Maja Pehrson

EDUC 523
11/09/14
Core Decision of Lesson Design
What:
For my social studies lesson with my fifth grade students at Lea Elementary
School, I want to focus on the relocation of Japanese Americans during World War II,
with a particular focus on the causes behind the relocation. While limited time has been
allotted in the classroom specifically to social studies, students have been introduced to
social studies topics through literacy. Currently, they are reading a short story in their
literacy textbook that chronicles a young girls time living in an internment camp during
World War II.
As there are varying perspectives on why the internment of Japanese Americans
happened, I hope that through approaching this topic my students will develop their skills
on making inferences and sourcing information. Rather than accepting one account as
the indisputable truth, I want my students to consider who created the source and for what
purpose. Using prior knowledge as well as information from the source, students will
make inferences about what caused the relocation of over 100,000 Japanese Americans.
How:
Students will move toward their learning objectives through a guided discussion
and video analysis. Our discussion will be framed using the Reading and Analyzing
Nonfiction (RAN) strategy, an adaptation of the more traditional KWL chart (what I
know/what I want to know/what I learned). Using a constructivist approach, I will
ground the conversation in students prior knowledge, considering what understanding
they already have that needs to be built upon as well as what misconceptions they have
that need to be challenged. While my hope is to have students discuss with each other
rather than simply look to me for the correct answers or approval of their responses, I will
ask guiding questions in order to draw out important aspects of students thinking or to
redirect responses that may be misguided or less relevant.
Our discussion will be centered on a short video clip taken from a US government
video created in 1943 to explain how and why the extensive relocation of Japanese
Americans took place. Using evidence from the video to make inferences, we will keep
track of which pieces of prior knowledge were confirmed or discredited. We will
conclude our conversation by focusing on what lingering questions students have so as to
try to move students toward a more inquiry-based approach.
Why:
I am choosing to focus on the topic of Japanese internment since students have
been introduced to it through a short story yet have not had a chance to discuss more
deeply why this historical event took place. While the story takes place at a Japanese
internment camp, the focus of the story is on how the protagonist continues to keep her
Japanese heritage alive through dance. The story does not delve into the reasoning
behind her internment, which I believe is an important and challenging topic within

American history that many students are not exposed to. I personally remember being
very surprised when learning about this subject in high school, since I had never been
introduced to the topic during my elementary years.
I am focusing on building up students skills for making inferences and sourcing
information since they are vital tools needed to make meaning out of texts, images,
videos, and experiences both inside and outside of the school setting. My students have
been working on their inference skills all year through a daily exercise called Picture of
the Day. During this time, students work on making observations and inferences from
an image. While their inference-making skills have been steadily improving all year, I
think students could further cultivate this skill in a small group setting. Additionally, I
want students to focus on making inferences from sources other than pictures in order for
them to see that this skill is valuable outside of the Picture of the Day exercise. I know
that the classroom teacher, Mrs. Coyne, is going to cover how to make inferences about
texts soon, so I thought that I would have them apply this skill to a video.
So far from my observations in the classroom, students have not had much
experience evaluating information sources. Rather, they seem to accept most of what
they see and read in the classroom as fact. In order to challenge this framework, I plan to
use guiding questions to scaffold students thinking about the source so that by the end of
the lesson students can draw conclusions about the purpose and motivation behind it.
As mentioned previously, I am choosing to use the RAN strategy instead of a
KWL chart. The RAN strategy consists of five categories: what I think I
know/confirmed/misconceptions/new information/wonderings. I think this chart will
help organize the conversation. I will also use a chart paper with each of these categories
to record students thinking, helping students who are more visual to follow along with
the conversation. By starting off with what students think they know, rather than saying
what they know, students may feel less pressured to report correct information and
hopefully will be more comfortable giving input. We will end with students wonderings
to allow me to assess how students thinking has evolved as well as to get students more
used to an inquiry-based approach.
Finally, I am choosing to only show one minute and twenty seconds of a tenminute video. If I were to show the entire video I think students would feel bombarded
by too much information and would likely tune the video out. Since my students seem to
have limited prior knowledge about World War II in general and even less when
specifically considering Japanese internment, I think a short video clip will give us more
than enough information to try to unpack in a forty-five minute period.
Lesson Plan
Goals/Objectives:
Students will (1) draw inferences from a video and consider the source information, and
(2) deepen their understanding of the causes behind Japanese internment.
Standards:
Speaking and Listening Standards (Comprehension and Collaboration), Grade 5:

