Last
week, Ashlyn and I had the opportunity to teach a lesson in the pre-school
classroom at Brigham. Each week the pre-school lessons have been focused on the
five senses. Last week Ashlyn and I taught a lesson about the sense of hearing.
Before teaching the lesson, we brainstormed ideas and thought that putting
together different stations for the students to explore would be a fun and
interactive way to teach this topic. We decided to make shakers with four
different materials in plastic eggs that included pennies, beads, rice, and
marbles. Another station we had instruments that included a rain stick, bells,
bongos, maracas, etc. The last station we had was paper cups made into phones.
We thought that all of these materials would give the students an opportunity
to hear many different sounds throughout the lesson. We began the lesson with a
book called The Ear Book, but instead
of us just reading the book to the students we found a YouTube video that read
the book and made the sounds that happen in the book. This was also another
example of having the students hear different sounds.
Overall,
I thought we had many strengths throughout our lesson. We had our materials
readily available and developmentally appropriate for preschoolers to use. We
were organized and had sheets available for our teacher assistants to fill out
while they were helping with the stations. I also thought that we co-taught
well. I felt like our teacher assistants were a huge part of why our lesson
went so well. They took over each station and rotated the materials to make
things easier, instead of having the students rotate. We took advantage of
having so many extra hands to plan this lesson. I think this lesson would be a
lot more difficult to manage if it wasn’t for having an assistant at each
station.
Although
I felt like things went well for the most part, there are a few things that
could be improved. If we were to teach this lesson in the future, we probably
could add another station the students could go to. I also think that we could
have added more questions that could be asked at each station. On the other
hand, we kept things basic since it was pre-K. For other grade levels, we could
ask more in depth questions and research more about how our sense of hearing
works. I also think we could have maybe replaced the paper cup phones with
something else because there were times it was hard for the students to know
what to do. I thought that it went well though when there was a teacher next to
the students prompting the students and showing them what to do.
I
think the student’s motivation to work at each station was because they were
excited to play with the materials. They were able to hold these materials and
explore them in a way they knew how. They might not have felt like they were
doing much, but they were all hearing the sounds and that was our purpose of
the lesson. We kept the rotations moving to keep the students interest. I
noticed if the students were at a station for a long time they started to drift
off and not really pay attention. I think having many different materials for
the students to explore helped spark their interest and keep them motivated to
participate.
Our
knowledge of the topic was clear while we taught the lesson. I think we
explained things the best that we could for the students. Sometimes it is
difficult for me to find the right words to explain certain topics to very
young children in order for them to understand. I think the purpose of our
lesson was clear and the students learned something from it. As long as the
students were able to understand that we use our ears to hear and there are
many different kinds of sounds we can hear. We also use our sense of hearing
for many reasons.
The
students explored each station and answered the questions that the teacher
assistants were asking. I heard things like many students guessing what was in
the eggs before anybody asked them what they thought was in them. I also heard
students trying to have conversations in the phones and seeing if they could
hear the other person talk. These are all examples of things that showed me the
students understanding of the topic.
We asked the students what body
part they hear with and related this sense to things that they are familiar
with. We talked about how there are quiet sounds and loud sounds that we can
hear. The students gave us examples of things that they heard in the video such
as a train, a girl singing, water dripping, etc. We also talked about how we
need our sense of hearing in order to hear our teachers and other adults.
While
I was teaching, I thought of some of my goals that I have been working on at
Brigham. Since this was my third time being in the pre-K room, it was easier
for me to understand the students and know what they were saying. I was able to
interact with the students better and have conversations with them. I feel like
it has been getting easier working with English Language Learners. I am
becoming more comfortable and I take more initiative now, then I used to when
communicating with these students.
Overall,
I am pleased with how our lesson went. I enjoyed teaching this lesson and introducing
all of the materials and different sounds to the students. Once I was done
teaching I thought that this would be a great lesson to keep and teach to my
PDS class or teach in the future. I can add things and change different parts
in order to best fit whatever grade I am teaching. If I were teaching this to
my PDS kindergarten class, I would add one or two more stations. I would also add
more expectations for the students and have questions at each station to guide
discussion within the groups.
Exceeds- Here is the link to the video that we showed the students in our introduction and pictures of examples of materials that we used.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ByP6XAAhRA
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