Unit Plans

So I can't remember who it was that mentioned backwards design being difficult for them when it came to their lesson plans but that is something that I struggled with a lot. I think I struggled with it because I wasn't sure how to go about setting up my lesson plans or how in depth the lesson plans needed to be. So the components that came about in the end confused me a lot by doing them before my lesson plans were complete. The assessment part was something I had to look up because I am not familiar with different types of things teachers can do to make sure their students are understanding the lesson. The Blooms 100 questions was also super hard because even though I had thought about what I was going to kinda base my lesson around I had a hard time coming up with questions I would ask students before the lesson was even written out.

Historical Fiction Children's Lit Review

Historical Fiction Review The Long Winter: Author: Laura Ingalls Wilder Awards: Newbery Honor 1941 This story is about the trouble that Laura’s family and town went through in a winter in the 1800’s. They moved from the plantation to their store in town but because of the severity of the blizzards that lasted 2-3 days each the trains couldn’t bring necessities to town. All the towns people including the Ingall’s were running out of coal to warm houses and the most important thing which was food. By the time the trains were able to run in the spring all the people were eating was brown wheat bread that is all they lived on for months. Elijah of Buxton: Author: Christopher Paul Curtis Awards: Newbery Honor and the Coretta Scott King Award This story is about an African American boy who was the first of his community in Buxton to be born free. All the others in his community except the children his age was runaway slaves. The story follows the boy on his journeys from school to fishing and finally to the United States where is father told him to never go in fear he would be captured by slave owners. In the end he promised one of his friends that he would free the friend’s family, so he set off for the United States. He was never able to find the family of the friend but came across some slaves that had been recaptured and they had a baby with them. So, he promised to keep the baby safe and ended up taking the baby back to Buxton with him. Paperboy: Author: Vince Vawter Awards: Newbery Honor 2014 This story is about a boy who can’t speak very good taking over his friend’s paper route. He ends up meeting some not so nice people on the route. Of all his troubles they end up putting his life in danger and his housekeeper’s life. This story takes place in the segregated South. Island of the Blue Dolphins: Author: Scott O’Dell Awards: Newbery Honor 1961 This story takes place off the coast of California. It is about an Indian girl whose brother is killed by a pack of wild dogs which leaves her all alone. This is about her fight to survive on her own in the wild. Treasure Island: Author: Robert Louis Stevenson Award: None The story of a boy who lived in the world of seamen, pirates and buried treasure. This story has you following the boy on his wild adventure of following treasure maps within an imaginary island. Inside Out & Back Again: Author: Thanhha Lai Awards: National Book Award Winner, Newbery Honor Book 2012 This story follows a Vietnamese girl whose family was forced to relocate during the Vietnam war. It shows you their struggles once getting to America. They ended up settling in Alabama. The story takes you through the emotions that I am sure a lot of immigrants feel when coming to America and not being accepted at first. Breaking Stalin’s Nose: Author: Eugene Yelchin Award: Newbery Honor 2012 This story is about a boy who grows up believing the lies of the Soviet Army. So, he wanted to become part of it. When he found out who Stalin really was and the truth he rethinks wanting to join the Young Pioneers. Sarah Plain and Tall: Author: Patricia MacLachlan Award: Newbery Honor 1986 This story follows a family who the mother passed away in child birth. The father put out an ad looking for a woman to become the step mom in the family. The children dreamed of what she would be like. Then because the woman missed the sea and her family she took the wagon to town by herself and never returned. Crispin The Crossing of Lead: Author: Avi Award: Newbery Honor 2003 and Mark Twain Award 2004-2005 This story is about a peasant boy who had to flee his village after being accused of a crime he didn’t commit and was facing murder. It takes you on his journey that he traveled and the people he came across. Eventually he came across someone who vowed to protect him that made the boy his servant. Towards the end he must change himself once again to protect his owner’s life and his own. Lily’s Crossing: Author: Patricia Reilly Giff Award: Newbery Honor 1998, Mark Twain Award 1999-2000 This story is about the life of a little girl during WWII. Her father is sent overseas, and her best friend’s family moved. Then there was a refugee that came to town and Lily began a friendship with him. But they both have their own secrets they are keeping from each other and Lily’s is deep enough that it puts the boy’s life in danger.

