Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Grade/Class/Subject: ELA 7
Observation Time/Duration: 1
class period (50 min)
School Name: Swainston Middle
School
This tool is for the educator and evaluator to discuss an observation that has occurred. It is intended to guide thinking
and conversation, so every question may not be answered or be relevant to every observation.
Notes:
Learning Focus: Students were learning how
to use sensory language and imagery. They
were also learning how to make inferences
that are supported by textual evidence. I
connected these concepts to prior learning by
asking them to define sensory details, similes,
and metaphors, which were words that they
learned in the first unit.
Knowledge of Students: First of all, the
objective and the content of the lesson were
strictly grounded on the Nevada Academic
Content standards. Students were completing
a variety of high level tasks, such as making
inferences, predicting, analyzing and
questioning a text. These tasks will be crucial
for them to master to prepare them for high
school and college. The variety of the tasks,
and the amount of collaborative group work
also ensured that all students are actively
engaged. Finally, tasks were broken down into
manageable steps to ensure all students felt
capable of success. Group and partner work
also allowed students to feel successful at
accomplishing the tasks.
Instruction and Learning Practices: I
employed a variety of strategies to ensure
students were engaged and making meaning
of new learning. First, the lesson made use of
actual tangerines for students to practice
writing figurative language and sensory
details. The tangerines were linked to
students preview of the novel Tangerine.
Second, students worked in collaborative
group discussions multiple times throughout
the lesson. They shared their inferences and
listened to other students findings. I
assessed a number of assignments to ensure
students achieved the lesson goals, such as
their writing prompts, writing done in their
Springboard books, and their journal entries.
Developing Independent Learners: Students
engaged in metacognitive learning by
participating in group discussions where they
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Notes:
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Artifacts to Provide Contextual Information (if applicable): These can include some or all of the
following but are not limited to this list: teacher notes; meeting notes; audio/visual/print artifacts.
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