Table of Contents

Standards
Standard
1
pg. 2
Standard
2
pg. 3
Standard
3
pg. 4
Standard
5
pg. 5

Report
Introduction
pg. 6
Focus

areas

of

lesson

plan.pg. 7-10
Feedback

from

peers..pg.
11

References
.....pg. 12

Appendix 1
Lesson

plan.

..pg.
13-21

Appendix 2
Peer

feedback

sheets..

pg. 22-25

ENGLISH

LESSON

PLAN:

POETRY

ABORIGINAL

POEMS
STANDARDS
Standard 1: Know students and how they learn
Focus area 1.5: Differentiate teaching to meet the specific learning
needs of students across the full range of abilities

Graduate:

Demonstrate

knowledge

and

understanding

of

strategies for differentiating teaching to meet the specific learning

needs of students across the full range of abilities

The focus area is achieved in this lesson plan by using different

types of activities associating with poetry. The uses of different
types of activities within one lesson impact students to have a
bigger perspective on different ways of learning. Student learning is
seen through the different activities and gives the chance for
students with all learning abilities to participate. The use of having
different types of activities allows teachers to have a perspective on
how students learn through such different activities. These different
types of activities show pedagogical reasoning, which was
development by Shulman (Marsh, Clarke & Pittaway, 2014). The
lesson plan consists of comprehension, transformation, instruction,
evaluation, reflection and new comprehension. (Marsh, Clarke &
Pittaway, 2014) Having a diverse in activities benefits teachers for
future lesson making and allows teachers to observe student
performance. This lesson plan demonstrates the knowledge and
understandings through the range of activities students must
complete.

Standard 2: Know the content and how to teach it

Focus area 2.4: Understand and respect Aboriginal and Torres

Strait Islander people to promote reconciliation between Indigenous
and non-Indigenous Australians
Graduate: Demonstrate broad knowledge of, understanding of and
respect for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories, cultures
and languages

The lesson plan is focused on classic Australian literature by using

two poems written by an Indigenous poet. The focus area is
therefore achieved in this lesson plan by incorporating Indigenous
histories, cultures and languages. By having the class topic on
Indigenous poetry, it shows that the lesson respects Indigenous
people and Indigenous students in the classroom. This is done
because the students are recognised and can help those Indigenous
students who have learning disabilities to actually participate
because they have a real personal connection with the lesson. The
lesson plan also allows a culturally inclusive environment, which
enables children to develop values, knowledge and understandings
that will allow them to participate positively in a multicultural
society (Williams, 2012, p. 38). Student learning in this sense is
achieved by acknowledging Indigenous people for both Indigenous
and non-Indigenous students. It leaves an impact on students by
giving them the chance to increase their knowledge through the
activities provided in the lesson. It gives students, both Indigenous

and non-Indigenous, the chance to learn about Australian history,

through the notion of English.

Standard 3: Plan for and implement effective teaching and

learning
Focus area 3.4: Select and use resources
Graduate: Demonstrate knowledge of a range of resources,
including ICT that engages students in their learning

ICT (Information and Communication Technology) is used in this

lesson plan by allowing students to observe how the Indigenous
poem is read out loud. The use of watching the poem No more
boomerang on YouTube, leaves the students to feel engaged with
what the topic of the lesson is, which is about poems and
Indigenous people. The lesson also provides a radio interview that
can be listened to, as another resource to the lesson plan. The use
of ICT demonstrates how students learn in the classroom in todays
society with the use of technology. The use of video technology in
this lesson plan is useful for effective mode of instruction (Jones &
Cuthrell, 2011, p. 77). This type of instruction triggers emotion and
leaves students to focus on the chosen topic of the lesson (Jones &
Cuthrell, 2011)

Standard 5: Assess, provide feedback and report on student

learning
Focus area 5.1: Assess student learning
Graduate: Demonstrate understanding of assessment strategies,
including informal and formal, diagnostic, formative and summative
approaches to assess student learning

