Chloe Stiffle

Teaching and Learning in Urban Contexts

Unit Narrative

Starting Small: Designing a Unit Lesson Plan

In class on August 3rd, we begin to explicitly think about utilizing backwards

design. In class that day, I found myself easily coming up with essential questions for a

made up mini-lesson. This is not to say I felt this process would be easy through and

through, but I left class that day feeling that I’d be able to efficiently complete the week-

long unit plan and individual breakdown of one of the classes. When I came back to this

assignment a few days later, my mindset changed. Suddenly coming up with a lesson

plan for the first week of a class felt insurmountable. Questions of implementing

everything we have learned in our three courses as well as summer placement impeded

on my ability to start small. If I look to teach this history, am I representing and

portraying more than a white-Eurocentric narrative?; How do I even start to introduce a

class?; What is the best way to teach 20th Century European History?; Are my students

going to take me seriously? It seems ridiculous, but the longer I stared at the UBD

worksheet, the more outlandish my thoughts became; my nervousness for teaching and

being a “good” teacher came to a head without me even putting a word down on my unit

plan.

By taking a step back and working on the assignment for AJ’s final where we had

to compose an email to our Penn mentor, I was able to articulate my goals for the

upcoming year. Completing that assignment helped me to then turn back to the

Tomlinson and McTighe (2006) text, Integrating Differentiated Instruction &

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Understanding by Design and come back to this assignment. By thinking about desired

results and essential questions that I wanted to shape my unit plan, as well as the year

in general, I was able to get my unit plan underway (Tomlinson and McTighe, p. 33).

What I realized, and each class I took this summer also supported, is that while things

occur at the macro, my classroom is the micro, comprised of individual moments where

I can choose to act for the best for my students, or not. By honing in on what I value as

a future educator and the essential questions of my unit plan, I was able to shift my

feelings of stress, to ones of wanting to better the students in my classroom.

Since the unit was to be designed for the first week of a school year, I knew I

wanted enact learning activities that emphasized the importance of one’s own history as

well as to start to build connections and a sense of comfortability in the classroom. As

my classroom will be diverse in a multitude of ways, it is important to acknowledge a

multitude of perspectives. Milner (2007) expands on Critical Race Theory by noting the

importance of narratives and counter-narratives, especially ones told by people of color

(p. 391). Thus, on the first day of class, after creating a list of classroom expectations

and before diving into the historical context of the week, I chose to provide the students

with the opportunity to lean into and reflect on what communities they identify with in

their life – loosely relying on the Generate-Sort-Connect-Elaborate: Concept Maps

activity in Making Thinking Visible (Ritchhart, et al., 2011, p. 125-129). Following this

time of contemplation, by pair-sharing their work, students will find similarities and

differences from one another; as well as understand that in my class, from day one,

their voice matters. By sharing communities they identify as being a part of, the class is

being open, and somewhat vulnerable, with one another in small group settings.

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Further, I will also share my community-web with the class as a form of letting them get

to know me better. Hammond (2015) writes, “Being seen as trustworthy by another

stimulates the brain for connection” (p. 74). A sense of trustworthiness is needed not

between just myself and students, but also between students in order to perpetuate an

inclusive learning community where connections are made. Further, by starting by

talking about community and personal narratives, students can refer back to these initial

conversations throughout the unit to work through their understandings of nationalism.

Creating a trusting community can open many doors. During my summer field

work, I had the opportunity to work with the Leaders of Change: College Bridge

program. One of the most meaningful days to me was my second to last day with the

students. During part of the morning, I worked one-on-one with a student on her final

presentation PowerPoint from a research paper she had been working on throughout

the summer. In between working on slides, she would ask me a few questions about

myself. One question, however, was the specific date of a historical event; a date I did

not know. I told her that I honestly did not know, and began to look it up. She then said,

“Shouldn’t you know the dates because you’re a history teacher?” We had formed a

sturdy relationship at this point, so I knew she was not being rude, just inquisitive. I told

her that while I know many dates, it would be impossible for me to know every date of

every event, so there is no point lying to her or pretending to know something I do not.

