Self-Reflection

When I first designed this unit, I wasnt even sure where to start. I knew that I
needed to create a weeks worth of lessons for some civilization in Big Era 4: Expanding
Networks of Exchange and Encounter, but the options seemed endless. Though I
eventually settled on the Mediterranean due to the importance of its influence within the
modern world, my original unit was not just about Ancient Greece, but Greco-Roman
history as a whole. This ambitious approach, however, was short lived as I quickly
realized that the combination of the two ancient empires was going to be too much
information in too little time for my students. As a result, I finally settled on Ancient
Greece and thus designed this unit.
In the early stages of designing the unit I settled on structuring my lesson plans in
a way that was fairly similar to how my supervising teacher does. Mr. Sirois goal each
day is to have students actively engaged for at least half of the class period or more. He
and I both agree that students retain much more information from class activities rather
than hour-long lectures. Therefore, though I do have some lecturing included in my
lesson plans with brief power points, each day ends with an activity, a group presentation,
project, or assignment for students to complete in class. These activities all act as a form
of assessmentthey allow me, as a teacher, to assess how much the students truly
learned during the class period, which then allows me to fill in any necessary gaps the
following day. However, most of these activities are graded based off of participation
since they many of them require group work.
As for content, it seemed fairly natural for me to break the unit up into five days.
The study of most ancient empires, Greece included, can be broken up in a similar way,

spending a day discussing its major eras, a day about its rise and fall, and then three days
exploring trade, religion, and culture. By studying these five topics within the unit,
students are able to gain an understanding of the important aspects of Ancient Greece, its
history, and its culture, as well as the way in which Ancient Greek culture can be seen in
the modern world. This last part is perhaps the most critical concept of the unit. Not only
is it the main idea behind the final essay, but this same idea will help students understand
why it is important to study ancient history, giving them an opportunity to uncover an
aspect of Ancient Greek culture that is a part of their own life.
Though I did not actually teach these lessons during my time at East Grand
Rapids High School, I was able to use resources from Mr. Sirois class in creating it
some of which we even used as we taught the lessons within his own curriculum. Not
only that, but Mr. Sirois own teaching tips were extremely helpful as I determined how
to structure the classroom for my lessons. Ive been very impressed with how he has
almost eliminated lecturing from his classroom, and I tried to do the same by including a
variety of activities each day in class.
In selecting the activities themselves, I tried to choose five different projects and
activities that would appeal to different learners each day. My goal was to have students
feel comfortable during some and push them outside of their comfort zone in others. In
the same way, the selected activities allow students that like working in pairs and groups
ample opportunities to do so, while the Google forms worksheet on Alexander the Great
and the final essay allow students who loath group feel at ease and in total control of their
grade. I also wanted to make resources for the activities available both online and in
printthough websites are great for student organization, sometimes students, like

myself, prefer paper copies of worksheets or articles so that they can highlight them and
take notes in the margins. Finally, I wanted to begin each class with a bell-ringer
question, like Mr. Sirois does, to help students settle down, get focused, and prepare for
the days lesson.
Though the process of creating the unit as a whole was enjoyable, perhaps the one
thing that I struggled with the most was the integration of faith within the unit. Since I
have attended a private, Christian school since kindergarten, being in a public school was
completely foreign to me. As a result, I didnt know where, if at all, to include Christian
ideas or themesand something as simple as beginning class with prayer is such a
familiar thing for me, that my inability to do even that was very difficult to adjust to.
However, as my integration of faith and learning statement suggests, I soon recognized
other ways to live out my faith within the classroom.
All that being said, I grew tremendously as a student and as a future educator
from creating and designing this unit. It gave me a profound appreciation for teachers and
the amount of work and preparation that goes into each day of teaching, and it helped
prepare me for my future occupation. As a result, throughout all the seemingly endless
hours of work, it solidified the most important thing in my mindI finally have seen
what it is like to be a teacher first-hand and Im happy to say that despite all of the stress
and preparation and testing of my patience, its all worth it.