Reflection: Picturing Poetry

The objectives for this lesson were as follows:

Become familiar with the comprehension strategy of visualizing

Learn and apply the sketch-to-stretch strategy as a way to better
understand and interpret texts
Visualize the descriptions and events in texts and describe how this
strategy helps enhance their comprehension of poetry.

Student Learning:
In this activity, students were formally introduced to the comprehension skill
of visualization. Many students did well with the concept, and correctly used
it when interpreting the poem The Road Not Taken, but a handful of
students struggled throughout the lesson. Only about 50% of my students
accurately analyzed the content of The Road Not Taken even after the use
of the visual. It made me realize that visualization is a skill that many of my
sixth graders had not been using when reading and comprehending. At the
end of the lesson, when I assessed the students, on a new poem, there were
still many students who had trouble with understanding the poems meaning.
This lessons outcomes showed me that I need to spend much more time
with visualization with my students in the future.
Teacher Reflection:
At the beginning of the lesson, the students were given the poem The Road
Not Taken to read with ten comprehension questions to answer. I had my
students do this so that they can see how difficult it is to interpret a poem
without visualizing it. When the students experienced the poem with the
video accompaniment, most of them could actually understand the poems
meaning. Many students realized what the poet was saying because of the
connections they made with the text as a visual. In the second part of the
lesson, I had the students complete a 5 Senses chart while the poem and
visual was reread aloud. This activity also went well because it forced
students to dissect the poem from what they can see, hear, taste, feel and
smell. I had to use modeling during this part of the lesson because the
students had never dealt with a poem in this way. The final part of the lesson
is where many students began to have difficulties. They had to read and
interpret a poem independently using visualization. This time, there was no
visual accompaniment, and many students could not make the pictures in
their minds to accurately find meaning in the poem. Here is where I realized

that more explicit instruction in analyzing poetry is necessary for my

students.
I think this lesson was very successful, even though many of my students
struggled through it. Upon completion of the lesson, I realized that more time
must be spent on helping my students interpret poetry, using visualization to
help them understand what they read. Poetry has always been a difficult
concept for my students throughout this school year. Many of them have a
hard time understanding the language both literally and figuratively.
Overall, I was very pleased with the outcomes of this lesson. Poetry is not
always easy, especially for students who lack reading comprehension skills.
The video of The Road Not Taken was a great visual text for my students. It
helped them understand the process for understanding poetry, and helped
them construct meaning from a text that they originally could not grasp.

Reflection: Peer Pressure Power

The objectives for this lesson were as follows:

Read and comprehend information presented in an informational text.

Read and comprehend information presented in a multimedia text
format.
Make inferential connections to compare and contrast texts in different
forms or genres.

Student Learning:
100% of the students were able to successfully find connections between the
reading passage Peer Pressure Power and the episode of Thats So
Raven. The students were successful in completing the graphic organizer
which required them to find text connections in the reading passage,
highlight them, and compare it with a scene from the TV episode. Many
students were also able to make meaningful text-to-self connections of times
when peer pressure was a part of a situation in their own lives. At the end of
the lesson, the students had a culminating essay question that connected
both the reading passage and the episode. 14 out of 19 students were able
to discuss the authors development of the topic of peer pressure in both
texts.
Teacher Reflection:

I believe this lesson was a true Common Core experience for my students. I
modeled the final culminating essay question after one that had been used
in our End-Of-Year PARCC Assessment, and I think many of my students
handled it very well. I was pleased at the level of growth I had seen in my
students this year, and this lesson proved how far my students had come.
Since January of 2015 I have been giving explicit instruction on comparing
and contrasting texts with similar themes and topics, and at the end of the
lesson most of my students were able to demonstrate proficiency in this
standard. I was very proud of the work they produced.
Most importantly, this lesson gave me a glimpse into the experiences my
sixth graders are facing as adolescents. I chose the topic of peer pressure,
because I knew it would be something that my students could directly relate
to. They are now at a pivotal age where self-image, self-esteem and feeling
included are most important. The conversations my students had about peer
pressure gave me insight to what they are dealing with in the world today.
Having this knowledge helps me better relate to them, so that I can steer
them away from the negative pressures they face every day. My students
were engaged in their learning, and readily participated in our class
discussions. This is why it was not difficult for them to complete their essays
in the end. Overall, this lesson was a success!