Task 4: What does a quality edTPA lesson plan look like? (Essential Question D).
An important component of your edTPA is planning for instruction. One aspect of the planning for instruction component of your edTPA is your actual lesson plans. To help guide all candidates to think about and address all the required elements required by the edTPA the MSU, Mankato College of Education has developed a lesson plan template. You are required to use the edTPA template for this course and student teaching.
Pre-Posting: To help give a visual of what is expected in terms of content, quality, sophistication and overall general length, please view the example lesson plan.
To view the example lesson plan click on the link below.
Posting - What stands out to you? What do you see cutting across all of the resources you have read/seen on this topic so far? What are the cautions needed or “hints” for making this a quality product? How will you approach the edTPA lesson plan format now that you have seen this example? What will you do differently than you have done in the past? What questions do you still have?
Response Postings:
By Sunday, November 17: 11:59 PM. Response postings
The areas I found especially helpful is the Language Demand Objectives. Both the language function section and the language supports section game me a better understanding of how to apply this to my lesson. In this lesson the teacher will provide a work wall, in my lesson I will visually present the vocabulary in a power point presentation.
ReplyDeleteI also found the types of assessments, I have a good understanding of summative and formative assessment but sometimes I struggle with is an assessment is formal or informal. I tend to use all in class worksheets, partner work as informal and may need to change that on my lesson plan. The reminder to use a rubric was also presented in one of the formal assessments provided in this lesson plan. Using a rubric is helpful to both the students and the teacher for grading purposes.
Lastly I learned a lot from the knowledge of students to inform teaching. I think this is a very valuable and I think it makes a big impact when planning a lesson and “pre” thinking about how to modify a lesson rather than doing in the classroom. The part that I am concerned about is that in this lesson it has 3 students identified as needing accommodations. This is so unrealistic. First I would be teaching 5 hours of Health Education, seeing a minimum of 5 ESL students per class, a minimum of 5 students with Special Education needs/IEP/504/or gifted a talented. In an urban high school filling out this section with that amount of detail would not be practical. This section would be better suited for a contained classroom that has a traditional (30) number of students in it.
Michelle,
DeleteI'm glad the language section helped you because I remember last class you were confused about it. I think you were overthinking & I was underthinking it - I keep having to redefine my understanding of what the section is really asking for. When Carrie just did my observation she pointed out to me that I needed to have the language demands written as "students will be able to..." same as the content objectives, which was news to me.
I agree with you that the knowledge of students to inform teaching section was valuable, if unrealistic to actually do for every lesson plan - especially in an urban setting.
I think what would be a more useful format for such thinking is a master sheet compiled at the beginning of the year where you jot down general reminders and exceptions for each of your students to refer to when, perhaps, one of them is having difficulty. Putting together that one detailed sheet is more reasonable than doing it for every lesson plan, I think...
Michelle,
DeleteI understand where you are coming from about the formality of the assignments. From what I have seen in my field experience, worksheets like the ones you mentioned can be either formal or informal, depending on what you need them to be. I know that some districts have curriculum requirements for number of informal and formal assessments, so you should be able to use whatever you are using and accommodate if needed.
You may not have ELLs in your class. I know that we pull out the ELL students for Science and Health and we teach the lesson in our classroom. I guess this just depends on the students' needs and availability of resources.
Sara,
DeleteThanks for the Language Demand tip Carrie gave you... I will be checking my lesson now!
Erik,
Thank you for the insight of the ELL pull outs for health.
I have not noticed this be too big of an issue at the school I am currently at. I know that students are at different academic levels but I have seen students that could not participate because of ELL needs.
One of the most important things I noticed in this example TPA is the amount of extensive writing on each section. A sentence or two often isn’t enough. It is important to elaborate on the theories you will be using (as the Vgotsky is expounded upon in the example), and really spell out completely the lesson plan step by step, with each talking point and each new instructional direction outlined. Furthermore, I was interested in the section on Knowledge of Students to Inform Teaching since I haven’t been working with many students this semester with IEP/504s or identified as gifted and talented. It was nice to see an example of the kind of exceptions/alterations I can make to my lesson plan – and the sort of student traits I should be taking note of when planning my lesson.