Trade books that could be associated with my Unit Plan

I had fun looking up different books that could be associated with the English Language Arts unit plans. There are so many good and informational books for the younger ages that it could be hard to choose. So I narrowed it down to some that I did use in my lesson plans and others that could be used. 1) If You Give a Mouse a Cookie: This book I did use in my lesson plan as a sequencing book for the children to answer sequencing questions about. 2)Be Kind: This book was used as a writing assignment lesson in my plans for students to relate and write a short story about a time when someone was kind to them. 3)The Very Hungry Caterpillar: With a lesson plan for beginning middle and end I thought it would be fun to tie in an ELA lesson with a science lesson. Students love butterflies so I thought it would be fun for them to learn about the life cycle. 4)From Caterpillar to Butterfly: This is a nonfiction book that students would notice the difference between nonfiction and fiction and compare and contrast. 5)Love You Forever: This would be used in a writing assignment around mothers day since it is based around a mother and her son. It shows the everlasting connection so I thought it would be fun to have students write something they loved about their mother. 6) The Ugly Duckling: This would be another lesson about being nice or even the beginning middle and end lesson. 7)If You Were a Capital Letter: This story go through the stages of writing a sentence from capitalizing the first letter of a sentence to punctuation marks. 8)Brown Bear, Brown Bear What do You see?: Describing writing assignment. Students would have to write a couple of sentences describing something and then they would draw a picture to go with their sentence. 9)Green Eggs and Ham: This would be used during the Poem section of the units. It rhymes really well and it will show students different words that rhyme. 10)The Night Before Kindergarten: Describing how they felt the night before they started kindergarten. I feel it would help each student if they knew that the feelings they are expressing is normal.

Week 5 Lesson Plans

I think everyone done exceptional on their lesson plans. They are all very informative and I actually learned a lot on what I could do to improve my lesson plans. Since I am not in the school districts yet or actually teaching a class some assignments are a lot harder for me than other and lesson planning is one of those harder areas. I like how everyone really put a lot of thought and creativity into their anticipatory sets. I really enjoyed Rebekah's about the crime scene I think that would really get the attention of the students. Also the mention of Padlet was interesting to me because I am always wondering what type of technology that teachers may be using.

Fun Vocabulary Lessons

When thinking of teaching vocabulary I think that the more a student is able to use motion or memory the better they will be at remembering what they have learned. Due to the fact that some students learn better visually or even when they are mobile. As a teacher I want to think outside of the box when it comes to teaching my students what they need to learn that is why it was so fun for me to look up different ways to teach vocabulary than the same old way of writing the spelling words so many times. Below I have found 5 different ways that teachers can choose to help students learn vocabulary. I think at the top of my list would defiantly be the sensory learning using other things such as what is showing with stamps and kinetic sand. But I also really like the fact of turning vocabulary into games such as the swat game and using scrabble and bingo. If students can relate the vocabulary words to something fun they remember then I feel they will be able to remember it for a while.

Word Walls

I really enjoyed looking up word walls! There are so many different ideas to choose from on how to organize the word walls. I plan on using them in the classroom for sight words that we may learn about from a book that we are reading as a class. Or even just words that I notice my students having trouble with. I feel that while students write the word walls would come in handy with what they are trying to express in their writing. Below are some pictures that I found on Pinterest of some word walls. Depending on what age group I end up teaching I fee that pictures that go along with the word can be helpful. I also love color because I feel that it attracts your attention more than a plain white background. I also love the "Tricky Tree" idea especially for words that we as a class find tricky! :)

Week 1 Take aways

I will be honest this first class was very overwhelming going over all of the assignments and content. I felt as though my brain was in over drive by the end of class. 😂 I am excited however to be able to practice more with unit plans. I think that will help me out a lot when I get into my career. When going over the content I found it interesting about the background of Language Arts and what it actually represented. I knew it represented reading and grammar but not really comprehension and phonics. Maybe looking back I could tell a little bit but it never really clicked in my head at the time. Another thing that I never really worried about was multicultural teaching. Seeing how diverse our country is becoming this may be something I want to reflect on more when I make lesson plans and teach my students.

Introduction

Hi Everyone! I am super excited to get these next 8 weeks started, I am hoping to learn more about what I can do to engage my future students in their reading endeavors. I am a stay at home home of a 2 1/2 year old with another little one due in August. For my current profession I am also a direct sales consultant with a Scentsy. In the future I hope to become a kindergarten teacher but any of the lower elementary classes would be fine with me. I am currently a junior at Columbia, hoping I can finish up my degree in the next couple of years so I can get into the school districts and begin my career as I love to work with children. For (2) truths and (1) lie my stories are.... 1) I own 5 dogs and 2 horses to which I love to spend time with. 2) I live in a little town that has only approximately 150 residents 3) I hate to garden.