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:17 PM

Comment: Include the number of students
that will participate in the lesson, and I would
also include that the lesson will be 45-minutes
in length.
Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:18 PM
Deleted: in order to

1. Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups,

and teacher-led) with diverse partners on Grade 5 topics and texts, building on
others ideas and expressing their own clearly.
2. Summarize a written text read aloud or information presented in diverse media
and formats, including visually, quantitatively, and orally.
3. Summarize the points a speaker makes and explain how each claim is supported
by reasons and evidence.
Materials and Preparation:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Computer
Chart paper
Post-it notes
Pencils
Clipboards (if were not sitting at a table)

Learning Environment and Management Issues:

1. We will likely sit in a circle so as to encourage students to direct their comments
to the whole group rather than just to me. I am not sure if we will be able to work
inside or outside the classroom. A quiet space outside of the classroom would be
ideal so that we can listen to the video a few times without distracting the rest of
the class.
2. I will ask students to come to the small group lesson bringing just a pencil with
them. I will have chart paper prepared with the five RAN categories listed and
will hand out post-it notes when needed. If we are not sitting at a table I will also
hand out clipboards so that it is easier for them to write. I will also have the video
set up and ready to go before the students come over.
3. I am going to thoughtfully choose students who I believe will be engaged in this
lesson. I will tell students where to sit when they come over for the lesson. We
will also go over small group expectations at the beginning. This is something
they are very used to doing at this point, although I will try to make sure that they
understand what each expectation means instead of simply reciting them. If we
are unable to leave the classroom there could be management issues with other
students distracting the small group or vice versa. I will try to address this issue
by emphasizing the need to focus and work with group members when going over
expectations.

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:19 PM

Comment: How will you determine who
gets to participate in this lesson? What criteria
will you use?
Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:23 PM
Comment: What technology will you use to
watch the video?
Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:22 PM
Comment: Id have extra pencils handy, just
in case a few students forget.

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:24 PM

Comment: I would align these with the
classroom rules/expectations that students are
already familiar with.

Plan:
1. The hook of the lesson will be to bring up the story they are reading in literacy,
The Dancing Bird of Paradise, and ask students about the context of the story.
Once we have established that the story takes place at a Japanese internment
camp, I will ask students to write at least three things down on post-its about what
they think they know about the Japanese relocation. I will emphasize that I am
asking for what students think they know, and that it is fine if the information they

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:27 PM

Comment: I would prepare a few guiding
questions to structure how you will bring up
the story. Also include the question you will
ask them to depict the context of the story.
Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:28 PM
Comment: Will you have to define this for
them? Or, will they be familiar from prior
knowledge?

write down is not completely accurate. If students collectively have very little
prior knowledge, I will give them a brief overview of what the internment camps
were.
(10 minutes)
2. During the body of the lesson, we will watch the first minute and twenty seconds
of this video clip (https://archive.org/details/Japanese1943). After the first time
watching it, I will ask students for their general reactions to the video (What did
you think of the video? How did you feel while watching it? What made sense to
you? What did not make sense?). I will then play the video a second time,
pausing it at key points based on students responses to the previous questions. I
will pause the video at points in the video that I think may need clarification
(What happened at Pearl Harbor? What does alien mean in this video?). We
will then discuss the reasons given for the relocation of Japanese Americans.
When we watch the video a third time, I will ask students to pay special attention
to who made the video and ask students to think about why the video was made.
Afterward we will discuss their findings, and I will make sure to ask students to
ground their responses in evidence. We will then revisit the question of why
Japanese Americans were relocated. I will ask some guiding questions to help
students in their thinking (What evidence did the government have to think that
Japanese Americans were potentially dangerous? Are any of you or your families
from another country? What would happen if the United States went to war with
that country?)
(25 minutes)
3. To wrap up the lesson, I will ask students to move their post-its with information
they thought they knew to either the confirmed or misconception category. I will
then ask students to write down one piece of new information they learned and
one question they still have about the topic.
(10 minutes)

