Video+Critique+Assessment+DASH

Video Critique  We kind of just jumped into the lesson without giving it any introduction. I believe that if we were to tie what we were about to discuss with the fact that it is connected with the market economy unit the students would have been more ready for what was to come. With this said I thought that Lance and I were able to connect the objectives (or in this case vocabulary) to their everyday lives. This had a lot to do with our formative assessment. We would call out on students to give an example of the vocabulary in their own lives or ask them to answer a question that was proposed. Our summative assessment had the students use the vocabulary words they had learned in a paragraph that they constructed. While flipping through the student’s responses I noticed that many (70-80%) were able to use the vocabulary in the proper context. If we had more time at the end we would have liked one of the students to share their response so that students who did not meet the expectation would have been able to see what meeting the expectations looked like. The reason we decided to use this form of summative assessment is due to the high priority placed on vocabulary in the middle school. I saw that by putting the terms up on the board students that are more visual that auditory learners were able to stick with the class discussion. With this said, Lance and I should have put the some of the more complex vocabulary into laymen’s terms. This is where our use of resources came into play. Using the projector seemed to be beneficial to the lesson. I felt relatively comfortable during the lesson which only increased each time I taught the lesson. The reason for this relax state was because the classroom was focused. Though this video was taken during the morning and the students became more energetic throughout the day. Lance and I were able to call out on a few students by name and the other by pointing towards them. Lance and I have a good relationship with the students that resulted in a fun lesson.  Behavior problems did not arise. At the beginning of the lesson I think I could have done a better job of getting the students attention so that the lesson could have started sooner. I wouldn’t say it was a behavioral problem but while Lance and I were discussing the concept of collateral the students were still discussing amongst themselves about the various subjects. We should have maybe slowed down and regained the student’s attention. The seating arrangement may have been a factor in this. While watching the lesson I did not notice some chatter in the back of the classroom. If the seating arrangement would have been in maybe a half circle we would have been more capable of monitoring the students.  Our leaning activities were mostly based on large group discussion. By having the students answer questions for us they were able to connect the knowledge with their lives. We ended the lesson with an individual activity that the students would do to give them an opportunity to use the vocabulary in their own words. I saw this as developmentally appropriate for the majority of the class. There were some examples of students not being able to put their thoughts down on paper. This was mostly associated with ELL students. The summative assessment gave Lance and I an opportunity to focus on the students that seemed to have a difficult time with the lesson. I was able to look around the class and see which students seemed to be encountering problems. When noticing this I would help them by explaining some of the vocabulary while they decided how they would use them in their paragraph. This was also an opportunity for Lance and I to give the students individual feedback.  Through this assignment I have learned that perspective is very important when determining how effective your lesson is. While standing in front of the class it appeared that every student was very attentive; yet, when watching the video I noticed that there was some chatter and what not in the back. This has taught me to walk around when teaching to assure that all students are being attentive. If I were to teach this lesson again I would want the students in a half circle so the discussion would have branched out past the front two rows. Those who were seated in the front of the classroom seemed to participate the most and therefore appeared to have a higher understanding of the material. By recording my lesson I saw the lesson through the student’s eyes rather than my own. It allowed me to assess myself in a somewhat less bias way than I would if I were to reflect on the lesson by memory.

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