I observed Meghann implement the Concept Mastery Routine with an Honors English 8 class. Although this was an honors class, there were a couple of students in the class who receive special education services. Meghann and I both used the implementation checklist to help guide the lesson. This helped Meghann ensure all steps were completed, and it helped guide me as the coach so I could provide her with valuable feedback.
Meghann started the lesson by cueing students to the concept diagram and explaining how the diagram will help them create a definition and have a deeper understanding of the concept “dystopian.” She also explained that she would be writing with the students using the document camera and they were expected to fill out their own concept diagram along with her.
She provided students with the concept of dystopian and the students were able to provide the overall concept of genre. It was clear that the students had been studying this concept as their background knowledge was evident.
She then moved onto eliciting key words from the students after they had a chance to discuss it with their groups. This was a good way to get all students involved in both the small group and then again in the whole group. She wrote down all of the key words that the students came up with even the ones that sounded at first as nonsense.
The next step of classifying the characteristics elicited a rich discussion within the class. Students were passionate about why certain key words would belong in either always present, sometimes present, or never present. They were given time to discuss it in their small groups prior to having a whole group discussion. Providing students time to process the information in small groups made for an engaging class discussion. Although this was an exceptional part of the lesson where students were challenged to expand their thinking, it also took a long time and caused her to need to rush through the remainder of the lesson. I cued her through nonverbal communication to perhaps move onto Step 5. Another challenge during this time, is the students were having difficulty coming up with examples that were never present. This is where the concept diagram that we did during the coaching was helpful. I jumped in and suggested that perhaps the key word utopia could be used as a never present. This elicited some discussion as to the differences between dystopia and utopia.
The students had just finished reading dystopian books, so the examples were quick to come up with. They were able to write the books that the different students in the class were reading. The nonexamples were also quick to come up with, because they are familiar with so many other genres of books. During this step students brought it back to real life as well with adding North Korea as an example. This also created a rich discussion about current events. Meghann added a couple other examples and nonexamples in the testing ground. It was clear that students had a deep understanding of the concept as they could not only identify if the testing ground words were examples or nonexamples, but they could justify their responses.
Meghann then challenged the students to use the key words in the always present column to tie down a definition. She got them started by saying “Dystopian is a genre…” Students also struggled to use all of the information in the always present column, so Meghann took several different definitions and put the ideas together to create one tie down definition. The students all followed along and wrote the same definition.
Finally, Meghann reviewed what they just learned and offered answers to any remaining questions. Students continued to want to discuss the key aspects of the concept. In fact, as the bell rang at the end of the day, the students were continuing their discussion trying to argue their point of why certain aspects are always, sometimes, or never present in dystopian.
Meghann and I met to debrief at the end of the day, and she was thrilled with how the lesson went. She said that the students in that class got so much more out of the lesson by teaching it using this tool. She actually felt bad for her other classes that had learned it with a PowerPoint. We did discuss how she could work on pacing next time so the final steps are not as rushed. This routine clearly provided the students with a deep understanding of the concept and kept them engaged throughout the lesson.
A copy of the checklist and the complete concept diagram can be found at:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9YSFDW4RsEMTEpEaTRqVVoya28/view?usp=sharing
Meghann started the lesson by cueing students to the concept diagram and explaining how the diagram will help them create a definition and have a deeper understanding of the concept “dystopian.” She also explained that she would be writing with the students using the document camera and they were expected to fill out their own concept diagram along with her.
She provided students with the concept of dystopian and the students were able to provide the overall concept of genre. It was clear that the students had been studying this concept as their background knowledge was evident.
She then moved onto eliciting key words from the students after they had a chance to discuss it with their groups. This was a good way to get all students involved in both the small group and then again in the whole group. She wrote down all of the key words that the students came up with even the ones that sounded at first as nonsense.
The next step of classifying the characteristics elicited a rich discussion within the class. Students were passionate about why certain key words would belong in either always present, sometimes present, or never present. They were given time to discuss it in their small groups prior to having a whole group discussion. Providing students time to process the information in small groups made for an engaging class discussion. Although this was an exceptional part of the lesson where students were challenged to expand their thinking, it also took a long time and caused her to need to rush through the remainder of the lesson. I cued her through nonverbal communication to perhaps move onto Step 5. Another challenge during this time, is the students were having difficulty coming up with examples that were never present. This is where the concept diagram that we did during the coaching was helpful. I jumped in and suggested that perhaps the key word utopia could be used as a never present. This elicited some discussion as to the differences between dystopia and utopia.
The students had just finished reading dystopian books, so the examples were quick to come up with. They were able to write the books that the different students in the class were reading. The nonexamples were also quick to come up with, because they are familiar with so many other genres of books. During this step students brought it back to real life as well with adding North Korea as an example. This also created a rich discussion about current events. Meghann added a couple other examples and nonexamples in the testing ground. It was clear that students had a deep understanding of the concept as they could not only identify if the testing ground words were examples or nonexamples, but they could justify their responses.
Meghann then challenged the students to use the key words in the always present column to tie down a definition. She got them started by saying “Dystopian is a genre…” Students also struggled to use all of the information in the always present column, so Meghann took several different definitions and put the ideas together to create one tie down definition. The students all followed along and wrote the same definition.
Finally, Meghann reviewed what they just learned and offered answers to any remaining questions. Students continued to want to discuss the key aspects of the concept. In fact, as the bell rang at the end of the day, the students were continuing their discussion trying to argue their point of why certain aspects are always, sometimes, or never present in dystopian.
Meghann and I met to debrief at the end of the day, and she was thrilled with how the lesson went. She said that the students in that class got so much more out of the lesson by teaching it using this tool. She actually felt bad for her other classes that had learned it with a PowerPoint. We did discuss how she could work on pacing next time so the final steps are not as rushed. This routine clearly provided the students with a deep understanding of the concept and kept them engaged throughout the lesson.
A copy of the checklist and the complete concept diagram can be found at:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9YSFDW4RsEMTEpEaTRqVVoya28/view?usp=sharing