Megan Matchett

Professor Reilly
EDUC 359
15 May 2015
Live Lesson Reflection
The lesson that Ciara and I taught was on the geography of South America. The
content objectives that we used were explain the effects of natural disasters in Colombia,
compare and contrast the economy of Ecuador to the U.S., and identify key
characteristics about culture and politics in Venezuela. The language objective that we
used was accurately create a Venn diagram about the economy in Ecuador and the U.S.
after reading the passages. I think that the objectives were just barely met. Jack was able
to meet the objectives but only with help. He needed assistance in achieving the
objectives. It was not his fault, the objectives also did not seem to be the problem, the
other materials were too difficult for a student his age.
I realized that there were a few parts of the lesson were way too difficult for a
student in 3rd or 4th grade. I think that I should have communicated with Ciara a little bit
more because she wrote the passages for economics in Ecuador and the U.S. and I did not
see them until the lesson. I think that the words and the sentence structure was too
difficult, some of the passage was even difficult for me to pronounce and understand.
Because the passages were too difficult, it was hard for Jack to do the Venn diagram.
That part of the lesson definitely did not go as planned. I expected the passage to be
developmentally appropriate and then the Venn diagram would be pretty simple to fill in.
If I were to do this lesson again I think that I would simplify the passages a lot so that
they are readable for a 3rd or 4th grade student. That was the main part that was too
difficult. I do not think that any part of the lesson was too easy, the SmartBoard

presentation was developmentally appropriate as were the activities for Colombia and
Venezuela.
I think Jacks language/vocabulary development was challenged. Pronouncing
the country names seemed to be a little bit difficult for him and most of the vocabulary he
did not know. It was not too difficult; it was the right amount of challenge. We had him
pronounce the words that he struggled with to reinforce this pronunciation. We probably
could have added other words that challenged him and it still would not have been too
difficult except for the words in the economics passages. If I were doing this lesson again
with an actual ELL student then I would probably take out some of the difficult words
throughout the whole lesson. I might even just pick one country at a time for a lesson so
that the student does not confuse the three countries and vocabulary words. Also, for the
economics passages I would rewrite it so that it is developmentally appropriate for a 3rd or
4th grade student with basic knowledge of English. I would probably keep it simple by
having 3 or 4 sentences about Ecuador and 3 or 4 sentences about the U.S. The ELL
student and any English-speaking student would have an easier time filling in the Venn
diagram with this information. I would also add more visuals of volcanoes in Colombia
for an ELL student because then they would be able to visualize the effects of an
eruption.
Overall, the lesson went pretty well. Ciara and I worked pretty well together. At
times during the lesson it was difficult to decide which one of us was going to explain
something so I realized that I kept kind of taking over without meaning to. It was mostly
because we had different approaches to explaining things. Better communication could
have helped. But I think that Jack did learn about the geography of South America.