Observation of a Veteran Gifted Endorsed

Teacher
TAG Teacher Name: Melinda Sawyer
School: Shakerag Elementary School
Class: 2nd grade TAG
Date/Time: January 26, 2016

12:40-1:10pm

Observer: Stephanie Beckles

Characteristics of the class:
Observations:
Ms. Sawyer provided a hook: What factors impact animals
survival?
She told the students that an author was supposed to come and
visit the class, but he is missing, so their job is to get the
information needed to help him write his book. The teacher gave
the students the book title, and cards to sort. She encouraged
them to think in terms of survival and lifetimes. The students
were clearly engaged and excited about the prospect of beginning
this work.
As students worked on sorting the cards, Ms. Sawyer guided one
group to begin to make a timeline. She then used these students
to go off and guide other groups to sort according to a timeline
as well.
Ms. Sawyer did a great job of facilitating the discussion. Her use
of open-ended questions helped to guide the children in the
direction that she wanted them to go.
As the children worked, Ms. Sawyer mentioned that she was
keeping track of some of the questions the students were coming
up with, so that they could go back later and address these
misconceptions by doing research to find out the correct answers.

Observation of a Veteran Gifted Endorsed

Teacher
At the end of the lesson, the students were asked to number the
pictures in order, so that they could recreate their timelines the
next day.
Ms. Sawyer told me that the plan for the next days lesson was to
follow up with reading the book Lifetimes, so that the students
could see how their pictures all fit together.
The students were engaged through the whole lesson. Ms.
Sawyer kept the pace moving along, and through questioning she
was able to encourage them to use higher order thinking skills
and metacognition.

**After taking the Characteristics class, I realized that a lot of the

traits of students with gifted abilities were present. The students
asked thoughtful, engaging questions that showed higher order
thinking. And when it came to the group activities, there was
definitely a sense of fairness and collaboration in working on the
task together. I noticed that a number of the students had strong
opinions when sorting the cards, and were comfortable in voicing
those opinions.
Ms. Sawyer did a great job of encouraging the students to think
outside the box, as well providing feedback that encouraged them
to continue with their exploration.