Kate Collier

Professor Kinney-Grossman
EDUC 544
8/12/16
Personal Narrative
This lesson plan, Who are you as a historian?, has been shaped by my summer
experiences in the TEP program at the University of Pennsylvania. Over the course of the
summer, I took Teaching and Learning in Urban Contexts, a course that guided me to explore
what it means to learn and to teach in specifically an urban setting. In addition, my summer field
placement was at Upward Bound Math and Science, a pre-college program for high school
students. Within the program, my role was to help the English teacher in her classroom and to
assist the students with their final research projects. Through reflecting and engaging critically
with class readings, in class discussions, and at my placement, I was able to create this lesson
plan for the first week of school.
Who are you as a historian? is intended to be a first week of class unit designed for a
7th grade 45-minute World History class of 24 students. The reason I selected this format and
demographic is because my future Fall and Spring student teaching placement is at Penn
Alexander, a K-8 Elementary School in University City. From my conversation with my
classroom mentor last week, I gathered that I would be student teaching a 7th grade World
History class where the class size is on average 24 students. In addition, he explained they have
an interesting schedule where some days are 45 minutes and some days are 90 minutes, so I
decided, for the purposes of this assignment, to make the class time uniform at 45 minutes.
When designing this unit, I decided to use Carol Ann Tomlinson and Jay McTighes
(2006) Understanding by Design method and incorporate aspects of Differentiated Instruction.
Therefore, looking at the five-day unit framework section of my website, I organized my lesson

plan thinking first about the goals, understandings, and essential questions I wanted my students
to accomplish, know, and engage critically with. From there, I thought about what type of
assessments I wanted my students to do. In an effort to differentiate my lesson plan, I elected to
use a variety of activities to accommodate the uniqueness of students (Tomlinson and
McTighe, 2006, 34). In doing so, I chose three informal assessment tasks. The game where the
wind blows allows kinesthetic students, who learn best by moving around as theorized by
Howard Gardner in his Multiple Intelligences Theory, to get up and out of their seats and engage
with their peers in an introductory activity to identity (Gardner). The pair/share activities allow
students who are more shy to participate in class discussions where they have the opportunity to
have a conversation with a partner. For students who are more outgoing and like to participate in
group activities, there are opportunities for them to participate in larger group discussions.
I also elected to differentiate and scaffold the performance tasks. While each of the tasks
assigned is static in that the students do not have a choice for which activity they select, I would
argue that the performance tasks also accommodate all students (Tomlinson and McTighe, 2006,
34). The identity chart activity allows students who are spatial learners to engage with the notion
of identity in a physical representation of it, whether that is a chart, web, etc. (Gardner). In
addition, within the Autobiography Project, the journal reflection activity allows students with
strong intrapersonal skills to engage and reflect on past events in their lives (Gardner). For those
who are spatial learners and for ELL students, the pamphlet activity allows students to express
their autobiographies in part through illustrations (Gardner; Tomlinson and McTighe, 36).
Finally, the interview portion allows students who are outgoing to chat in a structured way with
their classmates, and gives students who are shy the opportunity to get to know their classmates
better. In addition, for the performance tasks, I created a handout with instructions for the

Autobiography Project, Interview Worksheet, and rubric for the pamphlet task. Lisa Delpit in her
article, Other Peoples Children, specifically discusses the importance of explicitly teaching
students, particularly Black students, skills of the dominant culture (1995). Inspired by this
insight, these materials are intended to communicate explicitly and effectively my high
expectations for the Autobiography Project with my students. I also planned into Day Threes
lesson that we would go over these materials together as a class. In doing so, I want to make my
expectations clear in multiple forms, written, oral, and graphic organizer, in an effort to ensure
maximum comprehension so students do not leave my classroom confused about what their
assigned tasks are.
The third stage of my process in planning the lesson was the learning plan. While much
of the plan incorporates the informal and formal assessments discussed above, I also
incorporated a classroom routine. This routine, including a check in with me for attendance,
saying good morning or good afternoon, turning homework in, taking a seat, and followed with a
signal from me, Are you ready to learn?, allows students who thrive from routine to feel
ideally more comfortable in my classroom when they know what to expect at the beginning of
each class. As an added bonus, this classroom routine could help cut down transition time, so that
we, as a class, can get to learning quicker. In addition, I elected in my learning plan to state how
the classroom would be spatially designed each day. For the days when the desks are arranged in
a circle, I am hoping that will encourage students to engage with one another in an open, whole
class discussion. For the days where students desks are arranged in groups of 4, my plan is to
give the students a space that will allow students to engage with others as they do classroom
activities, facilitate the pair/share conversations, and give students a clear vision of me and others
for whole class discussions.

