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Clinical Field Experience B: Aligning Lessons

Jessica Quap

College of Education, Grand Canyon University

EAD 520: Strengthening Curricular Programs to Promote Continuous School Improvement

Betty Nardelli

January 12, 2020

Introduction

In order to understand how different teachers plan their lessons and the challenges they

face, I interviewed Kaycie Noble, elementary teacher, Janice Ward, High School English

teacher. Both teach in a small rural school district with approximately 300 students on each

campus. Ms. Noble teaches 4th grade English where she has 5 class periods of students, and Ms.

Ward teaches 10th grade English 2 and has 6 class periods of students. In order to value their

time, I interviewed both at the same time, which led to some great discussions about the

differences in challenges and planning from elementary to high school.

Interviewees Instructional Challenges and Lesson Plans

We began by talking about instructional challenges and curricular demands they are

facing. Both recognized right away that the COVID-19 pandemic is the largest instructional and

curricular challenge they have ever faced as teachers. Ms. Noble stated that for the most part, all

of her students attend school unless they are on quarantine; however, Ms. Ward struggles to get

students to come to class because at one time the high school students were 100% virtual. Since

coming back full time, kids have been in and out from quarantine.

Aside from the pandemic, they stated that a big instructional challenge is the lack of

planning time to prepare the rigor of lessons and not enough time with students to cover all of the

materials on the curriculum map. According to the article, “Budget Cuts and Teacher Planning

Time” and every teacher in the world, “Today, instruction is more active with an increased focus

on problem solving and teamwork. The teacher's role has transformed into one of facilitating

learning as opposed to presenting knowledge” (Kelly, 2019). They both agreed that most of their

quality planning time takes place at home and on the weekends.

The district they work for has a very strict year at a glance with each 9-weeks divided up

into units with a number of days they have to cover the materials. They both stated that within a

unit of only 25 days, they do not actually teach their kids all of those 25 days due to pre-testing

and post-testing, snow days, and other surprises that come up. There is no room for forgiveness.

When asked about their process for lesson planning, Ms. Noble said that she meets with

her grade level team because they try to make any connections from class to class that they can

for students. She relies heavily on her year at a glance and plans strictly to those skills that will

be post-tested. Her school also has a PLC period in which they plan using a school lesson

planning document that follows the NIET TAP Lesson Model. Within the lesson organization

planning time, TAP includes a rubric that states the exemplary models of a lesson for areas such

as guided review of prior knowledge, anticipatory set for new learning, I do, We do, You do

gradual release model, Essential questions, feedback opportunities and assessments/student work

products. As she plans, she states that she uses these rubrics in order to ensure that she is

planning best practice, research based lessons.

Ms. Ward lessons plans with the TEKs Resource System year at a glance and TEKs

specificity outlined as being covered on the state accountability assessment. Her planning with

the TRS is paired with a newly adopted textbook that is 100% ensured to cover all tested skills

within a unit. Her essential questions, guided questions and assessment/student work products

come from a combination of the resource system that has performance based assessments and the

textbook with formal assessments. She too utilizes the gradual release model of instruction.

According to a study done using the model, “The gradual release of responsibility model of

instruction has been documented as an effective approach for improving literacy achievement,

reading comprehension, and literacy outcomes for English language learners (Fisher and Frey,
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2003). Her planning process is lengthy, and she states that most of her planning is done on flex

days off or on the weekends.

Interviewees Differentiation of Instruction and Use of Technology

Each teacher is very fortunate to have a Special Education certified aid in her class during

times that she has students who need inclusion support. They are given common planning time in

which the SpEd. colleague takes the plans and differentiates them according to each student’s

IEP. Ms. Ward and her co-teacher utilize the both teach co-teach model in which the content

teacher presents the material while the co-teacher gives intervention in the forms of questions

and visuals to scaffold the learning. Ms. Noble also has a co-teacher who serves as more of a

small group intervention teacher who works with a group of students during the We do and I do

portion of the lesson.

Technology has been at the forefront of both classrooms this year as we have had to go to

100% virtual at a moments notice because of COVID-19. Each utilizes Google Classroom when

assigning classwork to their students and for attendance checking purposes. In high school,

students and teachers have been using the flipped classroom model after coming off of virtual

learning because they saw it as a golden opportunity for the new way of teaching and learning.

