Observation Week of 10/11

This week in my observations I only observed one day due to being gone at the Greenbush Conference at PSU. This is what I observed the one day that I was in my 6^th grade social studies class …

Once the students entered the class their OTB (On the Bell) was to get out their homework. Their homework the night before was to color in an interactive map of the Middle East and Northern Africa, and answer the questions that followed. They are finishing up a mini unit on Ancient Egyptian and Middle Eastern Kingdoms, and the benefits these ancient people received from the natural environments around them (ex: deserts, the Nile River, plains, etc.). They all went over their homework as a class similar to last time I was there, sharing and adding information together as a class, all learning from one another and adding to their notes. To make it more fun their teacher let students come up and write or draw answers on the SMART board, which the kids absolutely loved and were all very eager to volunteer to-do! I thought this was a great idea to get students more involved, and provide an incentive to participate. They then split off into group work as a table group. Each table group was assigned a section to read in the text and take notes over, and then they all picked one fact each to share out to the rest of class. This was a great way to divide up the work load, but still allow each student in the class to receive all the necessary information from the notes. The teacher concluded the class by playing a video (provided by the online textbook) that introduced what unit they would be starting next week, Egyptian pharaohs. The video was an entertaining and relaxing way to end the class period (as the students absolutely adore watching videos), and it genuinely built excitement among the students for the upcoming week’s content.