Learn to Teach &Teach to Learn

In class we learned the following models of teaching would be used to create our lesson plans to teach in the classroom: Behavioural Model (Direct Instruction), Information Processing Model (Indirect Instruction) and Social Interactive Model (Cooperative Learning). I think the process of creating a lesson plan can be very time consuming and is a lot of hard work. It takes time for me to think of something I want to do because I want it to be challenging and wonderful! I could spend hours upon hours lesson planning. I liked how we had a lesson plan frame for each lesson we were teaching so that I could use it as a guide to facilitate learning. An example of a lesson plan frame can be found here.

My topic was on Bar Graphs for Fourth Graders in Mrs. Ferguson's classroom at E.J.R Elementary School in Pine Bush, NY. I made sure that I was in the classroom a few times before I was actually teaching so that I could get to know the students, but my friend Mrs. Ferguson had another plan for me. Mrs. Ferguson gave me her math lessons to teach every time I was in the classroom before I even had to teach my own. I think she did this to help me feel comfortable in front of the classroom and believe me it worked. When it was time to teach I felt so energized and completely at ease which really helped engage the students into my lessons.

The following picture is of me teaching my Direct Instruction lesson from the Behavioural Model:

I thought the lesson went really well and I didn't feel nervous at all. The lesson was also timed perfectly for the amount of time I had with the class. What really made me believe I was becoming a teacher was when I came in for my next observation and Mrs. Ferguson told me that one of the girls in her class enjoyed my lesson so much that she took it upon herself to make her own bar graph based on favorite colors. I thought that was really sweet and it made me feel that my lesson was interesting to the students, especially if it made one of them want to go home and do something extra like that!

The following picture is of me assisting a group of students during my Indirect lesson from the Information Processing Model:


This lesson was a condensed version of my webquest. I chose the Inquiry method of Information Processing Model because I thought it would be interesting to teach the students how to use technology and to see their research skills. The class hardly ever used technology until I came into the classroom and I am happy that I had the opportunity to teach them about a topic while using technology because I feel technology is so important in learning today.

The last picture is of me introducing my Cooperative Learning lesson from the Social Interactive Model using a SMART Board!!!:


For this lesson, I chose the Think, Pair, Share method where students would think about a certain topic, exchange thoughts with a partner, and then share with the rest of the class. Some pictures below show the students working in this method. It was a valuable experience for me because the students were really coming up with intelligent questions based on their bar graphs. They used terms such as "altogether", "more than", and "less than" which really impressed me. I was happy to see that they were learning and having fun at the same time.

The following video is about Think, Pair, Share!



My Experience with Mrs. Ferguson was a memorable one that I will never forget! Mrs. Ferguson has become my friend over the past 10 weeks and I have had such a blast learning and teaching in her classroom!