Lesson Study Cycle 2
Research Theme: Students will make personally relevant connections to their work and lives through collaborative experiences that center their voice and choice to tend to their sense of empowerment.
Content Understanding Goal: Students will understand MHN and will be able to determine the theme and central idea of a text. Through this, students will know which needs are being met and not being met for themselves.
PDSA Cycles: Students did two mini units that talked about identity. Both were done after reading some articles that talked about connecting students to their work. We decided that we anted students to connect to themselves by creating an identity poem and then an identity mask. This eventually led to them connecting to their own needs using Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. From there, they would connect with other groups needs, especially groups that have been marginalized.
Lesson Study Memorialization Document:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Q-RYXSskpeW-G2UIKyIwWVO_b2W-Dfqw9nbGhQdLMO8/edit?usp=sharing
Annotated Bibliography: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PksNyqt2DrTsY1kMdXkj_JevQ9IW6AA1VDMjicRirFI/edit?usp=sharing
Literature Synthesis:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WJAtCdnA2ZrKZ4HmxMIi-98bReTXtMr31JVPkVYA7yU/edit?usp=sharing
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Lesson Plan
1) Name Buttons
2) Identity Poems
3) Identity Masks
4) Lesson Study
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Focus Student #1
PDSA #1: In This pdsa, my focus student described their culture. They were a bit more positive in this pdsa than the second one which is really interesting. I wonder if they got more comfortable with sharing how they feel or if maybe they their culture a bit more positive than how they see themselves.
PDSA #2:On this mask you can see how others view this student connects with how the student sees themselves. Could it be that this student is being defined by others? Before this we learned about the power that names have on people. This definitely connects with the power that people can have over us if we listen and believe what they are saying. I believe this was somewhat meaningful work because they were transforming but they were not impacting their community.
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Focus Student #2
PDSA Cycle #1: This student decided to not talk about culture, but instead they talked about gender. This was an identity poem, so I am glad this type of work was meaningful to my students.
PDSA Cycle #2:This student got really creative with their mask and made one closed eye and one that is wide open. What is interesting to me is that in both instances the student is being defined by others, when in reality, one side should be what others think and the other is the "real" you. In addition, one side is extremely negative, while the real one is kind and empathetic.
Focus Student #3
Empathy Interview: This focus student is a bit new to my class, and this is the reason why i chose to interview them. They are also going through so much and i really admire their hard work. I am still working hard on getting to know them more, but i am hopeful that by the end of the year they will feel transformed from the meaningful work we are doing.
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Lesson Study:
My focus student was extremely engaged with the activities done during this lesson study. They showed real leadership at times, but mostly would look to their partner to the right of them to validate their answers. They would also consult a friend from another table. Nevertheless, when it came to annotating the text, my focus student did an amazing job at showing masterful marginalia.
Evidence of Focal Student Thinking:
Many students put the social need above all others. This is what we predicted, since belonging at a school is so important for students around that age. This also connects with my observations of this student. They were extremely engaged with all the activities but they would often ask others for their opinion in order to validate their own.
Reflection
I want to start by celebrating My team's hard work on this lesson cycle. I truly feel like all four of us went above and beyond. Each one of us demonstrated true leadership when we needed to. I also want to appreciate Brad for hosting and doing such an amazing job. Now, I want to be truly honest. I feel like our lesson study day could have been better if we would have done what happened after the lesson that we did. I felt like our lesson study went amazing but I also thought it felt more of an introduction to meaningful work. After learning about Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, students reflected back on what needs they thought were important to them, which you see on the evidence of focal student thinking. After that came the connection to real life marginalized groups. I believe this is where true meaningful work was done and I just feel like we missed a great opportunity. Nevertheless, I am glad Brad was able to go deeper on this topic after our lesson study day. I think what can help us for the next cycle is going over our research together, and making sure that it directly connects with the lesson study. I feel like we often do different types of research articles even though we are in the same group. Now, this lesson cycle really impacted the project I am currently working on with my students. I am currently working on a project about addictions. This cycle has helped me be able to do meaningful work with my students. First, it is meaningful because addictions are all around us. Therefore, many students directly connect to it. Second, I was able to partner up with multiple community partners that have made our project even more authentic. My partners included: Judge Tim Nader, an Alateen group, Teen Recovery Center, and the DEA. Third, my students will create two final products that will address some of the needs that our community partners presented. The combination of all this things will truly transform my students and the people around them. That is meaningful work.