Observation Notes

Jacob Gilliard
At Sheridan Elementary School, science and math is not emphasized as
much as ELA and Social Studies. Math is taught on Tuesdays which is the
day I usually did not visit because of scheduling conflicts. As required, I made
accommodations to make it to a number of math sessions. Most of the times
I would visit, they would be doing review using games. One day, during my
observation time at my field experience class I had the chance to observe a
math lesson that covered line graphs, in particular looking at temperature
graphs and the change in temperature throughout a one day span. My
mentor teacher gave the students two different graphs and had the students
come up with story problems that would match the temperature graph. After
the students came up with stories she and the students sat on the carpet in
a circle and the students shared what they wrote and the rest of the class
had to guess what graph it matched with. While on the carpet she used
verbal communication to pick students to share as well as to give them
directions to raise hands and listen to one another. She also used nonverbal
cues such as looking at students or mouthing to them. As I observed I
recorded some notes. I would like to use this observation to help me develop
math activities that help get the whole class involved in the process of
understand the concept.
I also had the pleasure of sitting in on a lesson about money. Prior to
this lesson, the class already learned the value of different coins as well as

how to count money. The lesson I observed focused more on using the least
amount of coins to make a certain monetary amount. The activity that Mrs.
Dickerson used to teach this lesson was called Scoot. At each of the five
round tables was a jar of fake coins (pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters)
and a card with a monetary amount. For example, a table would have a card
saying 77 . Students would have to figure out the least amount of coins to
reach that amount. For that particular problem, the answer would be 3
quarters and 2 pennies. Each student was given a chart where they could
write their answers for the activity. Whenever it was time for students to
rotate to the next table, Mrs. Dickerson would say scoot and ring a bell
During the lesson, I observed Mrs. Dickerson walk around at the
different tables to monitor students progress. She would ask them to explain
how they got their answer. Later on after the lesson, Mrs. Dickerson
explained to me that the questioning technique allowed her to see if the
students actually grasped the concept. The students seemed to enjoy the
activity because they were able to move around the classroom. I noticed that
not all of the students chose the least amount of coins during the activity.
When this would happen, Mrs. Dickerson would try to guide them to another
possible answer. At the end of the lesson, Mrs. Dickerson and the class
discussed the answers and explained the different ways to reach the answer