Description for Unit of Instruction

What are you teaching?

Our group (Mishayla, Nicole, and Madison) taught fractions to a group of third
graders. The standards that we used are as follows:
CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.3.NF.A.3.B: Recognize and generate simple equivalent
fractions, e.g., 1/2 = 2/4, 4/6 = 2/3. Explain why the fractions are equivalent,
e.g., by using a visual fraction model.
CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.3.NF.A.1: Understand a fraction 1/b as the quantity
formed by 1 part when a whole is partitioned into b equal parts; understand a
fraction a/b as the quantity formed by a parts of size 1/b.
CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.3.NF.A.3.A: Understand two fractions as equivalent
(equal) if they are the same size, or the same point on a number line.
Why are you teaching it?
As we discussed possible lesson activities we could teach our assigned students, we
decided we wanted to do something that would challenge them and help them grow
the most. We knew our students were going to learn about fractions before we
started teaching them. We did not want to reteach what had already been taught.
Equivalent fractions caught our eye and felt that it would accomplish this goal. We
hoped that by teaching a more difficult topic, we could help the students practice
applying the basic knowledge they gained from Mrs. Ahrendsen.
What information did you use to make your decisions?
As we made our decision on what to teach we focused on looking through the
material provided by Mrs. Ahrendsen in the form of text books. She provided us
copies of the students textbook as well as a list of vocabulary terms they had
previously learned. As we knew the students had started learning fractions we
looked for the next step, that step was equivalent fractions.

Pre-assessment
Pre-assessment Goal:
We established that we needed to determine what the students knew. We plan to
use the data obtained from the pre-assessment to direct our lesson planning and
more to fully meet the needs of our individual students. In their classroom we
observed the students being taught fractions for the first time by Mrs. Ahrendsen.
She later pulled us aside and told us where the students were expected to be at by
our teaching week. This helped us in our pre-assessment because we had a better
understanding of the students knowledge. When we made our pre-assessment we
considered the current level of knowledge that the students were at and we
accounted for the level that we wanted them to reach. This is how we created our
test. We choose questions that we felt met this criteria. We further wanted to assess
the students if they finished their test early. We decided that an appropriate way to
do this would be by making fraction pizzas. This fast finisher activity would give us
more data of the students level as well as it would be fun for them after completing
our test.
Skills, topics, and concepts included
Identifying fractions
Naming fractions
Modeling Fractions
Vocabulary
o Numerator
o Dominator
o Equivalent
o Fraction
o Unit Fraction
o Half
o Whole
Equal parts of a whole
Equal shares
Understanding word problems
Fractions on a number line
Fractions of a While
Unit Fractions of a whole
Reliability, Validity and Bias:
Was the pre-assessment reliable, valid and unbiased?
We believe that our pre-assessment was valid because we did meet the criteria that
we had set. We both included questions that Mrs. Ahrendsen had taught them as
well as new information that we would teach. We choose to not write our own
questions for the pre-assessment, but rather to pull these questions from the
Chapter 8 Review Test and the textbook. These sources are reliable and are in line

with what they are learning and what they should be taught. This pre-assessment
did challenge them but this gave us the data that we needed in order to prepare
and teach our lessons.
Administration Conditions:
How was the pre-assessment administered?
When we arrived at the classroom we determined that the space available in the
classroom was too small to fit the needs of our three combined groups. So went
found available space in the teacher's lounge. This gave us a adequate testing and
teaching environment. When we brought our students down to the room we first
introduced ourselves to them and then we had them introduce themselves to us. By
doing this we established trust between us and them and this provided us with
better teaching environment. We administered the test as a whole group with paper
and pencil on March 23 at 9:15 am. We allowed students to take the full half hour
until the bell rang at 9:45 for completion of the pre-assessment. This time was more
than adequate for our students to finish. Most of our students finished by 9:30
which left us with 15 minutes to complete further planned assessments.
Question

Standard

NF.A.2a
NF.A.2b

NF.A.2b

NF.A.1

NF.A.1

NF.A.1

NF.A.3a

NF.A.3a

NF.A.3a

NF.A.3a

Standard

Question

NF.A.2a

NF.A.2b

NF.A.1

2
3
4
5

NF.A.3a

6, 7, 8, 9

Reflection:
If we had to redo our pre-assessment, we would first of all make sure that we had an
even 10 questions. We originally planned for this, but as a last minute complication
we only had 9 questions. We that 10 questions gives us a good basis for preassessment data at this age. There was also some questions that we realize now,
that could be tricky for students to understand because of their wording.

