Saturday, September 14, 2013

Reflections on Teaching » Week in Class: Week Two 2013

Reflections on Teaching » Blog Archive » Week in Class: Week Two 2013:

Week in Class: Week Two 2013

Pencil #2


On the whole, things are shaping up either as I would expect, or better. That’s not a bad place to be after two weeks.
Let’s talk about what they’ve done:

Good:

Writing: I’m doing a single weekly assessment where I give the students a choice of at least two questions from each subject to write about in a short-response form. This is a way to transition students from multiple-choice assessments to new Common Core assessments which will have these types of questions, but I do it because it’s more authentic, and more useful. How did it go? Some of them did what I asked, some answered the questions well, some did  not. On the whole I’m happy. I have some educating to do about my expectations, and what I’m looking for, which is not unexpected at this time of year, but I feel like there is a good base to build on. Here are this week’s questions for those who are interested: Week2Assessment

Better:


Math: I’m still using our district text, but I’ve re-written the lessons for the first chapter using UbD planner, and Core standards. What I’m finding that is much more critical than the “standards” I’m teaching to is the instruction, and the most critical part is how I introduce the idea, and the questions I ask students as I do it. This is a type of teaching that is