Small Group Instruction

            When students come to the resource room for instruction there are many benefits and things that can be done there that cannot be done as easily in the regular education classroom setting.   When using this teaching method it worked well to give the students a model of what I was expecting them to do.   It also was beneficial to be able to provide the students with more one on one instruction.   In the resource setting many of the skills are taught in spirals, revising them and reteaching them multiple times throughout the year.   This helps students gain a greater understanding of the skills.   This does not mean giving them more problems or more practice at an unknown skill but rather revisiting the skill so that the student's memory is refreshed and the skill can hopefully enter long-term memory.

            When working with students that struggle with language and memory retention it is beneficial to design activities to meet those needs.   There are many things that I learned specifically after teaching this lesson, but that I could apply to many other lessons after.   One is that giving students time to brainstorm ideas and then pick one from that allows students to get their ideas out and it helps them sort through things that are going through their head.   It is also beneficial, when asking students to write, to have them draw a picture before having them think of specific details about the topic.  

            When planning a pullout lesson it is incredibly important to task analyze the lesson and make sure that it matches the student's skill level.   It is also important to consider and plan the type of language that will be used.   The students that I work with are greatly impacted by the language that I use or don't use.   For their sake, it is critical that I think about the language that I will use during instruction.   It is also important to consider and plan to meet the student's learning styles.

            This type of lesson is best used when delivering specific lessons to meet the specific needs of the students.   Pullout lessons are beneficial for teaching specific skills to a smaller group of students.   They are designed to match skill deficits in a small group of students and provide support and instruction to give the students strategies to learn the skills.

Small Group Instruction Lesson Plan

Standard 4.2.2

            By the end of fourth grade, students will write paragraphs/reports with focus, related ideas, and supporting details.

Rationale

            This lesson is a pivotal step in developing paragraphs and an essay.   Modeling is incredibly beneficial to use to demonstrate for students how to accomplish the task and meet the specified goal.

Vocabulary

Goals

Objectives

Materials

Procedure

•  As the students enter the room, ask them questions about their weekend to get them ready for the lesson and what they will be writing about.

•  Model for the students the process of creating a spider graphic organizer, telling them that they will be completing one after we go through one as a group.

•  Have students take 3 minutes to think about their Thanksgiving break.

*Darius, Keilaughn, and Trai will think independently about their Thanksgiving break.

*Have a conversation with Joe about his Thanksgiving break.   This gets him to generate his ideas and talk through his thoughts.

•  Have students take 3 minutes and briefly share, with a partner, about their Thanksgiving break.

*Facilitate Joe's group, helping him follow his partner's share time.

•  Have students create their own spider graphic organizer about their Thanksgiving break.

•  As students are creating their web, work with individual students and help them develop their webs.

Questions/Assessment

Adaptations

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