Contextual Factors

Community Contextual Factors

Yorktown Elementary school serves the community of Yorktown, Virginia. Yorktown
Elementary School is located in the middle of York County. Yorktown is located in the Commonwealth
of Virginia in the center of Hampton Roads. Yorktown is a quiet, mostly residential, suburban
community with a tight knit feel. Yorktown offers a calm respite to the bustling urban areas
surrounding it. The city was founded in 1634 and has a rich history (Demographics, n.d.). It is a
historic community, known for the famous Yorktown Battlefield, the site of the surrender of the British
forces during the Revolutionary War. Yorktown spans 105 square miles and encompasses several
different communities such as Poquoson, Seaford and James River (Demographics, n.d.). Each area of
the community has a different feel and a different population, which in turn gives each of the
community schools a distinct feel as well.
Yorktown, Virginia is a moderately homogenous community. The population of was recorded to
be 66,269 in 2014. The residents of the community are 77% white, 13% black and scant percentages
belonging to other ethnicities. Less than 8% of the population claims to speak a language other than
English at home. About 16% of the community's income was between the $100,000 to $150,000
bracket and 13% of the population's income between $80,000 to $100,000. Only 5% of the population
are described as living below the poverty line. The community also boosts a low unemployment rate of
less than 4%, which is lower than the recorded national average in 2015. The community has a low
high school drop out rate compared to the national recorded average in 2014, with only 8% of the
population not obtaining a high school diploma. Of it's graduates, around 40% continue to enroll in
college and 42% of the residents have at least a bachelor's degree while 72% of the population has at
least some college. Overall, the residents of Yorktown are a fairly homogenous group with most of it's
residents being middle class, white and educated.
School District Contextual Factors

The district itself is also quite large and spans 105 square miles. There are ten elementary
schools, four middle schools and four high schools in the district. The district covers many different
communities each with its distinct characteristics. For instance, most of the schools located at the
southern end of the county serve a large military population, many of the schools in the middle of the
district serve a population with a higher socioeconomic status and the schools near the north end of the
county serve a population with a generally lower socioeconomic status. The district spans from the
border of Hampton and Newport News and contains Poquoson, Historic Yorktown and even has some
schools located in Williamsburg. Because of it's size, the community that the district serves is diverse.
Each area has a distinct population giving each school a different feel. Possibly because of the size of
the district or the tight knit suburban feel, the district shares many community partnerships with nearly
all local businesses located in the community. The school district has partnerships with around 75 of the
local and family owned businesses contained in the district.
The total per-pupil expenditure reported in 2013-2014 school year was $9,828. This is
significantly lower than the national average of ~$11,000 (Student Demographics, n.d.). Because of the
community's overall wealth, most of the federal funding goes to the more underfunded counties located
nearby. The lower student expenditure rate impacts by the schools by not allowing them to be able to
purchase many of the newer technologies that the surrounding districts schools have. However, because
of the close community-school partnerships, the students have the opportunity to participate in projects
which allow the students to see the importance of their education. Although the schools are very
diverse and the district is faced with lower federal funding, the community works hard to collaborate in
order to provide services to the students.

School Contextual Factors

Yorktown Elementary School serves over 600 students grade preschool to fifth grade (Student
Demographics, n.d.). Yorktown Elementary School is also a magnet school for science and technology.

