Department of Teacher Education & Learning Sciences

Elementary Education Program

Formal Observation Reflection

Directions: Complete the reflection questions and submit your response to your observer prior to having a post-
conference to discuss the observation. If a conference is held immediately after the observation you will submit
your responses to the observer the following day via email.

Name: Tyra Kornegay Date: 4/8/17

1. To what extent were learning outcomes appropriate and achievable to your students?

The learning outcomes were appropriate and achieved by having read to the students
Dr.Suess The Sneetches at the beginning of the lesson to have the students think
about equality and accepting differences. After the story, I asked the students
questions for them to answer and they answered fully with details coming from the
book as well as their own ideas. In my math portion of the lesson, my learning
outcomes was for students to work with comparing fractions and be able to correctly
place the fractions onto a number line. I believed that this was achieved by seeing
students correctly use their fraction strips to model out the fraction they were assigned
to model and correctly help me place the fractions on to the number line as a class.
2. How effective were your instructional strategies? What changes would you make in
your instructional approaches if you taught this lesson again? Why?

I felt that my instructional strategies were effective. By reading The Sneetches at the
beginning of the lesson, the students were able to associate a real life problem that
happens in our world (unfairness and not accepting diversity) with a mathematical
concept of how to compare fractions. Also, students were also able to connect the
previous days lesson of comparing fractions with the same numerator to this lesson
by referring back to the rule we created as a class which came in handy when we
came across examples of fractions in that category (the rule: if two fractions have the
same numerator, the one with the smaller denominator will be the bigger fraction
because the size of the pieces will be larger). Some changes I would make in this
lesson if I were to teach it again would be to manage my time better, create a more
organized way for two sets of partners to interact in the activity, and have a stronger
emphasis on the discussion of comparing fractions at the end of the lesson.
3. Evaluate the effectiveness of your oral and written communication with students.
(Consider how well you communicated learning objectives, clarity of directions, use of standard English, quality of
questions and effectiveness of discussion techniques.)

I had very effective skills of communicating with the students in my lesson. Whenever I
wanted the students to remember something that would be essential for their activity, I
not only would emphasize through words but I also wrote it on the board for the
students to see and write down if need be. I also repeated instructions for the students
multiple times having the students say back to me essential rules of procedures so
that way I knew they understood the directions and what I was asking of the students.
 Also, I had different participate in class discussion so that I wouldnt have the same
students who always get to speak in class outshine the other students.
4. Evaluate the level of student engagement in your lesson . (Consider how you presented the
content/skills, the activities and assignments for students, grouping of students, and structure and pacing of the
lesson.)

The level of student engagement in my lesson started off well. The students were
instructed to work with a partner at their table in the first part of the lesson. This went
very well and students were able to work together to compose a fraction based on the
scenario they were giving involving the Sneetches. When the second part of the
assignment came for the students and their partners to find another set of partners,
this is where the students became very confused. I had to stop the partner process for
a little bit so that I could clear up the misconceptions and misunderstanding that the
students had. This showed me that demonstrating all the different steps to students,
even something as small as finding a set of partners, is important because not only
does it help you as the teacher verbalize instructions well but it also gives a visual to
students of what you expect from them.
5. How effectively did you use instructional materials, resources, and/or technology?
All my technology and tools that the students and I used worked well and were
effective. I read the story of The Sneetches to the students off of the SMART board,
wrote instructions and created a number on the whiteboard using dry erase markers,
and the students used the fraction strips kit to model out and compare fractions.

6. To what extent were your assessment strategies effective? What changes would you
make in your assessment approach if you taught this lesson again? Why?
For my assessment strategies, I would want make sure that I had more time in my
lesson to ask students not only to share their answers and thoughts about how we
were comparing fractions, but I would want students to ask more questions. This is so
they could be more engaged with the learning process as well as promote student
discussions. In my lesson though, I did make sure to have frequent check ins with the
students working so that I could know if the class was or wasnt ready to move to a
new part of the lesson.
7. To what extent was your feedback to students accurate, substantive, constructive,
specific, and/or timely?
If students had questions regarding the creation of their fractions, I made sure to come
and address their questions and try to help the student understand by asking
questions to get them to think, reminding them of the tools they had in front of them to
use to help organize their thinking (the fraction strips), as well as having a discussion
with their partner to see if they could assist in sharing strategies or ways of thinking to
their partner. All these ways were used to help give feedback to students work as well
as answering questions.

8. To what extent did the classroom management and environment contribute to student
learning? (Consider your classroom procedures, your use of physical space, and the students conduct.)

I made it clear as the teacher that if students wanted to share out an answer that they
must raise their hands. This is so one student would be speaking at a time and I could
listen to the students response and then ask the whole class whether they agreed or
 disagreed with their statement. I also made sure that students were sitting at their
original desk at the end of the lesson to engage in a final discussion rather than being
all over the classroom in various places.
9. Did you make modifications to your lesson plan during the lesson? If so, what were
they and what motivated these changes?

No, I did not make any modifications to my lesson while teaching. The only thing I
would say I did was ask more questions that I had scripted out in my lesson plan to
ask the students than I was planning on originally.
10. Was your Teaching Behavior Focus goal met?
Yes, my Teaching Behavior Focus goals of assessing prior knowledge was met by
reviewing the lesson that was taught the previous day as well as going over the
components that make up a fraction before beginning the activity.