Lesson Plan & Implementation:

Reflection and Analysis

College of Education

Reflection is a critical process for supporting your growth and development

as a professional. At the end of each lesson, you should reflect on the
experience and analyze its effectiveness. This part of the process consists of
two parts: the reflection and the analysis.
In order to receive full credit your reflection and analysis must include
specific references to the video with time correlations. For this reason, it is
strongly suggested that you complete a chart as you watch your video with
the following headings and focus your viewing on the student learning goal
and/or teacher instructional goal.
Time

Celebration/Struggle/Questio
n:

Claim about teaching

practice

After first problem was

given

Some students were off task

while trying to answer
question

Use timer to help students

monitor their own time and
stay on task

Whole

The concept of arrays and

using them to solve
multiplication and division
problems comes very easy to
most students

Because this concept uses

manipulatives and physical
manipulation of the arrays,
students are able to learn
visually and physically see
what they are doing to the
problem

Entire lesson for second

math block

This group of students

needed more concrete
examples, rather than
explanations. By writing out
multiplication and division
sentences, we labeled, as a
class, what each part of the
sentence meant as it related
to arrays. (rows, columns,
product, etc.)

Differentiation is key to
student success. Each
student learns differently
and some students need
more support or a different
approach to learn the
same material.

You do not have to answer all of these questions, choose 3-4 and answer
thoroughly. They are meant to prompt your thinking. Your reflection should
make sure to address both reflection and analysis.

The Reflection: The reflection component should make you think about your
overall impressions and feelings that you had. You also might address
something that surprised you or something that made you pause.
What aspects of your lesson were implemented differently than you planned? Why did that
happen?
Because I taught this lesson during both the first and second math block, I was aware
that these two groups of students would need very different accommodations in order to
learn the same material. This was the first time I had planned and taught a math lesson, in
full, so I was excited to teach the first block of students (above level), to gain more
information about how I could improve this lesson for the second block of students (below
level). The first block of students followed the lesson plan almost exactly. They were able to
understand the material easily and complete the problems. This was very different during
the second block, which I thought was very interesting. After conferencing with my CT after
first block, she gave me ideas on how to incorporate different examples for students to see
how multiplication and division are related. Because this group tends to need more concrete
examples, I had to modify the lesson and add an additional activity to help this group of
students understand. For this, I decided to use a student example of an array, and write the
corresponding multiplication and division sentences. After writing these, I asked students to
come up to the board and label the parts of the sentences to how they would relate to an
array. Not only did this emphasize vocabulary, but it allowed students to see a more
detailed breakdown of how the two concepts relate.
What surprised you in your lesson?
I was very surprised at how easily both groups of students were able to learn and
understand arrays. Even though the second block of students needed additional support,
both groups were able to grasp the concept fairly quickly. This surprised me because the
concepts of multiplication and division were difficult for students to learn, so I expected that
adding another step to multiplication and division might be difficult as well. I think that the
students were easily able to understand arrays because it is a physical model of the
multiplication and division that they already know. Students were able to see, count, and
understand arrays as a way to help with multiplication and division, which was the purpose
of the lesson.
What connections can you make to your lesson today from your coursework, the literature,
and any previous lessons or experiences?
During this lesson, I really got to experience the different ways that students learn
and how one concept can be taught so differently to accommodate these learning styles.
When conferencing with my CT about ways to modify the lesson to help the second block of
students, I was surprised about all of the ideas that I had about how to differentiate this
lesson for this group of students. I used more modeling and scaffolding with the second
block because they needed more support. Having students work through their productive
struggle: was something that was also very useful in both blocks. This is something we talk
about often in our math methods course so I was excited to put it into action for this lesson.
Although the productive struggle came in different ways for each block, it was interesting to
see how students respond to different approached to the same material.

The Analysis: The analysis part addresses the lessons effectiveness to

what extent did the students meet the objectives stated in your lesson plan
and how do you know? Make a claim about student learning and support it
with evidence that you gathered from the lesson.
You do not have to answer all of these questions, instead use these questions
to prompt your thinking and make at minimum 2-3 claims about student
learning and support your claims with data (video, student work, methods
readings, observation form).
General questions to consider in your analysis:
Identify an individual or group of students who had difficulty in todays lesson. How do you
account for this performance? How will you help this (these) student(s) achieve the learning
objectives?
Because this lesson is heavy in vocabulary and student discussion, I payed close
attention to the ELL students to make sure that they were able to learn the material as well.
To learn the vocabulary, students learned a cheer from my CT that allowed them to
memorize which direction rows and columns go. Also, the vocabulary is constantly
emphasized through discussion and is displayed on the board as well. Even though I
expected to give more attention to the ELL students during individual work time, I was
pleasantly surprised that these students were able to learn this concept fairly easily as well.
Consider how the mathematics was represented in the class. Were connections made
between representations (verbal, numerical, pictorial, physical etc.)?
Making connections between physical models (arrays) and numerical multiplication
and division sentences was the objective of this entire lesson. Although students were
learning about arrays for the first time, they were able to draw those connections between
the arrays and the parts of the multiplication and division sentences. For some of the
students, making arrays actually helped them in solving multiplication and division
problems. It was very interesting to see students make these connections. Students were
also able to find arrays around the classroom and identify how arrays are used in real life, in
some cases. This plays into later standards involving area, as well. Verbal connections were
made because student discussion about their problems was the main focus of the lesson. As
a class, we worked through the problems given in order to talk about the many steps used,
the new concepts, and emphasize vocabulary. While discussing, we created the arrays with
the snap cubes so students could see a visual/physical representation as well.