Collaborative Lesson

LI 876: Collaborative Instructional Lesson Alison Wilkins Emporia State University (Lesson presented at Sunset Hill Elementary in Lawrence, KS)

Collaborative Lesson Unit: Big 6 Research and Native American Model Grade: 5th grade Content Standards: History Standard, Benchmark 1, Knowledge Indicator 1 History Standard, Benchmark 1, Application Indicator 2 AASL Standards: Indicators 1.1.1, 1.1.4, and 1.1.6 (all at Grade 5 level) Time Frame The entire unit (from research to completing the model) will take 2 weeks, but the collaboration portion of the unit will take 2 full class periods with a half hour of extra time for working with students who are behind in the research. Overview Throughout the semester, my elementary supervisor has been teaching the 5th grade classes about taking notes and researching. Her lessons will act as an introduction to what Im teaching and will lead the way into my lesson. Mrs. McDonald (5th grade social studies) and I collaborated on creating a lesson that teaches students to perform basic research and note taking skills while researching a Native American tribe. The students will be separated into groups. Each group will have a different Native American tribe that they must research. Each individual student will be responsible for researching one aspect of their tribe for their final project: clothing, housing, culture/ceremonies, food, and land/climate. They will be taught the Big 6 research model then use it to complete their research. While performing their research, they must take good notes and not plagiarize. The final product will be a model of a village, and each student will also write a paragraph about what they researched. The unit will be taught to 2 different 5th grade social studies classes. Principles of Library and Information Science 1. Students will be taught the Big 6 Research Model. They will not just learn this model. They will also apply it in their research of aspects of a Native American tribe. 2. They will work on methods of information seeking including using an index and table of contents. 3. They will be introduced to on-line searching and finding reputable sources. (Mrs. McDonald wanted her students to use only print resources for this project, so teaching on-line research is not a part of the unit but it was touched on in class discussion). 4. The students will learn to take notes that do not plagiarize. They will be taught to summarize and put notes in their own words. 5. Students will all be given equal access to the same quantity and quality of resources no matter what tribe they are researching. Required Resources 1. Nonfiction books on the following tribes: Navajo, Sioux/Lakota, Ojibwa/Chippewa, Tlingit, and Cherokee. 2. Students social studies textbook

Collaborative Lesson 3. Big 6 Research Model outline 4. Document camera (so they can follow along with me while Im teaching the Big 6) 5. Research organizer with research questions for each tribe over the following: culture/ceremonies, climate/land, food, clothing, and homes. Documentation of Collaboration Mrs. McDonald and I met after school to formally organize our collaboration after discussing the unit informally once or twice. We filled out a planning form for the unit (which I have submitted alongside this unit plan) so that each of use would be clear on our duties and understand what the other will be doing. It was an effective meeting in which we also exchanged materials and made schedules. Cooperative Teaching Plan Social Studies Teacher 1. Introduce the Native American tribes and cultural regions to her classes. 2. Put students into groups based on ability (she also put Native American students into the group that is researching their own tribe so they can learn about their heritage). 3. Create the research organizer to help the students focus their research (it will ask specific questions that she wants them to answer) 4. Gather materials for, supervise the creation of, and grade the final project. Library Media Specialist 1. Gather resource materials. 2. Gather a Big 6 outline for them to fill out while Im teaching the Big 6. 3. Teach the Big 6 research model. 4. Teach/review how to use an index. 5. Run a small group in the library of students who need extra guidance and assistance in their research. Together 1. Supervise and assist with research 2. Informally assess students progress throughout the research process Meeting Individual Information Needs and Equitable Information Access 1. An outline of the Big 6 Research Model will be given to each student to ensure that everyone has easy access to the steps of the model and possible keywords to search (which they will list on their outline) to assist in their research. 2. Students will all start with their textbook; however, not all the tribes are well represented in the textbook. As a result, multiple books over these tribes will be offered so that every student can have access to equal amounts of information. 3. Since this is the first research project of the year, students will be given a research outline with questions to guide their research instead of being allowed to simply write down random facts they like. This will meet their needs of learning what information will be helpful in their projects.

