Prior to this week's readings I was unaware of the term "STEM". Before I started reading I was confused trying to figure it out, but then I felt a little dumb when I realized it stood for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. That's basically how my week went, from clueless, to feeling dumb, and then finally realizing I understood and did most of this stuff unintentionally.
When I sat down to write up my lesson plan for this week's application, I felt really overwhelmed, I don't usually use templates this detailed when I do my weekly lesson plans and I recall having difficulty with the last lesson plan I had to complete for a prior class. A lot of the stuff on there is pretty easy to fill out, but some was very detailed. Much more detailed than the lesson plans I put together for my school now. My school plans are very basic and we share them amongst my 5th grade colleagues. Sometimes I don't even write them, we share the workload and rotate who does which subject each week. If my current plans are more than a page long, that would be extremely rare. That might have played into part of the reason I had such a difficult time putting together this one.
The most difficult part was filling out the 5 E's section. I had not been introduced to this method before. After reading a bit about the 5 E's it was very simple to understand and should have made planning easier, but I kept running into mental blocks. When not trying to complete a lesson plan for Walden (which stresses me out), I think the 5 E's would be very helpful. They are great guidelines for setting up a well flowing and informative lesson. This is very different from how I have planned in the past, but I'm definitely going to try to incorporate these E's into my planning. While I wasn't aware of the steps prior, I think I tried to stick to something like this in the past. My typical planning consists of using the teacher's guide and plopping it onto something to turn into the principal. We now have the FOSS program which is written like a cookbook for teaching. It's very well thought out and developed and has lots of hands on activities. It is great for my position now where I'm teaching 5 subjects and don't have lots of time to focus on one subject. The 5 E's would be very helpful if I ever get my dream job of moving into a science only position where I could focus all of my time and energy into one place. I feel once I get a position like that, I would be responsible for creating my lessons without the help of a "cookbook" style program that I have available now in my 5th grade position.
In the end my plan was based around a lesson on soil erosion. The outcome was for the students to learn how elevation, gravity and soil type affect soil erosion. This lesson would eventually lead into a project where they would then put themselves into the shoes of an engineer and have to decide where to build a new housing development, taking into consideration the different land types. The biggest issue I might run into if I decided to go through with the lesson would be getting the materials needed. My district has been pretty tight with money lately due to budget cuts, which I'm sure other districts around the state are feeling too. Most of the stuff I would need is earth materials and plastic containers, so it is all pretty much cheap stuff, so if I couldn't get funding from school, maybe I could ask parents for some donations to buy the supplies.
I've been rambling a bit, so I think I'll stop. But before I do, did anyone else find the lesson plan format a bit difficult to fill out? I wish they had some sort of sample lesson plan to work with. I always find I go overboard with these assignments and having a sample would be nice to compare to and base mine off of.
Thanks for reading,
Chris
I agree that the lesson plan template was extremely detailed. I think that it incorporated a lot of the thinking that teachers need to address with all of the requirements these days about inclusion in public schools. Still, I wonder how many people really use that template for every daily lesson plan they create. If there is someone out there doing that, I would like to take a ride in his or her time machine. I just don't see how making a plan that detailed can be done each day every day with only 24 hours in a day. I bet it gets easier with time, though. Also, I think this a template that should be used to create really in depth, all-inclusive, STEM lessons, even if you are not chugging out one of these for every class of the year. They are probably more like works in progress, in which a teacher may create a few each year until he or she has built up a repertoire of STEM lessons. One thing is for sure. If templates of this nature ever become a requirement for daily lesson plans, it might be a good idea to start working on them now so by the time it is required, much of the work has already been completed over time. The catch there is that with time comes new engaging science ideas, so if the ideas change over time, then you have to make a new lesson plan anyway. This plan was definitely the "big kahuna" of lesson plans I have ever written, but I cannot deny the importance of the details it made me think of.
ReplyDeleteAaron, I agree, it definitely was the "Big Kahuna" of lesson plans. It definitely makes you think about all the little things that sometimes you overlook, but I think with time and experience in the classroom, you pick up on those things and just do them naturally.
ReplyDelete