Assessing student learning is seen in this lesson plan through the

different assessment ideas that the teacher has for the students. It
gives three different ideas that are connected with the summative
approach of testing. This summative sense of testing means student
achievement at the end of a unit and/or topic. It assesses students
on what they have learnt and how well they have learnt it. The
summative assessment is the final goal in education (Marsh, Clarke
& Pittaway, p. 313, 2014). The lesson plan demonstrates the
understanding

of

assessment

strategies

because

it

includes

different assessment ideas. All three assessments in the lesson plan

are seen in the summative approach, however it is also a formal
approach because students are aware that they are being tested on

the unit and/or topic. The formal approach in assessments is a

planned type of assessment, which is set out mostly obtrusive.
(Marsh, Clarke & Pittaway, p. 313, 2014)

Introduction
Each standard in the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers
is important. The four standard out of the seven, that are relevant to
the lesson plan provided are standards one, two, three and five. The
focus area of each standard is seen through the Graduate
perspective. The lesson plan that is provided is based on the key
learning area of English. This lesson focuses on poetry, and more
specifically on Indigenous poetry. The lesson plan gives a brief
introduction of the lesson stating what two poems will be discussed.
It shows a variation of class activities that all students with different
learning abilities can participate. It provides assessment ideas that
can benefit student learning about Indigenous culture and history,
while still learning about poetry. This English lesson plan, shows
standards one, two, three and five through the activities provided.

Focus areas of lesson plan

Standard one is to know the students and how they learn. The focus
area of this standard is differentiating teaching to meet the specific
learning needs of students across their range of abilities (Australian
Institute for Teaching and School Leadership, 2014). The focus area
caters the students in the lesson plan by using different types of
activities that are associated with poetry and also the Indigenous
history and culture. Including Indigenous history and culture in an
English lesson considers the learning needs of students who are of
Indigenous heritage. It is known that Indigenous students have
different learning needs to students who are not of Indigenous
descent. The lesson plan shows a range of activities that cater for
students of Indigenous and non-Indigenous backgrounds. The
different instructions that are seen in the lesson plan enables
students to have different perspectives on to convey poetry in an
8

English class. Roy, Guay and Valois (2013) suggest the notion of
instructional adaptions, which is when a teacher provides a variety
of learning options for students. This allows teachers to make
judgements on students and their abilities, by adjusting their form
of teaching for the student. This is because each student with
different abilities may not pursue the same individual goals or take
the same route to achieve common goals (Roy, Guy & Valois, 2013,
p. 1188). The different types of activities that are found in this
lesson plan can be seen through Shulmans pedagogical reasoning
approach. This approach consists of six areas that teachers need to
process in the classroom. These are comprehension, transformation,
instruction, evaluation, reflection and new comprehension (Marsh,
Clarke & Pittaway, p. 182, 2014). All six areas show how the content
is relevant to student learning and the content of the lesson. These
six areas meed the specific learning needs of students across all
learning abilities.

Standard two is to know the content of the topic and how to teach it.
The

focus

area

that

is

connected

to

the

lesson

plan

is

understanding and respecting Aborignal and Torres Strait Islander

people to promote reconciliation between Indigenous and nonIndigenous Australians (Australian Institute for Teaching and School
Leadership, 2014). This English lesson plan both understands and
respects Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people by having
Indigenous content seen within the classroom. By doing such

activities that recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture,

it allows to have Indigenous perspective in the spotlight (Kerley,
2015, p. 5) Having Indigenous perspective seen within the
classroom allows both Indigenous and non-Indigenous to understand
the importance of culture, allows teachers to show respect to
Indigenous people and also promote Indigenous views in a positive
learning environment. (Kerley, 2015, p. 5) This can then be looked at
as culturally inclusive. To cater for student learning, the classroom
needs to be culturally inclusive. This means that it will enable
students to develop values, knowledge and understandings that will
allow them to participate positively in a multicultural environment
(Williams, 2012, p. 38). This type of education will mostly cater for
non-Indigenous students because it will give these students the
perspective of Indigenous people. Cultural needs are also being
fulfilled for the Indigenous students because it connects the
students to the lesson.