Interestingly, she seemed to really appreciate my honesty and proceeded to tell me

things she wished that some of her history teachers could do to improve class. This

moment reinforced the way in which, if desired by the student, that vulnerability and

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honesty in a classroom can build bridges and create wonderful learning moments, not

just involving direct, historical contexts.

Further, the previous anecdote highlights another key point I learned about this

summer and tried to implement throughout my unit plan, the value of forming learning

partnerships. By utilizing moments with students that builds up respect, teachers can

“create a social-emotional partnership for deeper learning” (Hammond, 2015, p. 17 &

19). By taking the time to walk around during small group activities for help or including

activities where students can speak to their experiences, I can begin to form learning

partnerships with my students. Moreover, a passage titled “Accepting Responsibility for

Learner Success” in Integrating Differentiated Instruction & Understanding by Design

also emphasizes the value of learning partnerships. Tomlinson and McTighe (2006)

emphasize that “part of the teacher’s job is to establish an environment in which shared

responsibility [between students and teacher] for successful learning is part of the

classroom ethic and practice” (p. 44). This connects back to understanding ourselves as

in the process of a dynamic conversation with our students to fortify learning rather than

a regurgitating experience.

The above quote also supports my desire to break away from being seen as the

only legitimate source of information in the classroom. Students should learn from one

another, not just from me. I try to offer my class as many opportunities as possible to

share their thoughts with one another – discussing notions of patriotism in songs,

bringing in and sharing articles on the immigration crisis in Europe, and our mini-debate.

Further, these activities do not have a blatant right or wrong answer; which I believe

helps to fortify my aim to promote growth mindsets rather than fixed mindsets in my

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students. Dweck (2010) explains “people with a growth mind-set don’t put people in

categories and expect them to stay there, but people with a fixed mind-set do” (p. 28).

By teaching my students that while authentic facts do matter, perspective, and which

voices are represented and which ones are silenced, is also important to examine since

this blurs the lines of history. Thus, to be a historian, it is not about regurgitating all the

information I give, but about compiling evidence and making a solid argument for a

particular perspective.

One hope I have as a history teacher is to make the past relevant by connecting

it to present events. While nationalism in the 19th and 20th century context is fascinating,

by using Day 4 to discuss the massive waves of immigration of people from Syria, Iran,

and more, I want to show the class that nationalism is just as messy and complicated

today as it was years ago. However, this lesson also concerns me in terms of

implementation. Is it too much for the first week of class? By “too much,” I mean is it too

contentious or possibly close to a student’s life to discuss. By talking about our present

world, it opens up many avenues for a conversation where people may have stronger

opinions about; an opinion that may hurt someone else in the class, or make them feel

unwelcomed. Also, since this unit is during the first week of the class, I definitely will not

know each child’s story. I went back and forth whether to include this or not, but in the

end, I chose to keep the lesson because it involves students collecting information (an

article) and learning during class time that the nationalism of some European countries

in the present moment leads countries to want to take in more immigrants, while others’

nationalism wants to keep immigrants out. By teaching this as a long-term cause to 19th

century nationalism and possible evidence for particular debate perspectives, the lesson

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is redirected; however, this is not to say that all that may not go according to plan in

actuality.

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Bibliography

Hammond, Z. (2015). Culturally Responsive Teaching & The Brain: Promoting Authentic

Engagement and Rigor Among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students.

Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

Dweck, C. S. (2010). Mind-Sets and Equitable Education. Principal Leadership, 10(5),

26-29.

Milner IV, H. R. (2007). Race, Culture, and Researcher Positionality: Working Through

Dangers Seen, Unseen, and Unforeseen. Educational Researcher, 36(7), 388-

400.

Ritchhart, R., Church, M. & Morrison, K. (2011). Making Thinking Visible: How to

Promote Engagement, Understanding, and Independence for All Learners. San

Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Tomlinson, C. A. & McTighe, J. (2006). Integrating Differentiated Instruction &

Understanding by Design. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and

Curriculum Development.