Pre-assessment Results
From our first graph we found the mean, median, mode, and range. The mean is
3.125, the median is 3, the mode is 5, and the range is 4. We learned that students
needed growth in all standards. However, we learned that they especially needed
help learning content from standards NF.A.2a and NF.A.2b. We learned that one of
their strengths was that they understood the vocabulary involved with identifying
fractions. From the pre-assessment we learned that they struggle with word
problems and number lines. After we administered our test we had students create
fraction pizzas. All of the students were successfully able to divide their pizzas into
faction without assistance. From this we learned that students knew what a fraction
was and that a fraction is made up of parts. We also learned that they do better with
hands on activities.

Refection of results:
Based on the pre-assessment data we made adjustments to our lessons plans by
putting more emphasis on the material that students missed. Since we were
teaching in centers, we divided up the areas that needed to be taught. Before we
administered our lesson plans we all had individual ideas of what we wanted to
teach. The pre-assessment results brought our focus together and we started to
work towards one goal as a group. Based on the pretest we were able to determine
that the students had not mastered information on which we were testing on,
except for question 5. All the students correctly answered question 5 in the preassessment. From this data gathered we were able to determine that they
understood fraction names such as fifths, sixths, and eighths. From the preassessment we determined that although our students may have been introduced
to fractions by Mrs. Ahrendsen, there was still gaps in their knowledge. The students
still struggled with fractions on a number line. From the graph that showed student
achievement according to standards, we were able to see that the students needed
growth in all of the standards that we focused on. However, students needed a lot
more growth with standards NF.A.2a and NF.A.2b than they did in with standards
NF.A.1 and NF.A.3a.

Post-assessment
Post-assessment goal:
We wanted to determine what the students knew and how well they would be able
to apply what we taught them.
Reliability, Validity and Bias:
Was the post-assessment reliable, valid and unbiased?
We believe that our post-assessment was valid because we did meet the criteria
that we had set. We both included questions that Mrs. Ahrendsen had taught them
as well as new information that we would teach. We choose to not write our own
questions for the post-assessment, but rather to pull these questions from the
Chapter 8 Review Test and the textbook. These sources are reliable and are in line
with what they are learning and what they should be taught. This post-assessment
did challenge them but it gave date so we could see if our lessons taught them what
they needed to know to successfully complete the assessment . As a fast finisher
after the test we had students work on a equivalent fraction worksheet, which they
were able to start working on.
Administration Conditions:
How was the pre-assessment administered?
The post-assessment was administered in the library on Monday, March 28, 2016 at
approximately 9:20 AM. The given to each student as a pencil paper write on. We
administered the test as a whole group. Each student was handed a test and was
told to try their best. The students were given 20 minutes to complete the postassessment. This was adequate time for the students because most students
completed the assessment in 10-15 minutes and had the remaining time for the fast
finisher activity.
Reflect:
If we had to redo our post-assessment, we would first of all make sure that we had
an even 10 questions. We thought about adding one after we gave our preassessment, but we decided against this because we wanted to keep our tests
consistent. Some of the questions still seemed tricky to some of our students. We
wish that we had spent more time deciphering word problems. We could tell that
this was our student most difficult area on the test. When administering the test, we
would have ideally liked to had more room for our students to spread out. They did
have adequate space but there was some distractions because it was a public
setting in the library and other groups were around us assessing as well.