The area that the school serves is a stark contrast to the statistics represented by the surrounding county.
The student population is made up of several different ethnicities that are rather proportionate to each
other. Of the 638 students that were enrolled at Yorktown Elementary School in the 2013-2014 school
year, 353 were white (55%) and 285 were non-white (45%). Of the students that were identified as nonwhite, 22% were African American. Over 42% of the student population qualifies for free or reduced
lunch (Student Demographics, n.d.). This school represents a very large, diverse student body both
academically, racially and financially.
Classroom Contextual Factors
This unit will take place in a third grade classroom. The classroom is open and fairly large. It
has two wide windows on the far wall that let in a lot of natural light. There are several bookshelves
around the room for storing classroom materials and a cubby for storing edible reinforcements and the
teacher's personal items. Along the back wall there is a built-in counter with a sink. Above this built-in
counter, is a space for three bulletin boards that relate to what the students are currently studying. In the
back of the room there is a bookshelf full of classroom library books. Near the library books is a large
rug used for carpet time and doubles in use as a student reading area with pillows and quiet games.
Next to the the rug area, there is a horseshoe shaped guided reading table. Behind the guided reading
table is a bookshelf containing teacher tools for guided reading and guided reading books. The
classroom does not have a teacher's desk, but there is a tall rolling table that holds the computer that is
used as the teacher work station. The student desks are arranged in groups. There are two groups of six
desks in the front of the room, a group of four desks in the back of the room near the built-in sink and a
group of five desks in the back more near the guided reading table. The whiteboard is located in the
front of the room and the projector screen pulls down to cover the whiteboard. The room contains
everything the students need for teaching and learning.
The third grade classroom has a variety of technology both for student and teacher use. All of
the classrooms K-5 come with a teacher desktop and three classroom computers for student use. The

student computers come with headphones. Each teacher desktop station has a computer, VCR, Hover
Cam and speakers. Each classroom also comes with a projector and projector screen. There is also an
abundance of resources available to the teachers to check out for use in their classroom. Since
Yorktown Elementary School is a science and technology magnet school, there are a variety of
resources pertaining to math available to teachers. There are three large storage closets full of math
manipulatives and games for any teacher in the building to check out to use in their classroom. In
addition to math resources, there are several sets of basal readers available to the teachers for guided
reading groups. Each classroom has it's own set of basal readers that are leveled and teachers will often
borrow from other grades if several students are reading above or below grade level. In addition to
concrete resources, the school has a math specialist and a reading specialist that are available to assist
teachers if they need assistance in either of those areas.
Parental participation in this third grade classroom is limited. The parents of the students in this
classroom have outside obligations and/or situations that greatly impact their availability to participate
in the classroom and school functions. Oftentimes, scheduling a meeting for conferences can be
difficult, but there are a some parents that are willing to come by and assist in the classroom
occasionally. Although it is not the same as classroom parent support, Yorktown Elementary School has
a very supportive Parent Teacher Association (PTA) group. Members of the PTA are seen volunteering
daily assisting in various classrooms, organizing fundraisers or assisting with classroom tasks such as
delivering sharpened pencils to the teachers. The third grade classroom this unit takes place in receives
the services that the PTA provides, as listed above.
The classroom subjects taught in the classroom have recently changed. Because time for state
assessments is coming soon, the third grade team has chosen to temporarily discontinue teaching social
studies and science in order to focus solely on the content areas that are covered on the state assessment
for third grade. Until state testing is over, the only subjects that will be taught are English (to include
grammar, reading, writing and spelling) and math. All of the English material is taught in the morning

and early afternoon and math is taught in the last two hours of the day. The students will review skills
taught throughout the year in order to prepare them for the state assessment, while sill learning new
math concepts, spelling words and reading strategies.
Student Contextual Factors
This third grade class is a very heterogeneous group of students. The skill levels of the students
in the classroom vary dramatically. Although there are no students identified as being special needs,
there are four students who are in the process of a child study and five students who receive response to
intervention services. Of these students, there are three students with ADHD. This greatly impacts their
ability to stay focused on assignments and achieve the same success as their peers. Two of the students
who are currently in child study are performing notably lower than their peers. These two students have
great difficulty retaining information and generalizing concepts, and generally perform poorly on
assessments and classwork. On the other hand, there are several students with a higher skill level than
their peers. There is one student who is identified as gifted and attends a gifted program one day out of
the week. There are also three other students who achieve above their peers and have very high grades.
In fact, the largest reading group in the class, which contains six students, has the students reading five
levels above third grade reading level. In order to reach all of the students in this class, I will provide a
lot of differentiation and group work in assignments. I will also utilize partner work and group work
while pairing a higher achieving student with a lower achieving student to get the most out of the
varying ability levels in this class. Differentiation will be the key to teaching success when it comes to
this classroom.
Another factor that impacts the design of instruction is gender. In this classroom, there are a
total of 21 students. Out of the 20 students, there are eleven boys and nine girls. Due to the uneven
number of boys and girls, instruction will be tailored more to suit the boy's interests and learning styles
in order to engage more students. The boys in this classroom are engaged with technology; whether it
be through iPads, videos or even just the projector, this is a tool that is useful in keeping their attention.

