Lesso 2 reflection

This week we talked about primary and secondary sources, we created a timeline of Vermont history, and we talked about some of the historic events and their causes and effects. First we went over the agenda and the expectations chart created together. Then we did our ice breaker where we asked if the students would rather live in the past or the future. The children responded with a variety of answers, one even being that he just wanted to live in the moment. Then we started on our first activity being the primary and secondary sources. This was more of a vocabulary where we talked about what the words meant and some examples of them. We then had the students match sources like a declaration of independence and a biography. The students are well with this activity and match all the examples correctly. Then we did the timeline. We laminated different historic events in Vermont with dates for the students into cards. Then we present the timeline and the way that it worked and how the dates would appear. The kids then used the dates to put the timeline in order and we read off the cards. The last activity we did with the students this week was the cause and effect. We had a sheet with causes and had the students brainstorm the effects that these events on the timeline had on the people of Vermont. We asked how these events affected people's everyday lives. The kids came up with similar answers like when asked how the big flood affected the people they answer with things like people being hurt, homes were destroyed, food was destroyed. This week I helped one of the students more one on one based on what I saw last week. Last week he was very hesitant to do any work but had no problem talking and sharing with the group. I sat and read all the questions and brainstormed with him. He also has a hard time spelling and doesn’t like to write his answer down so we talked about how to write down what he wanted and I helped with spelling. After this the students had a little time so they drew one of the events on the back of the worksheet. 

I learned a lot about the students this week. That one student in particular shows that he wants to learn and he is smart but he is very discouraged when asked to write anything. Next time I will try sentence starters on things so he writes less. Also the kids have a hard time taking turns talking but also letting us talk. No matter if we are talking about content or directions one student disrupts a lot. For future lessons I want to try and control the talking more by maybe having rewards or a system of some sort. I find that even after many reminders of the expectations where they start to say kind words and listen to others when they are talking, the students still ignore the reminders. I don’t like the idea too much of a talking stick but if I have to use one I will try.