Practical Suggestions for Success Lois Yocum, Ph.D. University of Arkansas – Fort Smith

Teachers  Are committed to students and their learning.  Know the subjects they teach and how to teach those subjects to their students.  Are responsible for managing and monitoring student learning.  Think systematically about their practice and learn from experience.  Are members of learning communities.

 Retells what happened.  Allows the reader visualize and understand what is being described.  Sets the scene.  Is used when the prompt uses verbs such as state, list, describe, or asks, “What?” or “Which?”

A description must meet these criteria:  Gives an accurate and precise enumeration and/or explanation (of concepts or strategies)  Provides a clear and logical order of elements or features of the event, person, concept, or strategy described.  Includes supporting features or elements that would allow an outsider to “see” whatever is described.

Example #1  Students  Events  Concepts  Strategies During a major unit on “Families”, the culminating project was for the students to create a booklet. The booklet was to include both written and visual information. During the end of the term, students broke up into groups to share their booklets. Many different activities were done throughout the semester to help students understand and explore key concepts.

During a major unit on entitled “Families”, the culminating project was for the students to create booklets that would introduce their families to a foreign exchange student who would be coming to stay in their homes. The booklet was to include both written and visual information about family structure/roles, history, genetics, and traditions. In- class discussions, field trips, and other activities were done throughout the semester to help students understand the concepts and give them ideas for exploring them. At the end of the term, students broke into groups to share their booklets. Each student acted as the foreign exchange student during the presentation of another student’s booklet.

 Analyzes how, why, in what ways.  Identifies a particularly successful moment in a sample of teaching and why it is regarded as successful.  Explains a rationale.  Examines what student performance suggests about one’s teaching (evidence of student work to explain and illustrate practice and to explain and provide a context for that practice).

 Answers the following questions: ◦ Why did I do that? ◦ Why did this happen? ◦ How did it work?  Relates to evidence of student learning, such as work samples, artifacts, and videotapes.  Focuses not on what happened but on why it happened.  Examines features.  Interprets ◦ Conclusions about a teaching situation ◦ Rationale ◦ Evidence

 Is similar to analysis.  Focuses on self-evaluation.  Relates to why certain events occurred and what a teacher will do next time based on what happened and why it happened.  Asks the following questions: ◦ What went right? ◦ What went wrong? ◦ What am I going to do to revise or refine the lesson before teaching it again?  Is used when the prompt asks for consideration of the successes of the lessons, what could be done differently, and why.

Example #1 Include a clear description of an artifact or event upon which the writer is reflecting While the unit on “Families” was very successful, there are a few things that would help it function more smoothly. Some of the ideas were suggested by parents. Their suggestions will be incorporated into my lessons the next time I do this unit.

While the unit on “Traditions” was very successful, there are a few things that would help it function more smoothly. Many parents were pleasantly surprised about their children’s requests for information about the family and were glad to participate in the research, but they would like to have had some advance notice. One parent suggested that a letter be sent to parents a week or more in advance to allow them to talk with other family members and do some thinking about the topic in advance. Another parent does genealogy and volunteered to do a presentation in class. This would provide an interesting way to explore traditions about naming. Having students create family trees would be useful for the study of genetics and would give the students personal links to this topic. Next year I would like to try a math unit on patterns prior to starting the “Traditions unit. By asking the students to recognize patterns in their family lives, perhaps they would understand the definition of the word tradition more quickly without as much of the brain- storming and prompting I had to add to the lesson this year.

 Goals ◦ How did I arrive at the goals? ◦ What decisions did I make about the goals? ◦ What does this show about my goal-setting behavior?  Planning ◦ What decisions did I make about the lesson? ◦ What influences shaped my planning? ◦ What does this show about my planning decisions?

 Implementation ◦ Describe the decision-making process at each point in the lesson. ◦ Why did I make these decisions? ◦ What does this show about my teaching?  Reflection ◦ What decisions did I make about future instruction based on this lesson? ◦ Why did I make those decisions? ◦ What does this show about my teaching practice?

 Keep the standards in mind when describing, analyzing, and reflecting on your teaching.  Spend time reading and reflecting on the specific standards.  Think of each standard as a mirror that reflects your teaching practice.