Artifact Reflection Title of Artifact: Brave New World Lesson Date Completed: 5/2/13 Artifact Description: This artifact

is the PowerPoint outline that I built for the lesson in the 12 grade English to introduce key concepts, topics, and vocabulary of the book Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. I built and then taught the entire lesson by myself using minimal guidelines from my cooperating teacher, Mr. Nigl at Potosi High. WISCONSIN TEACHING STANDARD ALIGNMENT Primary Alignment: 9. Reflection. Teachers are able to evaluate themselves. The teacher is a reflective practitioner who continually evaluates the effects of his or her choices on pupils, parents, professionals in the learning community and other who actively seeks out opportunities to grow professionally. The reason that I chose this experience to align with this standard is because this was the first time that I was able to build a lesson and teach it in an actual classroom rather than a class of my own. Due to this change in the circumstances I learned several valuable things, not only about how I teach but also how I might change how I develop my lessons in the future. This lesson was an introductory lesson for a book called Brave New World by Aldous Huxley for two sections of 12th grade English. While my cooperating teacher gave me some basic guidelines in the fact that it should introduce some of the vocabulary and themes of the book, he basically let me have free reign with the lesson. I built the lesson in such a way that I started building up the students knowledge from asking their impressions of a picture of a futuristic city, worked into the main vocabulary word, which in this case was dystopia, and then moved into themes of the book while introducing other vocabulary words that were relevant to those themes. I also included in the lesson a link to a radio drama of the book, a journal entry focusing on the students vision of dystopia, and an overall question for the students to think about while they were reading the book. Only until I was teaching the lesson did I realize just how much material in the lesson and that I wouldnt be able to cover it all. Even in the first lesson I had to leave out the radio drama and gloss over some of the material that I would have liked to go more in depth with. After the first lesson I met with my cooperating teacher and we discussed how the lesson went. We discussed the fact that I ran out of time. I identified where I could cut some time in order to get through the lesson more effectively, including cutting the time for the journal from 5 minutes down to roughly two minutes, cover some of the less important subjects or themes a little less in depth and just give them the basic understanding that they will need to start the book, and completely forget the radio drama. I also identified that I lost time to the fact that the students had journals at the beginning of class and some took rather long to finish which cut into my time. This however, was beyond my control to change because it was a long standing routine for the class.

The cooperating teacher and I also discussed what I would do if I was running the entire unit rather than just teaching just the introductory lesson. This included ideas of doing a double-entry journal answering the question, is it better to be free and unhappy or be happy and give up all freedom at the beginning and the end of the book to see if the students ideas might have changed or if they have more thoughtful responses with examples at the end of the book. I also gave the cooperating teacher ideas about several activities he could do throughout the book including several journal ideas and other activities to provoke thought in the students. I also noted that this book could be taught in tandem with a science lesson on genetics and reproduction because that is a major topic in the book and would provide a cross-curriculum opportunity. I then took all of the things that we had discussed and implemented them in the next lesson. I gave them less time to do the journal that I asked from them, covered some topics less in depth and completely skipped over the radio drama. This resulted in the lesson going slightly smoother with me feeling less rushed at the end but I still wasnt able to cover things as well as I would of liked or could have if I had been teaching in my own classroom and been teaching the entire unit rather than just the first lesson. In the end the reflection and discussion with my cooperating teacher allowed me to practice my skills, identify trouble areas, and implement the solutions. This reflection process is a continual part of my growth as a professional. Secondary Alignment: 7. Instructional Planning: Teachers are able to plan different kinds of lessons. The teacher organizes and plans systematic instruction based upon knowledge of subject matter, pupils, the community, and curriculum goals. UW-PLATTEVILLE SCHOOL OF EDUCATION KNOWLEDGE, SKILL, DISPOSITION STATEMENT ALIGNMENT I believe that this artifact best aligns with KS4.a. REFLECTS ON TEACHING. The candidate makes an accurate and thoughtful reflection of his/her teaching effectiveness, is aware of specific elements of his/her teaching that contributed to successful instruction, and can offer alternative teacher action to predict the future successes of alternate approaches. I believe that this alignment works best because I was able to show how I reflected on the lesson that I had taught, identify the issues within the lesson, apply solutions to those issues, and then teach the lesson again in a more effective manner. This experience also shows that I am able to identify opportunities to improve the lesson and use crosscurriculum teaching to enhance the learning experience for the students. Secondary Alignment KSD3.e. DEMONSTRATES FLEXIBILITY AND RESPONSIVENESS KSD1.a. DEMONSTRATES KNOWLEDGE OF CONTENT AND PEDAGOGY KSD4.e. GROWS AND DEVELOPS PROFESSIONALLY

What I learned about teaching/learning: While Ive been told in classes again and again that I will adjust my lessons based upon the needs of the students and class as a whole and reflect on what went well in the lesson and then fix those things that need adjusting, it never really sank in until I taught a lesson of my own and had to not only adjust the lesson as I was teaching it but also afterwards, using my fellow colleagues to brainstorm possible solutions and strategies to enhance the learning experience for the students. This experience really hammered home the fact that teaching is a constant process of editing and revising your lessons depending on the situation at hand and the needs of your students.

What I learned about myself as a prospective teacher: I learned that while I have a great amount of knowledge in my content area and am able to express my knowledge to the students, I have to consider what the most important thing to the lesson is and then trim the rest of the lesson either completely away or down to smaller sections so that I am able to teach the lesson in the class period. Part of this will come with experience in knowing just how much I can fit into a certain time period but it will also be a reflective process of going over the lesson once Ive created it in order to find the most necessary parts.