On Wednesday, December 07, 2005, I taught my social studies lesson on urban and rural communities. I taught it in Ms. G’s third grade class. I read the class the story, Bernelly and Harriet: The Country Mouse and the City Mouse by Elizabeth Dahlie. Then, after reviewing the urban and rural terms, we willed out a two-circled diagram together. Then I handout out a sheet of pictures rural and urban communities and the class must work individually to correctly identify the pictures.

            Quite a few things went well with this lesson. This time I feel that overall class behavior was a lot better than my last lesson so I feel that we were able to get through the lesson a lot smoother. One thing I was happy to see was David (pseudo name) was behaving himself very well today. He would raise his hand and acted positively throughout the lesson. Last time I taught a lesson he acted out, so it was a welcome improvement. I did have some students act up, but once there was a threat of extra homework, the quickly settled down.

            There isn’t much about the lesson I would change because I feel it went fairly well. If I was to change anything, I think I would have been more firm with Ed (pseudo name). He was really being rude today, calling out of turn, not raising his hand and bothering other students. I think I would have made him move to a seat away from other students and if that didn’t work, he would get his name moved to yellow on the board.

             My SBTE asked to extend my lesson to the next day and do a writing activity with them to compare and contrast Urban and Rural communities. It went pretty well, although students who finished the writing assignment early we immediately disruptive. I did my best to use classroom management and assigned them their reading for enjoyment books if they had finished early.

            At the end of my lesson, my SBTE, Ms. G shared her comments and suggestions for my lesson plan. She said she liked how I incorporated literature into the lesson. She said the students really got involved in coming up with similarities and differences between urban and rural communities. She also praised me into extending the lesson into the next day.

            Ms. G also made some suggestions on how I can improve my future lessons. Even though my classroom management has improved, she told me I should mot resort to whistling or talking over students to get their attention. 

            I have learned a lot from my social studies class this year. One thing really appreciated that I learned about this year was not to teach social studies from a textbook. I think this is very important because many people think social Studies is boring to begin with and won’t pay attention to the lesson. By keeping the lesson fun and engaging, a teacher can spark student interest and get them involved in the learning process.   Another thing I learned this year was how to get students engaged in the learning process. Strategies such as class discussion and group investigation. In the past, I would have thought it would be hard to get students engaged in Social Studies because it covers events that have happened in the past. This semester, thanks to all the strategies we have learned, I have discovered ways to make it fun and engaging for my students. Another think I have learned about this semester is critical response questions. This was the first class have taken that has covered this topic, so I didn’t have any idea how to set one up. This class really helped me learn how to create critical response questions. Another topic I was introduced to in this class was document-based questions. This was also another topic  had not been exposed to before, so I am really glad  learned how to set one up. Essential questions were another topic I was unfamiliar with. I am glad we learned about essential questions because I found that once I established my essential question for a lesson, creating the lesson itself became a lot easier. Overall, I found this semester’s Social Studies class to be highly informative and engaging. I hope to create future lessons plans that are also informative and engaging.