Before and During Reading After Reading Beyond Reading Rubric Worksampls
Kimberly L. Fry
Creative Language Arts
Cyberlesson Reflection
1. How did you implement your cyberlesson?
This cyberlesson was implemented whole class to a group of 19 first graders. The first grade Social Studies unit is “All About Me.” This lesson provided me with a chance to integrate technology into this specific unit. I decided to teach this lesson to the whole class because This is the Way We Eat Our Lunch is a core book that needs to be experienced by all first graders. Another option would be to implement this in small groups at one of my learning centers, as all children rotate through each center in the span of a week. I also used the Smart Board when implementing this lesson. The Smart Board allowed the lesson to be even more interactive by giving the students a chance to come to the board and share their predictions and findings.
My students truly loved this project! They were actively engaged and participating. The use of the Smart Board also acted as a “hook” to pull them in. When children want a chance to come work at the Smart Board, they behave better so as not to lose their turn. They enjoyed having technology combined with literature. They also responded well when having to buddy up and devise a way to help others who may be hungry. My students also indicated that they enjoyed making predictions and then having to listen closely to the story to find out if their predictions were indeed correct. One of my students said, “I feel like a mystery person, you know, a detective…on the second column (the “I Found Out” column on the activity sheet) because I had to listen closely to find out the truth!” Other comments were,
| “It feels fun!” |
| “It rocks! I liked predicting and then finding out!” |
| “Awesome!” |
| “I loved getting the recipe and seeing everyone else’s!” |
| “I liked working with a partner on the project.” |
My students also surprised me with how clever they were when it came to helping out others in need. One student and his partner drew and wrote that they would set up a lemonade stand, sell lemonade, and take all the money they earned to buy food for those in need.
I believe that the use of technology was extremely motivating for the children. This caused them to think more about the topic and walk away with a better understanding than they would have if we had just read this story and discussed it orally as is usually done. I will definitely use this lesson in the years to come.
The strengths of this lesson are that it motivated my children to listen, participate, learn and be actively involved in thinking more globally. It also gave them an opportunity to learn more about one another’s likes, dislikes, commonalities and differences. In addition, this lesson actively involved the children in using technology in the classroom. The use of technology can easily seem like one more thing to “fit in” in an already jam packed curriculum. I appreciated the fact that this project helped integrate technology into what we already do.
There were no real ‘weaknesses’ in the lesson, but a difficulty in preparing a lesson like this for first graders is finding websites that are appropriate for such young children, especially ones relating to a topic such as world hunger. The hunger website did work out well, though. Once the children understood how the money was raised (by the advertisements) they could see how clicking on a website could help actually provide people with food. My children ask everyday to click on the website. This makes them feel like they are doing something to help others. Besides finding appropriate websites, this lesson was extremely successful.
| I implemented this lesson all in one “session” (which actually ended up taking the better part of our day!) Next time, if I chose to do it whole class, I would implement it over the course of a few days. I would follow a schedule such as the one below: |
Day 1: Introduction & Before Reading
Day 2: During Reading
Day 3: After Reading and introduce Beyond Reading (assign
homework)
Days 4-5: As the recipes come in, have students illustrate their
favorite foods so that they would be ready to be put into the
class cookbook.
· I would also give the children a chance to present their ideas for helping out in the fight against hunger.
· I also would try to get this book on cassette so that the children could enjoy it again independently at the listening center.
6. Recommendations?
· Make sure to use speakers on the computers, or headphones, so that the children can hear the words being read (especially if the children are doing it as an independent/supported center.)
· Make sure that everything is set up before the children arrive, because setting up takes time and little children do not have the attention span to wait for the “set-up” to be done.
· Especially if doing this with a whole class, break it down into a few days. Although the children enjoyed the lesson, and truly were engaged, I felt as though my whole day was upset because this lesson took too long. Also, the big change in schedule was hard on a few of my children who need real structure and consistency in schedule on a day to day basis.