I was really excited to implement my backward design lesson plan this week. I felt that this was one of the more successful starts to my project based learning units this year. The students were engaged and interested in the topic and the real world content. They were also excited that their work would be submitted for a contest, through which they could earn money. Students gained a good understanding of the different types of energy that we use in our school, town, and state. They also looked at how these energy uses effect our environment and how we can decrease our effects on the environment in the future. Students were able to use this information to start their newspaper articles by the end of the lesson. This showed me that they understood the concepts and what was expected of them.
I really liked the real world aspects and the motivation that the contest provided. Students were interested in the topic and I was able to give them many relevant websites to research their information. I felt that the original website from scholastic was a great way to give the students background information on the different types of energy before they researched their uses in our school, town, or state. We found that the nearby electricity companies also had valuable information on their websites as well.
The portion of the lesson that was not as successful was using the worksheets to start off with information. Both worksheets were jam packed with information and the students had trouble understanding some of the questions. I think next year I will cut some parts of the informational worksheets out and reword the questions so that they can more easily use the information given to them. I would also like to cut down the worksheets so that they can spend more time on the interactive scholastic and Duke Energy websites. I think that if each student from the group has more time to explore those websites they will gain more individual knowledge than they did through the worksheets. Many students enjoy the computers more and wanted more time to research on the computers so I think that this is the best way to increase understanding before producing the product.
The backward design process helped me to focus on the standards that I wanted to achieve first. I had an idea for the project earlier but by looking at the standards I was able to cut out some aspects of the project and focus on the pieces that pertained more to the 6th grade science standards. Then I was able to build my lesson with these standards in mind the whole time. I have found as a new teacher I would use the science book to lead instruction sometimes then realize afterwards that there were whole sections that did not cover any standards that I needed. By focusing on the goal first I am able to save time and come up with a more productive lesson.