ReplyDeleteThus, the caution/hint for myself in the future is to take my time and think through every detail – extensively. If I think I’ve written enough, I should always read over it again and make sure I really have covered all the possibilities enough. I will approach my lesson plans similarly after seeing this example – but, taking special care with the theory section and the Knowledge of Students to Inform Teaching, which I believe (up to this point) are my two weakest areas. Furthermore, I’m continuing to solidify my understanding of the Academic Language Demands section and the differences between all the categories.
One question I have is for the pacing of the lesson Dr. Chapman indicated I should specify how many minutes will be spent on each section of the lesson – that is not done in this example.
The pacing portion is something that I never get right. I think that this is because I do not regularly teach the students. I have a very hard time anticipating how much time they will need on certain activities because I do not know them as intimately as I would if I taught them every day. I am also concerned about putting the time numbers on the plan because ELL lessons might take way more time, or way less time than anticipated.
DeleteI think that your hint for the future is very helpful. At this stage of out teaching careers, we need to make sure that we are prepared for the lessons. It might take a while before we are able to just "wing it."
I see that Sara noticed this as well, but my big standout was the amount of writing in each section. Each section was very detailed and provided a lot of information. There are a few sections that I feel that I will be very familiar with after awhile, and those are the language function / supports sections, and the 504/IEP section. A lot of ELLs are on these plans, and the 504/IEP is also common amongst students that are in specialized classes such as ELL.
ReplyDeleteThe trouble that I think I will have with my TPA is the amount of writing. I am currently in a K-5 school, and will be teaching my lessons to Kindergarten students. The lesson I am teaching on Thursday is a 15 minute Kindergarten lesson about winter close. The pacing section is also very difficult for me regarding the short, 15 or 20 minute lessons. Because the class time is so short, I feel that some of these tasks (instructions and such) would take only 30 seconds or so. Having the precise minute count is very hard for me to imagine doing until I get more experience with the class length.
The "hint" that I am taking away from this example is to just include as much writing as I can justify in the sections. I feel like some of it might just be fluff, but if that is what they want to see, I have no problem putting it in there.
Another question about the pacing deals with ELL students. What if I have this entire 20 minute lesson planned out, but they are struggling with the very first step. I feel like I would need to forget the planned lesson and focus on the area that they are having trouble with. Would this negatively impact my results on an observation?
Erik,
DeleteI want to address your final question first. Carrie told me that we aren't actually getting observed next semester - so whether or not you stick to your TPA lesson plan won't be "known" by your graders. That being said, you will probably address it in your reflection section, and I think the rationale you put down there will support your decisions. If anything, I'd say altering your lesson plan to meet student need is proof of more masterful teaching than sticking to a plan that isn't working!
I'm not sure that the TPA is intended to be filled with fluff, but I can certainly see where it reads that way. When writing our lessons out like we are now, I think the idea is just to get it in our heads that we are always considering certain elements (student needs, differentiated learning, academic language, etc.) again and again and again so that it will just be second nature once we actually start our careers. It can be annoying, though, spelling things out again and again :/
Finally, I just want to agree that pacing is one of the most difficult things. In Language Arts, I like a lot of discussions and it's impossible to know when students will have a lot to say or nothing at all. Plus, I naturally talk super fast - especially when I'm nervous - so, so far all of my lessons have run a little short. I hope with time the pacing element will iron itself out for us :)
Eric,
DeleteI like your example. We all get caught up in our own content, timing, audience, ect.
I won't be putting in fluff to add to the length of the TPA. I am filling them out will all the information I have knowledge of. I will also only be guessing on the pacing. I already feel one of my lessons it way longer than a 55 minute class, I will be teaching the lesson this week (but not observed). I want to be over prepared with content and push some to the next day if needed. Unfortunately in this case, I will not be there the next day. It will be up to the cooperating teacher if she wants to fill in where I leave off.
My TPA's are only 5-6 pages, not 11 like the example. JUST FYI
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