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ELEMENTARY UNIT/ LESSON PLANNING COMMENTARY

Your Name: Jason Kawana
Date: 3/9/14
Unit/Lesson Title: Decomposing Numbers Day 2
Grade Level and Content Area: Kindergarten Mathematics
Number of Students 27
Total Amount of Time: 35mins
1. Learning Goals/Standards: What concepts, essential questions or key skills will be your focus? What do
you want your students to know at the end of this unit/lesson? The main thing that I want my
students to walk away with by the end of the lesson is a better grasp of decomposing numbers
and that the whole is the sum of two parts.
. !ationale: Why is this content important for your students to learn and how does it promote social justice?
This content is important for students because this is a part of the kindergarten math curriculum
of what students should be able to do by the time they lea"e kindergarten. #y lesson promotes
social $ustice by gi"ing e"eryone a chance at participating. #y students will be working with
partners but I make sure that each partner has a chance to learn the material and manipulate
the e%uation in order to come to their own conclusion as well as learn from their partner&s
conclusion.
3. Identifying and supporting language needs: What are the language demands of the unit/lesson? How do
you plan to support students in meeting their English language development needs including academic
language!? The main language demands of the lesson are things that the students ha"e been introduced to
before. Students will be continuing to re"iew the words addition' number e%uation or sentence' as well as
whole and part and decomposing numbers. Students will be able to use these words with oral practice in
sharing with their partners and with the class as a whole. I will also be modeling the usage of these words
throughout the lesson as well.
(. )ccessing prior knowledge and building upon students& backgrounds' interests and needs: How do
your choices of instructional strategies, materials and sequence of learning tasks connect with your students"
backgrounds, interests, and needs? Students in my class learn "ery well with manipulati"es so I ha"e
included these into my lesson so they can ha"e another approach at learning the material. Students in my
class also en$oying using whiteboards whene"er they can so incorporating this into their math lesson will
be fun if I can ha"e them engaged while they are doing this lesson.
*. )ccommodations: What accommodations or support will you use for all students including English
#anguage #earners and students with special educational needs, i$e$ %&'E students and students
with (E)"s!? E*plain how these features of your learning and assessment tasks will provide all
students access to the curriculum and allow them to demonstrate their learning$ )ll students will
be able to learn in my lesson due to orally practicing the language as well as using
manipulati"es in the lesson and working with partners. Students that are ha"ing difficulty
will also ha"e the ideas of their partner that can also act as a source of information.
)d"anced students will also be helping their partners if they are ha"ing difficulty which
allows them to understand the material e"en better if they are able to e+plain it.
2013-2014
6. Theory: Which theories support your unit/lesson plan? (explain the connections) Barbara Rogoffs article
about Community of Learners supports many opportunities in my lesson. In a community-of-learners
classroom, organization changes from dyadic relationships between teachers responsible for filling students up
with knowledge and students who are supposed to be willing receptacles to complex group relations among
class members who learn to take responsibility for their contribution to their own learning and to the group's
functioning. Students can take responsibility for creating their own learning and are sources of knowledge in
the classroom as well. Therefore students are learning not only from the teacher but also from each other as
well.
7. Reflection: (answer the following questions after the teaching of this unit/lesson) What do you feel was
successful in your lesson and why? If you could go back and teach this learning segment again to the same
group of students, what would you do differently in relation to planning, instruction, and assessment? How
could the changes improve the learning of students with different needs and characteristics? This lesson went
really well in my opinion. The students gained a great understanding of the material at hand and the idea
of separating the pins really helped in their understanding in my opinion. Manipulatives were very
engaging for the students. Next time I might use less examples or have multiple students come help me at
the same time so that the rest of the class isnt just doing nothing. I would also prepare the materials a
little better because I found myself struggling to gather the appropriate amount of pins for the problem
at hand. Besides some minor technical difficulties I think that the scaffolding was at the right amount for
the students to understand the objectives and the lesson went smoothly.
**COMMENTARY IS REQUIRED FOR ALL UCLA ELEMENTARY FORMAL OBSERVATIONS **
2013-2014