Flow in a Lesson |
I chose to focus on an Everyday Mathematics Lesson that focuses on place value. Looking through this lesson I began to use the FLOW method to analyze the pieces that make up this activity. The four "F's" that I would like to concentrate on today are..
1.) Focus 2.) Freedom 3.) Feedback 4.) Challenge The EDM lesson begins with a focus of an objective but I believe splitting your whiteboard into four corners to practice four different skills does not necessarily provide optimal attention in that area. If I were to increase the FLOW in this lesson I would start with the motivation of why we are doing this lesson and provide a more hands on approach. I would first take out the ten blocks either using the digital manipulatives or the inperson ten blocks. I would start by asking students to make groups of the number written on the board. As a teacher I feel that it is important to gage your students minutely to know where to take the next part of your lesson. If we see that students are achieving the tasks quickly then we need to have a "back up" plan where we provide students time to dial in on our focus and objective. When we challenge students to do this, we then pull their attention into the lesson while not making it too easy or slow paced for the learner. CHALLENGE THEM! I do believe this program offers a way to instrictly motivate students with allowing them to play online games. During the games students are motivated to keep playing as they are able to restart each time to reach a new level. Not only does the game embedded in the lesson, "Fishing For Digits,"motivate students to keep playing, it also does a great job of analyzing where the child is starting and offers student choice. On the teachers browser we can assign the same game to students yet change the skill set or level for each one. This is positive in my eyes and keeps the flow of the lesson moving because students are challenged in their own unique way. Lastly, I would change the discussion piece of the lesson. The lesson calls for students to discuss their strategies with a partner but I feel it is important for the whole class to have an opportunity to discuss their thoughts with everyone. Instead of having students discuss with partners or stand up and take 15 minutes for each person to speak and not reach every student before time is up, I believe we could find a beneficial solution to this that captures the time and effectiveness of the lesson. I would enhance the flow of the lesson by creating a padlet which allows students to write at the same time time expressing their strategies for finding place value. Not only can students type but they can send in a picture(visual) that matches their strategies while recording(audio) themselves. I would use the ideas from this class, by having students comment on two other classmates. This way I know they are looking at other classmates ideas and hopefully taking bits and pieces to use for their own strategies. Again, as stated above. the flow theory really has opened my eyes to being analytical of lessons in hopes to improve the pace and success of students in each subject level! |