Ultimately, my goal in the first week of school is to create a welcoming classroom

community for all students. I want students to get to know themselves, each other, and myself,
and respect the diversity of our classroom. It is important that every student feel comfortable and
welcome in my classroom as I believe that is the first step to foster learning. Without this sense
of community, I think students minds are automatically shut off from any engagement with the
content or between one another. Therefore, on the third day, I provide an opportunity for students
to come up with some classroom rules. I think if the students have autonomy in creating the rules
of the classroom, then they will have more incentive to follow them.
In addition, I think it is vital students get to know me. Reflecting on my time at Upward
Bound, many of the students, the girls in particular, did not participate in whole class
discussions, but after I had a few conversations with them one-on-one and shared things about
myself, they opened up. I think I formed a relationship with these students in these moments,
which enabled constructive communication and learning to happen for the rest of the summer
program (My TLUC Blog, Post #1, 2016). I was inspired, therefore, to create a learning plan unit
for the first week of school that helps me get to know students immediately on a present day-today basis through the informal assessments, and get a glimpse into aspects of students past
through the identity charts and the Autobiography Project. To use an example from Gloria
Ladson- Billings article Toward a Theory of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy, she found that one
of the teachers in her study used lyrics of rap songs as a way to teach elements of poetry
(Ladson-Billings, 1995, 476). Because this teacher was in tune with his or her students interests,
he or she was able to create culturally relevant pedagogy that provided a way for students to
maintain students cultural integrity while succeeding academically (Ladson-Billings, 1995,
476). For this reason, I decided to incorporate these projects in the first week of school because,

moving forward into the school year, I will have knowledge of my students interests and past
experiences in my back pocket to use in order to connect with students in in-person
conversations and to make my curriculum and lesson plans relevant to my students real,
everyday lives. In addition, throughout the week, I make a point to share my own identity chart
and pamphlet autobiography in an effort to help students get to know me today, the events that
have shaped me, and how I became their teacher.
Finally, I want students to understand that everyone can be a historian. I think a common
misconception of history is that only certain people can do it and be successful at it. In my
experience at Upward Bound, I had a conversation with two students, one male one female, the
former who said he only liked Math and Science and the latter who said she only liked English
and History. The two justified their statements on the basis that not everyone can be good at
every subject. My immediate response was an attempt to elicit a growth mindset in these
students, to help them believe they can learn and grow in every subject (Dweck, 2010).
Therefore, in my classroom and from the very beginning, I want every student, those who like
history and those who do not, to understand that there is a place for them to succeed as historians
in my classroom.

References:
Delpit, L. (N.d.). Other Peoples Children: Cultural Conflict in the Classroom. New York: The
New Press.
Dweck, C. S. (2010). Mind-Sets and Equitable Education. Principal Leadership, 10, 26-29.
Gardner, H. (N.d.). The Components of MI. MI OASIS. Retrieved from
http://multipleintelligencesoasis.org/about/the-components-of-mi/#box-7.
Ladson-Billings, G. (1995). Toward a Theory of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy. American
Educational Research Journal. 32, 465-491.
Tomilson, C. A., & McTighe, J. (2006). Integrating Differentiated Instruction and
Understanding by Design. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.