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:34 PM

Comment: Could you personalize the hook
somehow? Get students to think about times in
their lives that connect to the core theme of the
lesson.

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:34 PM

Comment: Or, what was memorable to you
about the video?

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:36 PM

Comment: Is there a way you can
incorporate text into the lesson? Maybe replace
one of the viewing with a one-page reading on
the historical event? Just a suggestion.

Assessment of the Goals/Objectives:

In order to assess students progression throughout the lesson I will pay close attention to
their discussion comments. I will listen for whether or not students are grounding their
claims in evidence and whether they are thinking thoughtfully about the source. This will
help me see if students are building on their skills to make inferences and source
materials. I will particularly focus on students responses during the closing of the
lesson. Are they able to correctly identify which information was confirmed or
discredited? Are their wonderings meaningful? Or do they show a lack of understanding
of what was discussed?
Anticipating Students Responses and Your Possible Responses:
1. If there are management issues I will probably first address them by asking the
whole group to revisit the expectations we laid out at the beginning. I will then
ask the students to evaluate whether they, as a whole, are meeting the group
expectations. I will emphasize that I want them to do this without naming anyone

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:37 PM

Comment: How will you track with they
say?
Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:39 PM
Comment: You need a more tangible
assessment; how about giving them a writing
prompt based on a guiding question? This way,
you leave with a written form of their thinking
to assess their inferencing, as well as their
knowledge of what caused the historical
moment.
Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:40 PM
Comment: Start the lesson with revisiting
these expectations.

specifically. If problems persist, I may have to remind individual students what

the expectations are. I will also make sure to comment on those who are
following the expectations in order to encourage others to do the same. If
necessary, I may move seats.
2. While I am unsure what students responses will be, I anticipate that the
conversation could likely go in two ways. The students might take the video very
literally and recite back the reasons given for the internment. In this case I will
try to make the situation more concrete for the students by relating it back to their
literacy story as well as to their own lives (If the United States went to war with
the country your parents are from, what would you do? Would you become a
danger to the United States?) An alternative to this line of response is that
students might say the government was bad and racist. I would then ask students
to think more about why people are sometimes racist. I would also ask them to
think about whether or not this could happen now and why or why not.

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:41 PM

Comment: Excellent questions! I think you
should include these questions regardless.

Accommodations:
1. I believe that by starting out with what students think they know, students who are
coming to the lesson with less prior knowledge will feel less pressured to know all
the correct answers when participating. I will emphasize the point that I want
students to share what they think they know, regardless of whether or not it is
correct. By having students write down their responses first, I am allowing them
time to think. Once we put up all of the post-it notes with students responses,
students will have a collective pool of information to work with going into the
lesson. Throughout the lesson, I will pause and replay the video as needed. I will
call on struggling students who are raising their hands to answer questions first,
allowing them to give a response before I ask students to think more critically. If
students do not seem to want to participate, I will call on them to rephrase what
one of their classmates has shared.
2. If some students need to be challenged more, I will direct more difficult questions
to them and follow up with more challenging response questions. If they finish
writing on their post-it notes early, I may push them to expand on what they wrote
or ask them to come up with more responses than I asked of everyone else.

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:43 PM

Comment: How will you determine when
you need to do this? Or, just decide when you
want to stop the video at certain points
beforehand?

Joseph Nelson 11/15/14 10:43 PM

Comment: These should be prepared
beforehand.