What? So What? Now What?

Reflective Journaling
This well-used and successful model for reflection will help you make connections and deeper meanings
from your observations. When it comes to making journal entries following your field observations,
please be sure to include a section answering each reflective question, using the descriptions below to
guide your writing.

FIELD OBSERVATION – NOTES

Grade/Subject: 12TH GRADE GOVERNMENT

Lesson Topic: Bias in the media

What?
(Reporting what happened, objectively). Like a scientist in the field, describe in detail the facts about the events in
the classroom that you are observing. Be sure that judgmental or interpretive writing is not done for this portion.

Each of the following questions must be answered:

What happened? What events are taking place throughout the lesson? How did class begin? What are students
doing? What did the teacher do? What behaviors do you see from the students? Describe the room (if it is your first
time).
Class began with Mr. Botsios taking attendance as the students settled into their seats
talking amongst one another and getting their notebooks out. Mr. Botsios got the class
to quiet down then explained the lesson activity. The students went on laptops and
looked at news websites from a list that Mr. Botsios wrote on the whiteboard. They read
articles from each site then rated them on a -10 to 10 scale; -10 being left wing and 10
being right wing. A score of 0 would be considered fair and that no bias was taking
place.
The students worked silently while they listened to their own music. They wrote down
the name of the website and wrote a score next to it. After they wrote the scores for
each one, they made a graph and put each of the websites on it where they felt it should
be placed. Mr. Botsios was walking around the classroom to answer questions they had
about the assignment and the articles or websites they were reading.
A few more minutes were given to students to finish up their work then they got into
groups of four. The desks are set in rows and columns everyday so now they moved the
desks to get into their groups. Mr. Botsios handed out a whiteboard and dry erase
marker to each group.
A PowerPoint was on the screen with each slide having the name of one of the websites.
He would say the name out loud then tell the students to discuss and decide on a
number to rank the website. One student would write the number on the board then Mr.
Botsios said “Boards!” and they would hold up the whiteboard. The next slide had the
correct score/rating that Mr. Botsios found on a website called allsides.com.
The students’ behavior was excited and focus – they enjoyed the activity. After the first
two class periods, Mr. Botsios let me lead the class in the whiteboard portion of the
lesson and the class responded the same.

So What? (What did you learn from the observation? What important ideas immerged from observation?). In
this section, you should describe your feelings, ideas, and analysis of what you observed in the classroom. This
usually should happen quite a while after the observation, so that the events have time to resonate more with you for
reflection.

Each of the following questions must be answered:

 The Classroom Environment: How was the room set up for the lesson? What was different this time or from
your own past classroom environments? Did the set up play a part in the success of the lesson? What might
have been changed to make it better?
 The Students: Do you think they learned what they were trying to learn? Did the lesson reach each student
individually? What were some of the differences among the students and how could they have been
addressed differently, perhaps?
 The Teacher: What methods did the teacher use and were they effective? What things did he/she do to help
students learn? Do you agree with his/her approach? Why or why not? How did they use their voice/body
language? Did they manage the class well in your opinion?
 The Lesson: Were the different components of the lesson complement and build on one another? Did the
methods help or hinder the learning of the objective, do you think? What parts of the lesson worked? Didn’t
work?
The classroom environment: When the students came to class, the classroom was setup as it usually is. There are
rows and columns of individual desks – about 38 of them. After the individual part of the activity, the students
rearranged the desks into tables of 4 or 5. This was like my own past classroom environments because in my
classrooms if we were in rows, we would form our own tables for group activities. The set up did play a part of the
success of the lesson because the tables got them to discuss their thoughts and ideas together. I think the only thing
that could have changed to make it better is not letting there be groups of 2 because then the student only hears the
thoughts and ideas of another person instead of 2 or 3.
The students: I think the students learned what they were trying to learn and that it affected them individually by
them understanding where they get their news and information from. There were some differences among the
students – I think mainly the ones that were quiet and didn’t have friends to make a group with. There were maybe
two groups in each class that consisted of only 2 or 3 people, and those groups did not seem as engaged as those
with 4 or 5 students.
The teacher: Mr. Botsios used his loud announcing voice to get the students attention when they needed to show
their answers on the whiteboards. It was effective because it kept the class excited and made them switch their
attention to him and the powerpoint. After he showed what score allsides.com gave, he explained why it was scored
that way
Now What?
(How does this impact you in your future activities as a teacher? What do you need to learn more about? What
would you like to change?). In this part, you should consider how this information and observation impacts your
future as a potential teacher. What things do you need to learn or would like to know more about? What will it take
to accomplish this?

Each of the following questions must be answered:

How did this experience impact your views about education, teaching, or learning? What did you learn about
yourself as a teacher from this experience? What things changed/stayed the same? What things would you like to
learn more about as a possible professional in this field? What ways would you go about learning these things or
finding this information?