Instructional Strategies
“The teacher understands and uses a variety of instructional strategies to encourage learners to develop deep understanding of content areas and their connections, and to build skills to apply knowledge in meaningful ways.”
This was by far my best standard. I think I did a fantastic job using different strategies in order to teach all students. For me this started in my backward planning which can be seen in my unit plan. By planning instructional strategies, I was able to use many different strategies and space them out so students did not become dependent on one or another. One strategy that I was more comfortable with because of a presentation I was asked to give was cooperative group work. I felt like I knew this strategy inside and out, and this showed through out my internship.
On the right you will find videos of PowerPoint and of the classroom strategies in action, as well as actual lesson plans that I designed for my internship. On the first day that I was in my internship I went with a strategy that I was not as sure about, role-play. I do not know why, but role-play just does not fit my teaching and style and it was for this reason that I wanted to try it. It actually turned out great as you can see in the video. I gave each student an individualized role on a sheet of paper and they were asked to play that character. From this point forward, I was very confident in the strategies I used. In the next two weeks I used straight lecture, FRAMEs, jigsaws, case study, and games. I decided I wanted to try another strategy that I was not comfortable with, simulation. I really did not like this one because I had to give up so much control, and with second semester seniors that can get out of control. In reality, it was not bad and the students actually enjoyed it. The students had just done a case study to discover the steps a bill takes to become a law. They were then asked to complete the process themselves, making laws for our classroom. They actually passed some great laws, like no flowcharts, notecards on tests, test corrections, and new desk arrangements. We completed the year also using discussion, debate, slot notes, evaluation, and Concept Mastery maps.
I love doing this as a teacher because for me, in planning, just doing one thing gets boring. And, I cannot imagine how boring it is for students. Differentiated instruction is something that is better for all those involved and something I have a great head start in, and I only plan on improving.