Fifth Week

This week my co-teaching partner and I planned and taught out Pathwise lesson.  We talked with our mentor teacher and decided to do our lesson during math.  The topic was prime and composite numbers.  The teacher usually uses the assigned math workbooks to teach out of, however, after previewing the lesson, my partner and I decided to make our own lesson from scratch, using the workbook only as guidance.  The workbook explanations and examples were extremely confusing and out of order.  We thought that our students would not be able to grasp and follow along with the book.  For this reason, we planned our own lesson.  We were able to discuss the lesson with the mentor as we planned it and were able to get some really good feedback.

We taught the lesson today with the 5th grade students.  We planned the lesson following the gradual release of responsibility model.  During "I do," we introduced, defined, and provided examples of prime and composite numbers.  During "we do," we went over additional examples with students' input and students also completed a number sorting activity in groups.  Finally, for independent practice we provided the students with a worksheet with problems that were very similar to the ones we practiced during the lesson. Once students had enough time to work on the worksheet, we went over it with the whole class.

I believe that the lesson was successful.  I was pleased with the input from the students throughout the lesson.  A few of the students would continuously raise their hands showing us that they were understanding the topic.  Others would occasionally share their answers, after having a light bulb go off.  This is what I enjoy seeing the most.  I loved when they became extremely excited, waving their hands in the air enthusiastically.   Even a few students who usually struggle in math would share their answers.  Of course, there were also a few students who needed some extra scaffolding and guidance.  We made sure to walk around during the activity and the independent practice to provide the students with the necessary guidance.  Overall, I was happy with the way the lesson turned out.  I certainly see a lot of room for improvement with the lesson that I would address if I taught it again, however, it being our first pathwise lesson, I was happy with the results.