Marcelo Gonzalez

Setting and Context

Thompson Valley High School is a nest in which students have an opportunity to grow
and hopefully take flight one day. The idea of growth within the students is what I feel is
represented in Thompson Valley high school. The students are not expected to be perfect nor I
have yet to witness any favoritism of one student over another. Instead what I see are teachers
and staff members challenging students to be their best self in the social experiment that is high
school. Thompson Valley High School does not have a community but instead creates one, which
in turn impacts the students, and will ultimately help me construct lessons that will continue to
help the students of Thompson Valley high school grow.
In order to better understand the school community some statistics can help shed some
light on where these students are coming from. In terms of diversity, Thompson Valley high
school is very similar to the statistics that make up the district as a whole, with the exception of
African-American students, which are not well represent in Thompson Valley. The primary
population that Thompson Valley serves seems to be those that identify as White (78.6%) and
Hispanic (17.3%). As far as gender goes, Thompson Valley is more evenly split among males
and females, with there being slightly more males. As far as students on free or reduced lunch
approximately 36% of students are enrolled in that program, an indication of their possible
economic situations. About 13% of students are considered gifted and talented, 12% are a part of
the special education program, and about 1% of the student population are in the English
language learning program. These statistics help give a sense of who the students we are working
with are, an important idea when preparing lesson plans.
The school community in Thompson Valley High School is built on the mission,
"Building for a new generation." In order to build for the new generation students need to be able
to feel that they have a role in building the schools community. I have experienced the students

Marcelo Gonzalez
Setting and Context
ability to care about their school in Mrs. Light-Kovacs classroom. She took the time in her
classroom to address a student's statement of Thompson Valley high school being an inadequate
facility. In this instance Mrs. Light-Kovacs had the potential to ignore the comment but instead
dug a little deeper. The conversation culminated into Mrs. Light-Kovacs reminding the students
that they have some autonomy in making their physical space more appealing and if they feel
limited or constricted to address issues at school board meetings. This to me was an example of
Mrs. Light-Kovacs getting her students to understand that they can play a large role in the setting
of their education, encouraging them to be more involved and grow. Fitting in with the mission
statement, because who would not want a generation of people who cared enough to go to a
school board meeting.
There are also a variety of programs that help the growth of students in Thompson Valley
high school. One of the main activities that many students seem to be involved in are sports,
which does seem to have a place in Thompson Valley High School due to the fact that 30
different sports are offered. Many students react positively when you ask them about sports and
that in itself is an easy way to connect with students. There are also over 20 clubs available to
students, one of those clubs being National Honor Society which is run by Mrs. Lights-Kovacs.
This gives many students the ability to choose and hopefully find a smaller community to belong
in outside the classroom. The parents seem to be very willing to be involved, although I did hear
comments from some students which have parents that are okay with their students missing
school so long as their grades are considered good. I want to attribute this to the long held belief
in our current system that grades are the sole factor in deciding for a kids success, when the
reality to me at least, is that the learning not the measurement should be valued.

Marcelo Gonzalez
Setting and Context
The smaller community that I am a part of within Thompson Valley high school is Mrs.
Light-Kovacs's second period geography class. There are 22 students in her class, a class size I
consider small, I grew up with having 30+ for the class size being the norm. When I walk into
the classroom I am greeted with posters concerning geography, economics, and student work.
She also does put in a little bit of her personality into the classroom to be able to relate with the
students, the one that jumped out at me were her avengers posters. The avengers posters helps
create a connection with the students because of their popularity and also gives a talking point.
As far as the demographics in the class the majority seem to identify as White, and a majority of
female students compared to male. Their interests range from sports, to anime, and certain
television shows like Dr. Who. The classroom is set up in rows with single student desks facing
the front (Please refer to diagram A for a visualization of the class room).
A.

Marcelo Gonzalez
Setting and Context
The students that I am working with range from students that require extra support to
high achieving students. This range of students is handled in Mrs. Light-Kovacs class through
student centered learning. The only thing she grades besides tests, are her students notebooks,
which act as a study guide and record of activities from the class. In all of the class periods that I
have been a part of Mrs. Lights Kovacs spends little time in lecturing and more time allowing
students to learn through a variety of ways. One of those ways was interpreting data from a
website on population statistics then making the information more readable by turning it into a
visually appealing poster. Through this activity Mrs. Light-Kovacs could help the students that
were struggling, allow high achieving students to work at a quicker pace, and also address the
social studies state standard of interpreting data. This teaching strategy overall allows Mrs.
Light-Kovacs to address the needs of students that may struggle with the content while also
keeping higher achieving students engaged.
Knowing the teaching style helps me create a lesson plan that will resonate with the
students. Currently the students are learning about the Oceania region one of the bigger
countries that comes to mind in that region is Australia. Most of the students also associated
Oceania with Australia, and most of the knowledge for that region is coming from that country.
Just recently students finished filling in maps concerning the location of countries in Oceania,
population, climate, and natural resources. They are currently working on an activity that
explores various aspects of Oceania on a surface level for more introductory knowledge. That
being said I would like to teach about the various governments in Oceania.
My tentative plan currently is to teach the governments of Oceania through the use of
facebook page posters. I want students to get into groups and make a facebook page poster
representing the government of different Oceania countries. Afterwards there can be a gallery

Marcelo Gonzalez
Setting and Context
walk and students can learn about the various governments in Oceania from their peers. I would
like to teach this lesson after the students gain an initial understanding of Oceania so that they
have some confidence when they do this activity. The reason I want to employ this teaching
strategy is because gives students a sense of accountability because they have to also teach their
peers. This lesson also gives me the ability to support those students who need more help and
give higher achieving students the ability to keep learning new content at the same time. I feel
this strategy also falls in line with Mrs. Light-Kovacs teaching style and would also fit in with
her notebook checks.
An example of the poster is having a countries flag as the profile picture, their friends list
(other countries they are close to, possibly with a reason as to why they are close to those
countries), and different things the country likes (possibly their social programs/ what the
government in that country values). The poster would be something that is relevant to the way
they have been learning because any of their projects have required a creative piece. The
teaching method would also fall in line to student centered learning because the students are
becoming experts in the government they are researching and they later help their peers
understand the different governments through the gallery walk. This also addresses the issues of
exposing the students to more countries then just Australia.
Overall I feel my lesson plan would address the concept of growth with students. The
students are expected to an extent to take charge of their learning while also helping their peers
to learn. The community is also represented in the lesson because this is an opportunity students
have to get involved with their education and have a say in what they believe is relevant to
understanding a nations government, with guidance of course from me and my fellow teachers. I
believe that the focus of the community in Thompson Valley high school is on supporting the

Marcelo Gonzalez
Setting and Context
growth of students no matter where they are. They are not expected to be given up on and are
trusted with their education to as evidenced with Mrs. Light-Kovacs student centered learning.