Unit on Plants
Guided Reading Group Lesson with Reflection
Guided Reading Plans &
University Supervisor's Observation
Photostory on Plants
Variations of the Gingerbread Man in a Photostory

During my student teaching experience I learned quickly how important it is to have my activities planned and the materials and resources organized for instruction. One's ability to plan, organize, and prepare for teaching directly impacts the success of their students. An important aspect of planning involves ensuring that lessons align with local, state, and national teaching standards. By clearly stating learning outcomes and activity objectives teachers guarantee that they planning to address curriculum requirements. Planning for teaching involves both daily lessons and long term unit plans. In my Science Curriculum and Instruction course I created a Unit on Plants for first grade. The unit was created with Monica Pendergast. It includes instructional objectives, a ten day unit schedule with daily lessons, and detailed lessons. The unit focuses heavily on using hands on activities and experiments in the classroom.

Beyond planning, it is important that a teacher selects appropriate instructional strategies and activities for their students. Teachers must be able to plan for a diverse group of students. It is also important that teachers include various grouping strategies in their classrooms, such as small guided reading groups and whole group word study discussions. The guided reading lesson plan for my first grade classroom includes planning for four different ability groups. The texts chosen for the students were non-fiction and related to topics being studied in math and science.  The observation of this lesson reflects my ability to select different instructional activities based on the ability of the students and the amount of time available for the activity.

Finally, it is important that teachers select appropriate materials and resources to use with their students. Including a variety of outside resources such as videos, literature, and online activities compliments the basic curriculum and deepens students' understanding of the material. Incorporating multi-media technology in the classroom engages students in learning about the lesson topic and enhances their knowledge of the technology. A Photostory was designed for a first grade unit on plants and incorporates the use of technology in the classroom. It includes poetry, facts about plant parts, and actual images of plants. It was created using images from Flickr under the Creative Commons copyrights. All images are credited at the end of the movie. Another use of Photostory can be seen through this link to stories and illustrations created by the students in my first grade placement. This particular photostory includes variations of the Gingerbread Man Story. Other photostory creations can be found on Mrs. Florence’s webpage.