Monday with a 2nd Grade Observation

The day started off slightly better. Morning meeting went pretty well and I ran the first few mini lessons. It was good to finally be back to a normal schedule this afternoon, now that PSSA is over. The afternoon was interesting because I observed a second grade math lesson. It was really nice to see how another class was set up and how it worked. I liked her classroom setup with desks instead of tables. I also liked the class marble idea. The teacher started with an empty jar of marbles, and if the class id doing well, they can add marbles. If they are not, they take away marbles. If the jar gets full, the class wins a party. It was also interesting to see how she differentiated activities and handled giving multi-step directions. She repeated the three steps, had them repeat it 3 times, then had two students stand up and recite the directions. She put on some quiet music while they worked, that seemed to keep them a little calmer. She had 3 different activities. The first was a quiet game in pairs. The second was an individual worksheet and the third was another worksheet, which she had differentiated. She placed two different worksheets on the ground and put Popsicle sticks with students’ names underneath the one that they should be doing. She also explained that if one seems easier than the other, it’s not because some people are not smart or not good at math, it just means it’s what’s right for them. I asked her why she explained it and she said she got a letter from a parent saying that her student came home saying that he always gets harder papers than everyone else. She asked what would happen if she got a paper that was too hard – they’d get frustrated. What if it was too easy? They’d zip through it in a second. She said this is the paper that is right for you. I also liked her technique when the Smartboard wasn’t working of asking them to send positive energy to the Smartboard as she was working on it. They all held out their hands at the board. It gave them a thought to think about and something to occupy them until it worked. I also really liked her energizer activity that she did before the lesson. The class is making up a class dance and they add steps to it every once in a while. They just count and on each number they have another dance move that they do.