Today was the first day working with my 5th graders and teaching my own lesson plan. It was very nerve racking, but I think it went pretty well. The best part about it was that the students all seemed super excited about doing the project we picked and were really anxious to get started. Our project is a Watercolor lesson inspired by Georgia O'Keefe. We are using many different watercolor techniques to paint large Georgia O'Keefe inspired flowers.
First I discussed the lesson in the anticipatory set and asked the students questions about what they know about Georgia and watercolors. I was very surprised to see that almost half of the class knew who Georgia was and that she painted flowers. They also had some different ideas on how they could use the paints. As we discussed the different techniques of watercoloring, I moved into the charts that they would be making. The students were so excited. I asked if they liked to do experiments and they all raised their hands and got really excited. So that made me really happy to know they were interested in the project.
My partner then started the demo on how to begin the charts. We did a step by step demo so the students could work with us. My partner did the main demonstration at the front of the room, while I walked around and helped the students as they went along. The students needed to mark out, with a ruler, lines to make a grid of boxes on their paper. Each box would have a different technique in it, so they were to have 12 boxes on their sheet. It was a little sad actually to see how many students didn't know how to use the ruler. They just had to mark out 4 inches and 9 inches and many of them struggled with this, so the demonstration took a little longer than we thought. But we got everyone all set and began putting tape over the lines and making boxes. That took about the whole class period along with the anticipatory set. We had the students clean up their charts and put them in their cubbies and that was it for the day. I can't wait to start working on the techniques at the next class time.
I felt that I did a pretty good job of trying to engage the students and get them interested in the lesson. It was kind of hard to ask questions specifically, because I don't know exactly what the students have already covered and what they haven't. Also not knowing everyones name yet makes it a bit difficult. Hopefully once I start learning names and where they are artistically it will become easier to ask questions and discuss their work. Almost all of the students seem really excited about the project, so I am ready to start getting into the painting soon!
Before my lesson began I was able to ask Mrs. M about how she plans her lessons. She showed me her calendar and all of her briefly written lesson plans. She said she has to change lesson plans so much due to time and students' needs that she doesn't write full lesson plans out. She writes her basic objectives and ideas and just goes with it. Her curriculum is based off of what the previous teacher left and she just adds onto and edits those lessons as she sees fit. She doesn't write a full curriculum map either. She only gets her students for 6 weeks so she doesn't have them for very long. Because of this she only gets to do about 4 projects each term. So she doesn't write a map out.
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