Standard

Question

NF.A.2a

NF.A.2b

NF.A.1

2
3
4
5

NF.A.3a

6
7
8
9

Question

Standard
1

NF.A.2a
NF.A.2b

NF.A.2b

NF.A.1

NF.A.1

NF.A.1

NF.A.3a

NF.A.3a

NF.A.3a

NF.A.3a

Post-assessment Results
From our first graph we found the mean, median, mode, and range. The mean is
6.14, the median is 6, the mode is 6, and the range is 3. From the post-assessment
results we saw that all of the students improved in all of the areas. They still
struggled the most in NF.A.2a and NF.A.2b. Students improved in all of the areas
questions covered. Students struggled most with questions 3 and 9. We feel that
this is because these are word problems, something that these students struggled
with. Students will need more practice overall especially with story problems and
number lines. Students strength was vocabulary and using models to solve
problems. Students weaknesses were number lines and word problems. We
attribute these results to gaps in learning and teaching.

Refection of results:
Based on the post-assessment data we would adjust our unit by using paper and
pencil examples. We realize that we did not do enough of this in our teaching and
there was a disconnect between our assessment and our method of teaching. Based
our result we were able to see growth and see where we had knowledge gaps. We
think it was a valuable experience for us to see the questions missed mapped out
on graphs. We see now the level of difficulty of questions and we would put more
focus on those question if we were to teach this unit again. Some of the specific
items that we teach further on is word problems and number lines. Question three
gave us a good example of how we needed to provide the students with the fraction
when teaching our lessons. We took the opposite approach in the lessons and had
the students come up with those fractions. It worked, but there is valuable benefits
in providing them with a fraction to work off of.

Overall reflection
Introductory Paragraph:
In our unit we taught fractions to a small group of third grade students. Mrs.
Ahrendsen began the unit with her whole class before we got into her classroom.
Our unit started a couple of lessons in and our students already had a general
background of fractions. We focused on teaching equivalent fractions. We each
taught fifteen minute centers for a total of 45 minutes of instruction and three
different centers each class period.
Assessment Design:
Our unit was designed around the information that Mrs. Ahrendsen had already
taught her class, the chapter 8 test, and the textbook. We saw lots of growth in our
student from the beginning when we administered them our pre-test to the end
when we administered our post-test. We attribute the success of our unit and
growth in our student to our lesson designs. The amount of information in which we
were able to cover with three teachers teaching each child every day also played a
part in our success. This means that every student in our group got a total of six
different lessons in our time in their classroom. This helped prepare them for the
test and gave them a good variety of instructional approaches.
Instruction:
We were able to learn what we planned well and what we needed improvements on
as a teaching group. We tried to split our standards and lessons between the three
of us, but we could see some overlap in instruction. This isnt a bad thing, but we
couldve used this information to put focus onto other objectives that were
challenging to our students. We feel good about the instruction in which we did give
them. Our planned lessons went as anticipated and we did well at having success in
on the spot teaching.
Challenges and Successes:
One of our daily struggles was trying to find a spot to fit all of the children as well as
provide the space we needed to split up into groups. We wanted an assigned area
that we could go to every time. It was frustrating to sit down somewhere, be in the
middle of instruction, and have to pack up and wander around to find a new
location. This was a problem for our group mostly because we had a group of three
teachers and the largest group. We had success engaging our students and keeping
them focused and learning for the whole 45 minutes. We had success with teaching
content and with our assessments. We saw improvement in our students both in the
lessons and on the assessment.

What We Learned:
What we learned as a group:
Through this experience we learned how to communicate well as a team of
teachers. We were taught how to divide content and how to effectively teach
together the standards that needed to be covered. We had coordination with our
lesson plans. We also we able to learn about sharing the teaching with each other,
not one person dominated the teaching in our group. We also learned what not to
do in pre and post-assessments!
What we learned individually:
I learned that I love to work with others as part of a team. It is very enjoyable for me
and I feel that it helps me to be able to better reach students. I also learned that
fractions can be fun. I tried to make fractions fun and engaging for students and I
feel that I was able to accomplish this.