Collaborative Lesson 4. There will be multiple books on each tribe so that not only will every student have access to a book other than their textbook, they will also have access to more than one extra book. 5. Small tutoring sessions with the library media specialist will target students who need extra assistance in using indexes and finding information. 6. Both teachers will circulate throughout the classroom to informally assess how students seem to be doing on their research. If a student seems to need help finding and recording useful information, the teacher or librarian will stop and work one-on-one with that student to help them meet their needs and find the right information. End Product/Culminating Activity This projects final product will be a model of a Native American village; however, the library media specialist will not collaborate on the creation of these models. For my part, the culminating activity will be completing their research organizer. Each group has 4-5 students and each student will research and answer questions over just one aspect of the tribe. The final product that I will see is each students answered questions which I will be informally assessing throughout the research process and helping them make any needed corrections or additions as they are researching so that all of their needed information will be found before they begin their models. Assessment Overview For my collaborative portion of this unit, there will be no formal assessment. Mrs. McDonald does not want to collect a grade for the research outline they will fill out with me, and since there is no library grade, there is no need for me to grade them. As a result, the assessments I will perform are informal assessments. I will perform informal assessments in a few ways. First, I will ask them to tell me what resources they could use and how they would use them. If the class cant answer these questions, it will show me we really needed to start with basics. I will also observe students as they perform their individual research. If my informal assessment shows me that a student is struggling, I will stop and help them one-on-one whether they directly ask for help or not. Finally, I will talk individually with students and have them show me what they have done and ask if they have any questions. If my little interview reveals any problems, I will know to stop circulating around the classroom and work with that student. Assessment Results The results of my various informal assessments were encouraging. When I asked the students what types of resources would be useful and how to use them, they could all answer that question. When asked what resources they could use, they responded with class text, nonfiction book, experts, Internet (which Mrs. McDonald and I narrowed down to good websites and took a few minutes to talk about finding trustworthy sites), and encyclopedias. When I asked them how they would find the information in them, they responded by saying they could use the table of contents or the index. They also all knew that the table of contents was in the front and the index was in the back. This showed me that they knew the bare basics of research and were ready to learn the Big 6. The students had never used the Big 6 before. However, they seemed to grasp the concepts easily enough. They all were able to fill in the blanks with me as I lectured with them. They were also

Collaborative Lesson all able to help me come up with some great keywords for step 2. My informal assessments of this section of my lesson showed that even though this was the first time theyd used the Big 6, extra teaching of the steps is not necessary as long as they can reference their outline. The research process was actually much smoother than I had suspected. I was able to assess that many of the students really caught on and were able to do most of the searching on their own. The questions provided by Mrs. McDonald made this possible. I think if we had just cut them loose it would have been another story entirely. The students used keywords we had discussed as a class to search the index and found plenty of information to answer the questions on the outline. Many of them were very proud of their work and were excited to show me how much they had accomplished. Informal observation showed Mrs. McDonald and I that there were a couple students in each class who needed extra assistance. The small group that I tutored on the second day was a second tier intervention for many of these students. Students what were assessed as students whose skills showed us they could fall behind came into the library for a 30minute tutoring session with me. All of them except for one greatly benefited and moved forward on their own when we went back to class. The one that the informal assessments of observation and casual discussion showed was still struggling was one that I spent a lot of time with one-onone back in class. Together we found most of the information he needed, and by the end he had made steps forward in being able to come up with keywords and in searching a page for information; however, I think he was still behind his peers. Students also made improvements in note taking skills. I had to remind a few students to use short summarizing phrases instead of copying whole sentences, but overall, students showed me that this is a skill they are getting close to mastering. Overall, I would say that the biggest gains for these two classes of students were in performing keyword searches in print materials. By the end of the research process, most of the students were able to effectively use an index by searching for keywords that fit in the subject they were searching. They also made gains in knowledge of the Big 6. This was their first introduction to the model and they were all able to make good use of it. Evaluation of the Library Media Program The library media program at Sunset Hill is designed for success in collaboration. The library has an open schedule 3 out of 5 school days each week. As a result, the librarian is able to go into classrooms to collaborate, pull in small groups of students for tutoring and other tier 2 interventions, and meet with teachers during their plan time if necessary. The librarian is able to directly instruct students on principles of information seeking strategies, research, and any other library media topics. This is a huge benefit for the school and the library media program. Instead of the teachers being forced to be the only ones teaching this, the librarian is able to put in expert advice and assist the teachers in any unit of study. Through this particular collaborative lesson, I witnessed students learning to perform keyword searches, use the Big Six, use an index, and show note-taking skills. For future improvement, I would recommend the librarian have more time for tier 2 interventions. I would have loved to meet with more than one small group to assess their skills and give them more attention. I know that the classroom teachers time is limited, but finding a way to make this work would greatly improve the library programs ability to teach the students these skills and it would ensure better success for more students.