Second Lesson

The second lesson went much more smoothly. The students did not have any lingering problems from recess, so they were all much more focused on the task ahead of them and ready to learn. They still were energetic and I found that it is usually the same few students that need assistance staying on task. We gave the students a packet that would begin what we called their "Virgina Journal" which included a chart that they could fill information for each region we would learn about. We also had a sheet that reiterated some difficult but important concepts that the students had to go over with each other. As the lesson progressed there were much less interruptions; however, some of the students were not doing anything at all so we had to be vigilant to encourage the students and make sure they were writing information down that they would need later. From this experience I also learned that students in the 4th grade do not fully understand the concept of why we take notes and how to do it. We spent awhile further explaining why we were taking notes and what information would be useful to right down. I had thought that it was clear from the way the information was organized, but it showed that some things like note taking we take for granted as we get older.
This lesson proved to be a good length as opposed to the last lesson. We were able to cover all the information we had set out to and have a discussion after the fact about some of the terms and areas we talked about. This was a good opportunity to get a gauge of how well the students were understanding the information.