This week I noticed how important it is to model what I am teaching students before I expect them to complete the lesson on their own. I had the students complete a scavenger hunt in Scholastic magazines to search for nonfiction features and write their purposes. I explained what I wanted students to do, but I did not model it for them on the first day. Students were confused and were unsure of how to complete the scavenger hunt chart. The next day, I went back and modeled three features and filled them in on my chart so that students could see. Then, I asked the students to do the same. Students completed the worksheet with much more ease the second day after I had modeled the sheet for them.
It's important that I went back and modeled the information for the students, but it's also important that I readjusted the next day's lesson so that I could essentially reteach the scavenger hunt lesson. I noticed that the lesson does not always go as planned, therefore, some information has to be retaught the next day. I can understand that I did not model the expectation the first day, so I had to go back and redo the lesson the next day. This is a case of me being able to catch my mistake with failing to model the chart for the students and going back to redo the lesson. This helped my students to be more successful with the lesson. I was happy that the lesson went much better the second day. I learned that modeling is extremely important, especially with first graders.
This is a good lesson, but I also think it highlights the drawback of having an activity that must be completed in a set way. If students are confused by the directions, then they cannot complete the activity. However, for more open-ended tasks, students can attempt the activity in whichever way makes the most sense to them, allowing you and them to learn from how they approach the activity, looking for what their approach reveals about their understanding.
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