The third standard that connects with the English lesson plan is
standard three, with the focus area to select and use resources
(Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership, 2014). This
lesson plan has different resources that implement effective
teaching towards students. The resources that are used in this
lesson plan is the use of websites to access poems, YouTube to
access a visual interpretation of the poem and listening to a radio
podcast. The use of technology in the classroom is called

10

Information Communication Technology (ICT). This form of usage

within a classroom keeps students engaged with the topic of the
lesson. ICT helps students to effectively follow instructions in the
classroom, which also triggers emotion. This leaves students to
focus on the chosen topic of the lesson through lived experiences
(Jones & Cuthrell, 2011, p. 77). The lesson plan however uses
YouTube to initiate learning abilities. Using YouTube as a form of
teaching allows students to concentrate on video. Berk (as cited in
Jones and Cuthrell, 2011) states that this method of teaching grabs
students attention, creates anticipation among students and
increases memorized content.

This lesson plan considers all

learning needs because of the different resources that are provided

for

the

students.

Each

resource

may

benefit

each

student

differently, which will effectively teach students proficiently.

The fourth standard that is evident in the lesson plan is standard

five, which is about assessment and reporting on student feedback.
The focus area of this standard that is evident in the lesson plan is
that it demonstrates understanding of assessment strategies,
using approaches to assess student learning (Australian Institute
for Teaching and School Leadership, 2014). The use of assessment is
important for all student-learning needs and in this lesson plan,
there are different strategies for assessing students. This part of the
lesson plan gives the teacher ideas on how to conduct knowledge on
students and their academic progress. This lesson plan in particular

11

consists of summative testing, which is the final goal of academic

progress (Marsh, Clarke & Pittaway, 2014, p. 313) This type of
testing also means that the teacher needs to have prior knowledge
about her students and their academic performance, in order to
conduct the appropriate testing. This therefore means it is a formal
based assessment, which consists of students knowing that they are
being testing.

Feedback from peers

12

The feedback that was received from the authors peers has
suggested that the author did not need to modify anything with the
standards that they have chosen. The comments that arose most
commonly from the feedback were how the author used a lesson
plan, which considered Indigenous culture and history. This helped
the author recognise that they directly linked their chosen lesson
plan with the appropriate standard. All peer reviews agreed that the
chosen standards were appropriately chosen to suit the lesson plan,
and therefore contributed to the authors analysis of the standards
in a positive way. It made the author understand the connections
that were appearing with the lesson plan and the standards.
Incorporating an Indigenous base lesson plan showed that the
lesson plan was based on inclusive learning.
In the peer feedback, it also states that the author critiqued the
chosen lesson plan based on the standards that were chosen. The
reason that the author had critiqued this was because; the lesson
plan consists of using the word nigger in the vocabulary list of the
activities. This can have a negative impact on the students and it
can arise in conflict between Indigenous and non-Indigenous
students, which is something that teacher, or student wants to
experience in the classroom. However, it can have a positive impact
by suggesting the culturally inclusive learning that can be evident
within the classroom, if the teacher teaches it in the appropriate
manner.

13

References
Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership. (2014).
Education
Services Australia. Retrieved from:
http://www.aitsl.edu.au/australian-professional-standards-forteachers/standards/list

March, C., Clarke, M., & Pittway, S. (2014). Marshs becoming a

teacher (sixth ed.).
Frenchs Forrest, A: Pearson Education Australia

Roy, A., Guay, F., & Valois, P. (2013). Teaching to address diverse
learning needs:
Development and validation of a Differentiated Instruction
Scale.International

Journal

of

Inclusive

Education, 17(11),

1186-1204.

Williams, L. (2012). The little Big Book Club: Implementing an

aboriginal
perspective

in

the

classroom.(Recommended

readings). Practically Primary,17(2), 38.

14

Kerley, V., (2015). Thoughts on creating a culturally inclusive

classroom:
Indigenous

literature

and

the

Australian

curriculum.

Access, 29(3), 4-6, 8-13.

Jones, T., & Cuthrell, K. (2011). YouTube: Educational Potentials and

Pitfalls. Computers in the Schools, 28(1), 75-85.

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