word meant. It was a great way to redirect their
attention back to me and to test their knowledge on what I taught them. I feel like they liked it more
because it felt like a game.

3. Right now, my students are learning skills that are essential to the New York State exams. My teacher
puts a heavy emphasis on text evidence because they will be taking the ELA portion next week. So in
my lesson I too put a heavy emphasis on text evidence. 15 minutes into my lesson, one of my students
was struggling with spelling a word, and so I said why don’t we go back to the text and look for the
word so we can spell it right. I would pause throughout the story to ask the questions that required them
to refer back to the text, or the book in general. My questions helped engage them with the story. The
students would point to characters' faces to describe how the character feels, they would refer back to
portions of the text to tell me their part of the plot structure, they were even able to make predictions
throughout the story that were correct. I made sure that my questions didn’t set them up for failure but
rather set them up for success because they can always refer back to the text to look for the answer.
When I’m helping them during their testing prep and they can’t figure out the answer to a
comprehension question, I always tell them to look at the story again because the answer is there and
they just need to look for it.

4. During a previous lesson, my students had learned about plot structure and character development.
Before the start of my lesson, I had referred back to the book they read to help them remember what plot
structure was. By referring back to something they already did, it helped them remember what plot
structure was. They were able to use their previous skills and apply it to my lesson. Before reading the
book, all of my students shared something that they wanted and something that they needed. They all
 justified their personal choices for wanting and needing that item. My questioning at the end of my
lesson really helps them reflect on what they have, both literally and figuratively. They were able to use
their personal experiences and connect it to the story. Though my students didn’t talk much about their
community assets, I think that my lesson could have engaged them to talk about the community. One of
my students did mention the difference between living in the city, like the main character in the book,
versus living in the country. She would much prefer living in the countryside because of what her dad
does for work and because she loves animals and living in the countryside allows her to have a space to
have as many animals as she wants. I asked her if living in the city would allow her to have animals and
she said no because in the city there isn’t a lot of space. Questioning allowed her to connect where she
lives to how the character in the story lives. I even mentioned, at the end of my lesson, about children all
over the world not having the things that they want and need. I made a self to world connection to help
them understand what they have, some others don’t. Help them reflect on the things that they have and
help them be grateful for it.

5. For my lesson, I think that my questioning was extremely important in order for them to use their
literacy skills. From the start of my lesson, when I asked about wants and needs and the difference
between the both of them, it prompted them to think about and reflect on their lives. With their
responses, the students and I were able to make connections between the students and between the
students and the story. In order for the students to answer my questions throughout the lesson, they had
to refer back to the text if they didn’t remember it by memory. The questions I ask further emphasize
referring back to the text evidence, which is an essential skill that the students need. My interactions
with them throughout my lesson consisted of them having to analyze both themselves and the character.
There were many points in the story when I asked some questions about how the character is feeling,
and they would have to pause and think about it. They used the text and the illustrations in the story to
point out how the character is feeling based off facial expressions and connect it to emotions.

6. Before my lesson started, I had asked the students if they remembered what the meaning of plot
structure was. Only one of them had remembered and so what I did was I referenced a previous book
that we read in class together and then in activity on plot structure. Throughout the story, I supported
them by pausing and asking questions that hinted to them that their part was here. When I asked him a
question and they gave me an answer, I would turn the page back and point to the part they were
referencing to show them how to refer back to a text. At the end of my lesson, as a group we had
reviewed what they wrote. Some of them weren’t too sure on what they had to write, so what I did was I
reminded them what their job was to do and we had asked other peers for help. My review at the end
made sure that students understood what I was trying to teach them and if I knew that they were
struggling I would help them review what it meant.

7. What changes would you make to your instruction to better support children’s learning related to the
central focus of your lesson? I realize that with my lesson I aimed to focus on character development but
instead I focused more on theme. Also the standards I chose were not tied to my lesson. That was my
fault because I forgot that I had to tie it back to the standard, I tied it more to my objective instead. I
could’ve provided more activity worksheets for them to analyze the characters feelings so that it could
tie back to my central focus of character development. I did have a worksheet of a character map that
lays out the characters' feelings in the beginning, middle, and end of the story, but I decided not to use
that because I thought that we could speak out loud about it rather than write about it. If I did use the
worksheets, it would’ve been better for them to process and analyze a story better. I do need to work on
the management of my students because they had lots of side conversations and we veered off topic a lot
during the lesson. I think because the students felt comfortable with me and because we had talked about
their interests, they wanted to keep talking about their interests.

8. If I were to connect my lesson better to the standards, it would’ve set a clearer goal for the students.
Standards exist to show what students need to learn and teachers are in charge of how they want the
 students to learn that standard. If clear goals are set for the students, they would be more understanding
of what their job is. For the character's development worksheet I didn’t use, another part of the reason
why I didn’t use them is because it wasn’t the same as the one that they used before. I think if I used the
worksheet that they used previously, they would be able to understand better what the goal was, which
was analyzing character feeling development. They would be using their prior knowledge and applying
it to the new knowledge I’m trying to teach them or help them review.

9. Three things I did exceptionally well were creating a plot structure mountain that captured their
curiosity, connecting with the students to the point where they are able to trust me, and creating ways
that made them eager to participate. Three goals for my next lesson are staying on task, practicing my
script multiple times to get it right, and not letting my students have side conversations during my
teaching.