Unit Plan Reflection ED 7718

Initially I was nervous that I would be unable to receive my unit feedback on Wednesday night, due to my doctor's orders.  I knew my group would be willing to meet with me another night if needed, but thankfully they were willing to have me via Hangout.  Thank goodness I was able to meet with my group, because I received wonderful and helpful feedback regarding my unit.

First, I have to say that I love knowing how to use Google Hangouts!  Thank you IT&DML courses for making it a part of the program.  It allowed me to feel part of the feedback process without getting everyone else sick.

Second, I love using Google Docs when collaborating with others.  It allowed my partners to see my work since I could not give them my hard copies I made.  It also gave them the ability to comment on my unit proposal while they were discussing different items with me.

It was great to have group members with a variety of backgrounds.  Sally and Cathy both have literacy backgrounds and they provided feedback on how I could improve my math lesson with literacy standards.  With Amy sharing her math lesson with us, I was able to see what she was using in her high school math classroom and make changes and additions to improve my math lesson.

Not being a primary literacy person, I often use broad terms to describe literacy standards.  My group helped me reword my unit plan, so it clearly demonstrates what literacy focus I want it to have for my students.  Initially I was broadly stating reading comprehension, but my group discussed with me that my primary focus for my students was information literacy based on my proposal and what I created so far with the unit.

Another area that my group helped me with was how I would grade my students' progress of the strategies they used for information literacy.  During the unit I will be having my students blog on a variety of literacy strategies that they used during the lessons.  Although I had a rubric for the end of the unit presentation, I did not have one created for the blog responses.  After the feedback session, I took my group's recommendation and began created a rubric for my students to use for their daily blog responses.  I know this rubric will help the students identify the strategies and reflect on their processes productively.

Overall I was very happy with our group's feedback session.  I also enjoy reading the reflections posted by other groups.  They are helping me look at my unit and seeing if I can improve upon what I have done so far.