Students say they really enjoy the new flipped classroom because their homework at home is not

the independent work anymore that they may struggle with, it is the beginning of the lesson that

is usually easier for them. The benefits are more time spent in the classroom applying new

learning instead of doing that part at home.

Interviewees Relation of Curriculum and Instruction to Vision/Mission and Continuous

Improvement Plan
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Within their campuses, each teacher participates in a Professional Learning Community

in which they spend a lot of time looking at the school’s vision, vision and CIP plan when setting

their teacher goals, students goals and daily lesson planning. Each teacher has these in their

planning binders as they contain set benchmark levels of success their students should meet if

they are to be seen as mastering the material. Most importantly, the school provides resources for

the goals they set for their students. Both said that most requests for intervention and technology

items are always approved.

With Ms. Ward, during their District Data Meetings, each Quarter Assessment is matched

against the state standards of Meets Measure and against the goals set in the CIP at the beginning

of the year. She shared that every EOC tested area must complete a district analysis of their

progress toward the CIP goals and justifications. She feels that while this process is very

stressful, she believes that it has ultimately made her a better teacher.

Support and Guidance

With all of this being said, both say they feel very strongly supported by their

Administrators and Master and Mentor teachers. During their weekly PLC meetings, which are

ran by me, we discuss ways to utilize the common assessments given and data collected to plan

for future re-teach opportunities. They both enjoy that each time I come with a new instructional

strategy for them to immediately implement in their classrooms. They also feel very supported

by the Master and Mentor teachers because they do not only come in to do formal walk-throughs

and evaluations, some days they just come to sit in their classrooms and play with or interact

with the kids. I told them that I do that because I loved to see how much their students enjoy

learning and enjoy them. Ms. Noble specifically stated that she feels that she can approach any
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member of her Instructional Leadership Team with a question and get absolute support and

guidance to solve the issue or help her out.

Review of Lesson Plans and Supplemental Materials

In reviewing a lesson plan from Ms. Ward, the lesson plan is very detailed and followers

the TAP Rubric model for instruction. She did state that she does not always write out such

in-depth lessons plans unless it is a formal evaluation, which is okay in our district. She usually

keeps track of her Student Learning Objectives and Student Work Products. I have been working

with her to begin tracking her lesson organization more. Each lesson plan has a beautifully

written SLO that includes a skill, why the skill is being taught and how mastery will be achieved.

This is something each school models in all meetings and was a focus of walk-throughs the first

9 weeks of school. Ms. Noble has a very fun and engaging preview of the learning in which

students will play a vocabulary game before reading about the nocturnal habits of bats. Ms. Ward

spends time reviewing what author's purpose is before her students read Martin Luther King, Jr’s

Letter from Birmingham Jail.

As stated before, each uses the gradual release model for learning. Ms. Ward has herself

down to write along with students as they reflect on the author’s purpose of the beginning of the

letter, which Ms. Noble is going to read to her students and complete a think-aloud. Guided

practice has both classes practicing what was just modeled then completing an assessment

individually to monitor progress of the skill. Ms. Ward is having her students write an

open-ended response while Ms. Noble is having her students fill in a graphic organizer from their

reading. I believe that both have SLOs that will be able to be gauged by their SWP and both of

these lessons would score very well on an evaluation.

PSEL Standard 2 and Implications for Future Practice

With regards to our conversations, I am really identifying with PSEL Standard 2 C which

states, “Place children at the center of education and accept responsibility for each student’s

academic success and well-being” (2015). I heard both teachers state many times that they are

constantly monitoring their lessons and adjusting to best provide what their students need in

order to be academically successful. This may not look the same for each student, but they

acknowledge that even growth from making a 23 to making a 41 is worth notice and the more we

can make that kid feel like they are learning and making progress, the more it will push them to

continue to show growth.

References

Kelly, M. (2019). How is Teacher Planning Time Impacted by Budget Cuts?. Retrieved 15

January 2021, from

https://www.thoughtco.com/budget-cuts-and-teacher-planning-time-7906

Fisher, D., & Frey, N. (2003). Writing instruction for struggling adolescent readers: a gradual

release model: because new accountability systems focus on writing, struggling students

need daily, coordinated instruction that is meaningful. Journal of Adolescent & Adult

Literacy, 46(5), 396.

Ward, J., & Noble, K. (2021). Clinical Field Experience B: Aligning Lessons [In person]. Slaton

High School.