Luckily, the girls in the classroom are also engaged by technology, so this tool can be used to engage all
learners in the room. The boys in this class also respond well to active learning through groups or
active responding techniques. I will capitalize on this strategy as well during my unit in order to keep
the attention of all students. Aside from learning preferences, there is also a difference in interests due
to gender. Because of the difference in interests, I will be giving the students a math menu for
homework and some choices throughout the lesson. This will help all students be engaged and take
ownership of their learning.
The age of the students taught during my unit is another factor that will affect my instruction.
Most of these students are eight to nine years old. According to Piaget's theory of cognitive
development, these students would be in the concrete operational stage (Educational Psychology, n.d.).
In order to reach these students, the math concepts will be introduced using tangible manipulatives and
experiments using discovery learning strategies. I believe that this will help most students be successful
because they will be able to touch and see the concepts of measurement and conversion and this will
allow them to take ownership of their learning experience.
The students in the classroom have different learning styles, which will also impact the design
and deliverance of instruction. Although most students are visual learners, some students learn best
through movement, music and general kinesthetic techniques. In order to accommodate all of the
learning styles in this room, I will add in activities and instructional tools that accommodate each
learning style. Throughout my unit there will be concrete manipulatives, videos, pictures, songs and
projects requiring movement. There will also be hand gestures and verbal cues during instruction not
only to encourage engagement, but to incorporate verbal and kinesthetic learners. Throughout the unit,
grouping patterns will be varied from partner work, cooperative learning groups and independent work
to accommodate students who like to work in small groups, large groups and independently. Variation
throughout the lessons of my unit will help me reach all of the students through their different learning
styles and keep engagement as well.

Prior Student Learning

My learning goals for the unit align with the measurement unit in the Virginia Standards of
Learning. In my unit, students will learn about different forms of measurement (volume, weight, mass
and length) and area and perimeter. Throughout the year, students have had some exposure to linear
measurement when creating something for a project. Measurement has also been taught in previous
grades but will be built upon in this unit. Although the students have some exposure to measurement,
most of the content will be new to them. In the Virginia Standards of Learning, area and perimeter are
included in the measurement unit; however, area and perimeter were also taught in the previous unit of
geometry. The students are very proficient at area, but still need further instruction on perimeter.
Because of the prior learning, my unit will focus mainly on measurement and perimeter.
The measurement unit will incorporate several different learning styles and will be structured
around the students. The students in this classroom vary greatly in skill and ability level. In addition to
the difference in skill level, these students also differ in the style that they learn best. Throughout my
unit, I will incorporate videos, songs, gestures and hands on discovery learning. Incorporating the
different styles will assist each student in succeeding in this unit. This unit will also be structured so
that each student will succeed. Whenever a student answers an exit card incorrectly or struggles on an
assessment, that student will be pulled individually for one-on-one instruction and remediation. There
are several students in the class who struggle with math that will benefit from the remediation.
As was mentioned above, the students have been previously exposed to area and perimeter, but
measurement will be mostly new to them. Because of this, most of the questions on my assessment will
focus on measurement. There are also several perimeter questions and more challenging area questions
to ensure that students have mastered this skill. All of the assessments for math are taken using iPads
through OnTrac. The OnTrac system mirrors the state assessment format and questions in the question
bank are taken directly from past state assessments or are created by the same company that creates the
state assessments. This helps the students prepare for the state assessment and ensures that the teachers

are teaching what will be tested.