Mini Lessons, In Short

September 12:

A reflection upon my own sentence fragment mini lesson:
My presentation didn't go as smoothly as I had envisioned it, which can only be useful in preparing me with classroom realities I will soon be facing. I think my own problem stemmed from my lack of confidence in the topic I presented; I know what a sentence fragment looks like and I can fix it thanks to my internal sense of grammar, but conveying what I knew turned out to be somewhat trying. When I asked for a "student" volunteer to correct the fragment on the board, he corrected it differently than I would have, which threw me for a loop. I didn't respond immediately, or in a manner I would have liked to. This falter in my confidence affected the rest of my lesson and the way in which I carried myself. I became nervous, started jumping around my plan, and abandoned some parts of it completely.
Not executing my lesson as I planned it wasn't the problem, but instead my loss of authority when I doubted my own content knowledge. I kept thinking that if students witnessed a slip in my self-assurance that the lesson wouldn't be taken seriously. The last thing I want is to fall on my face in front of a class because of a lapse in self-confidence; I'd rather a downfall come from taking a risk in trying something new that didn't turn out.
I still believe that the content of my lesson was worthy, despite the rough execution. I think that I tried to tackle too much in too little time. I attempted to define fragments, teach rules for correction, perform guided practice in identification and correction, discuss the socio-political implications of usage, complete an activity, and relate the material to my students in ten minutes - quite ambitious. I learned from this experience that I don't always have to define social implications and openly discuss them in every lesson I present. I could easily tie such issues in with the writing process after the students got back their first paper - we could discuss writing style and its effects then instead. I don't think the layout of my plan was engaging enough. I liked the idea I had in creating a rules sheet for my students to refer to, but I don't think just reading through the examples was beneficial.
To teach this lesson many revisions would have to be made. I think the most important though is integrating practice with the rules of identification and correction - not to separate the two into distant spheres. I think it would be better to have students identify fragments within a paragraph first (some of these sentences are not like the others...) and then discuss what a fragment is and how to correct it. Structuring the lesson this way would allow me to note how much my students already know about sentence structure and if they can note that a fragment is a fragment without me telling them so. Other than these few critiques I think I just need to get used to and comfortable in the teacher role. I think the majority of my problems stemmed from me treating this presentation as just slipping on the guise of a teacher instead of owning the role. I think this can be corrected with more experience in front of the class.

A response to the lessons of my peers (Satire, Grammar Usage/Style and accompanying politics, Formal English):
M,F, and J all seemed at ease in front of a classroom - especially F and J, they owned the role of teacher. They each got their students engaged with their lesson, but with very different tactics, which I found of particular interest. M relied on guided discussion and a partner activity to get us involved with the material, F used humor and the relation of the topic to real life situations we could take note of, and J used humor and a literal application of his topic for us to witness the means and ends of. F and J's lessons seemed to establish a firm base upon which to build at the beginning of a unit, I think their students would be interested to see what would follow - a sort of leave them on the edge of their seats tactic. They all fit their lessons within the time limit, but M seemed a bit rushed. Although, M was covering the most content. Each of their lessons were not only well-planned, but thoughtful and thought provoking. They dealt with real social issues, and were built around usage and exposure as a path to understanding and learning - not just lecture, or reading about such topics. I can infer where these lessons would take place, but remain unsure what would follow in F, M and J's unit. M stated explicitly where and when this lesson would take place, and the others were an opening to a specific text, but what would happen next? I would be interested to see what lessons would follow the ones I observed. I don't question out of a lack of confidence in their abilities and talents, it is solely a matter of curiosity.