Your Name: ___Shelby Wilson____
Inquiry Two, Part A:
Discuss Your Target Area and ‘Core
Practice’ for Guided Lead Teaching
NOTE: YOU MAY INSERT YOUR ANSWERS TO
THE QUESTIONS POSED BELOW IN A DIFFERENT COLOR FONT. Please name your file with your last name and
email as an attachment to your instructor (example: SmithPartATargetArea.docx)
Talk
with your MT about your idea, and use the information you gained from Inquiry
One to respond to the following guiding questions listed below. Email
your responses to your instructor before our Week 4 class (September 26) AND
post them on your book club blog:
1.
Describe your target area for guided
lead teaching.
I will be teaching writing and focusing on
realistic fiction.
2.
Approximately how much time per day is
allotted for your instruction in this area?
Writing is allotted 40 mins, four times a week
(2:00-2:40 M-W and F).
3.
Which Common Core State Standard(s)
will you work toward?
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.4.3 Describe in depth a character, setting, or
event in a story or drama, drawing on specific details in the text (e.g., a
character’s thoughts, words, or actions).
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.4.3 Write narratives to develop real or
imagined experiences or events using effective technique, descriptive details,
and clear event sequences.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.4.3a Orient the reader by establishing a
situation and introducing a narrator and/or characters; organize an event
sequence that unfolds naturally.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.4.3b Use dialogue and description to
develop experiences and events or show the responses of characters to
situations.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.4.3c Use a variety of transitional words
and phrases to manage the sequence of events.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.4.3d Use concrete words and phrases and
sensory details to convey experiences and events precisely.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.4.3e Provide a conclusion that follows from
the narrated experiences or events.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.4.4 Produce clear and coherent writing in
which the development and organization are appropriate to task, purpose, and
audience. (Grade-specific expectations for writing types are defined in
standards 1–3 above.)
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.4.5 With guidance and support from peers
and adults, develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, and
editing. (Editing for conventions should demonstrate command of Language
standards 1-3 up to and including grade 4 here.)
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.4.10 Write routinely over extended time
frames (time for research, reflection, and revision) and shorter time frames (a
single sitting or a day or two) for a range of discipline-specific tasks,
purposes, and audiences.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.4.1 Demonstrate command of the conventions
of standard English grammar and usage when writing or speaking.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.4.2 Demonstrate command of the conventions
of standard English capitalization, punctuation, and spelling when writing.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.4.3 Use knowledge of language and its
conventions when writing, speaking, reading, or listening.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.SL.4.1 Engage effectively in a range of
collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse
partners on grade 4 topics and texts,
building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.SL.4.4 Report on a topic or text, tell a
story, or recount an experience in an organized manner, using appropriate facts
and relevant, descriptive details to support main ideas or themes; speak
clearly at an understandable pace.
4.
How will teaching in this target area
provide opportunities for students to
learn important content and/or skills that relate to their lives? In what ways does this learning include learning literacy, learning about literacy, and/or learning
through literacy?
The students will be able to use their memories and previous
experiences that are unique to their lives when writing the stories. Each day
will focus on a specific goal that will promote the overall understanding and
ability to write realistic fiction pieces by the end of the unit. They will be
learning literacy by writing their own stories and seeing how their everyday
lives include stories and aspects that they can use to make connections and
draw from. The students will learn about literacy by gaining understanding
about what realistic fiction entails as a genre. Learning through literacy will
be achieved by allowing the children to share their pieces and hear their
classmates’ stories. This process gives them the opportunity to grow by gaining
public speaking skills and confidence in their abilities as a writer.
5.
What types of classroom talk take place
within this target area? To what extent is the talk teacher-led, student-led,
or focused on higher-level thinking? What norms for interaction would you like
to build within your classroom as you teach in this target area (e.g., see
ideas in Chapter 6 of Strategies that
Work, the Berne & Clark 2008 article, or draw from some of the readings
done in TE 402 on classroom talk)?
Teacher-led instruction will be limited due to
the nature of the lesson, mini-lessons. There will be a small amount of
instruction done in the front of the room and then the children will be sent
back to their desks to write independently with a specific task in mind while
writing. Then they will share within their groups and occasionally to the whole
class depending on time. This portion will be student-led based on their group
discussions that follow their independent writing.
6.
Which ‘core practice’ do you want to
work on developing/improving as you teach in this target area (refer to
document “Resources for Developing Core Practices”)? How will focusing on this
core practice contribute to your own
professional learning?
I will be focusing on conducting mini-lessons and conferencing
during readers/writer’s workshop, particularly writer’s workshop. By performing
mini-lessons I will be sticking with the routine that the children have become
accustomed to since the beginning of the year and will be able to work with
many children at various levels during the conferencing portion. This will
contribute to my professional learning by allowing me to see the levels of
comprehension or understanding of the particular lesson, with the overarching
goal of writing realistic fiction, for each student. Conferencing with them
will help my drive my instruction towards future lessons that will be
necessary.
7.
What resources within the community,
neighborhood, school district, school or classroom do you have to work with in
this target area?
All the previous experiences that the students
have had within the community, their neighborhoods, and the district will give
them material to draw from when writing their realistic fiction pieces. Within
the classroom I will be providing them with the materials needed for drafting
(yellow legal pad), pencils, and a notebook for publishing. The library will
also serve as a resource by providing examples of realistic fiction writing.
8.
What additional resources do you need
to obtain?
As of this moment I do not feel any additional
resources, in terms of materials, are needed. However, many examples of various
genres and writing styles will be needed as I move through the lessons.
9.
How will you pre-assess your students
in your target area?
In order to pre-assess my students in their
ability to write realistic fiction pieces I will ask them to write a personal
narrative, which they will have hopefully mastered by the time my unit is to
take place. Then I will ask them to go back and look at their personal narratives
to look for areas that they could change to make the story realistic fiction.
We will brainstorm examples together as a class and then they will be free to
work on their stories individually. Finally, I will analyze their answers, or
notes, written on the personal narrative drafts in order to see what my next
steps will be. Additionally, they will have lists of small moment ideas, seeds
of what to write about, and other various assignments that would need to be
evaluated.
10. What else will you need to find out about all students in
your class to help you develop lesson plans for your Guided Lead Teaching?
I will need to find out what previous
experiences they have had in writing realistic fiction and writing in a
Writer’s Workshop setting before my unit begins. I know they have been recently
exposed to WW because it is a new curriculum that has been set in place this
year, but I am unaware of how much exposure they had to free-writing or
independent writing, in their previous grades. I will ask my MT and other
teachers in the building to gain insight on this subject.
11. What else do you need/want to learn about the ‘core
practice’ to support your planning and teaching?
I want to learn of better examples of how to
transform a personal narrative, something they are comfortable with, into
realistic fiction. I find it difficult to only slightly alter a narrative in
order to make it realistic fiction. It seems easier to me to change the story
dramatically to make it into a fantasy or something of that nature. I will
focus on finding solid examples that I can provide to the students and will
model explicitly what I expect.
12. What concerns, if any, do you have about planning and
teaching your unit?
I am concerned about the amount of time
allotted for writing within the school day. Particularly because it is at the
end of the day I am worried that if another subject runs over on time writing
will be pushed aside in order to finish it. Also, the content that is set to be
covered within the curriculum is very lengthy and I am unsure if I will be able
to fully teach all of it within the three weeks of GLT. I will be starting my
instruction with the “Second Bend” of the unit in Lucy Calkins Writing Workshop
Model.
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