Secondary History/Social Studies

Task 2: Instruction Commentary

TASK 2: INSTRUCTION COMMENTARY

Respond to the prompts below (no more than 6 single-spaced pages, including prompts) by typing your responses within the
brackets following each prompt. Do not delete or alter the prompts. Commentary pages exceeding the maximum will not be
scored. You may insert no more than 2 additional pages of supporting documentation at the end of this file. These pages
may include graphics, texts, or images that are not clearly visible in the video or a transcript for occasionally inaudible portions.
These pages do not count toward your page total.
1. Which lesson or lessons are shown in the video clips? Identify the lesson(s) by lesson plan
number.
[The lessons that are shown in the videos are from lesson two and three. Lesson two is all
about the Great Depression and its affect on the American people. In the video, I go over
photographs from the Great Depression to get an emotional response from my class. I did this
also at the end of the lesson to sum up the Great Depression and to show that it had a deep
impact on the American people. Lesson three is a review session about Black Tuesday, Trickle-
Down Economics, and the Great Depression. I did this at the beginning of the so they could
review everything from the previous week. Lesson three was also the day of the summative
assessment about the previous two day of the unit, so I talk a little bit about that as well.]
2. Promoting a Positive Learning Environment
Refer to scenes in the video clips where you provided a positive learning environment.

a. How did you demonstrate mutual respect for, rapport with, and responsiveness to
students with varied needs and backgrounds, and challenge students to engage in
learning?
[Mutual respect is something that I focus on in my classroom, since it is a necessity if you want
to do anything with your students. One way I demonstrate this is to let students answer
questions about the photographs in lesson two. One student says, I dont want to look at her
when referring to the migrant woman. Rather then shut them down, I let them elaborate on what
they mean. I feel like letting students express their honest opinion is important and shows that I
respect them. They show me respect when they answer questions and listen to what I have to
say. When I go around and talk to them during group discussion, I let them say what they think
before I say anything. I want their honest options and respect what they think. I also
demonstrate a good rapport with my students in the second video, particularly when I have them
come up and pick a question to answer. All students come up without fighting me and are ready
to ask the question, and in some cases answer it. This shows that we have a good rapport in
the class since they do things, even if they dont feel like it. It also helps that I had them choose
the next student to come up and pick a question. This gave them a bit of power over how the
lesson progresses and let them really think about who will come up next. It also let students who
dont usually get to talk in class come up and say something. This removed any bias I had when
choosing students because I wasnt actually choosing anyone except the first student to come
up.
When it comes to the responsiveness to students will varied needs and backgrounds, this is
something that I have worked on in these lessons. In the first video, I let the students talk about
what they think about the migrant mother before we discus as a class. This is because a
majority of the students, 25 out of 33, are ELLs at various place in learning English. This is why I
let them talk before I had them share, so they could think and share an opinion before giving it
to the entire class. This strategy is a sheltered instruction strategy that I use to get my ELLs to
talk and practice their English. Another thing I do is to let my SPED students decide when they
want to come up and engage with the class. A lot of the SPED students in my class are
emotionally disturbed and do not feel comfortable talking in front of people. By talking to them in

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 Secondary History/Social Studies
Task 2: Instruction Commentary

groups and one on one, this lets them get their ideas across without raising their affective filer
too high. This can also be very affective when I have students who are ELL and SPED. When it
comes to TAG students, I expect more from then in my lessons and I try to talk to them in my
video. This does not always work, especially when it is group discussion, but they share some
good ideas in the video. I also have one student who is very high and can think at a higher level
then other students, though they are not TAG and were absent when video two was shot. For
them, I try and ask them higher level questions and treat them as they are TAG, I would have
done this if they were there during lesson three.
When it comes to challenging students to be engaged in class, I try and incorporate talking and
group discussion in my classes. This was a focus in my videos and is something that works
well. For example, during lesson two, video one, I have them talk in small groups for two
minutes before having them answer to the whole class. By doing this, all students should be
engaged in learning and ready to contribute. Lesson three, video two, also shows this since all
of my students are held accountable for talking since they dont know if they will be called up
next. They need to be able to talk and at least be ready to answer the question, which can be a
challenge for my students. Group discussion and work in small groups are the main way I know
my students are engaged in learning.]
3. Engaging Students in Learning
Refer to examples from the video clips in your responses to the prompts.

a. Explain how your instruction engaged students in

developing the skills of inquiry, interpretation, or analysis in relation to sources or accounts of
historical events or a social studies phenomenon
building and supporting arguments or conclusions
[Day one of filming, also lesson two, is when I had them interpret photographs of the Great
Depression. In that entire lesson, I have them look at pictures that were taken from the Great
Depression and write about what they feel when they look at them. While doing this, they must
interpret what is going on in the picture as well as analyze the actual photo itself to get an
understanding of life during the Great Depression. This is done through the entire video and
they must talk about it in small groups first, and then give their answers to the entire class. This
goes on for the entirety of video 1.
Students are asked to build an argument in this video as well. For its entirety, they have to make
an argument about what they think the photographs mean. This was done in a variety of ways,
usually just them saying what they think about it though. Some students were able to make
great arguments about what they thought about the photographs from the Great Depression.
One group, starting at around 2:30 talked about the children around the migrant woman and
how it must have been difficult for them. The fact that they were able to make this argument,
though I had to guide them a little, showed that they were able to make arguments in a very
deep way. ]
b. Describe how your instruction linked students prior academic learning and personal,
cultural, and community assets with new learning.
[Students were linked into their prior knowledge when I made the comparison to the roaring 20s.
Because they spent a lot of time going over the roaring 20s, they were able to talk about how
the Great Depression was different from the 1920s. By going over this, they were able to clearly
see how life in America was changing as a result of the 1930s. Some of my students needed a
lot of guidance, since they were saying that the Great Depression was a prosperous time, but
after the initial explanation, they were able to compare the two times in American history
because they knew so much about the roaring 20s. ]
4. Deepening Student Learning during Instruction

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 Secondary History/Social Studies
Task 2: Instruction Commentary

Refer to examples from the video clips in your explanations.

a Explain how you elicited and built on student responses that supported students
ability to form inquiries, interpretations, or analyses of history/social studies sources or
accounts AND build and support arguments or conclusions.
[In my lessons, I required my students to be able to analyze historical documents and events
and relate them to how they changed American history. One way was through the group
discussion that we had in the first video. One way that this happened was that they needed to
be able to talk about photographs from the great depression. The groups had to talk to each
other and interpret what the photographs actually met, as well as what they made them feel like.
One group was successful with this and I helped them build a deeper understanding of this idea.
They also were able to build arguments because of this. In the video, you see many of my
students talking to each other when they are either describing photos, in the first video, or in the
second video when they are reviewing the Great Depression. During these clips, they make
conclusions about what they learned in order take part in these discussion. They must argue
these conclusions using the academic vocabulary that we went over on both days prior to the
assessment. In my videos, you will see that I have my students interpret different historical
sources, particularly in video one, and make conclusions from what they have learned about,
especially in video two.]
b Describe and cite examples from the video clips of how you supported students in using
evidence from one or more sources to support interpretations or analyses and
arguments or conclusions about historical events or a social studies phenomenon.
[During video one, they must interpret historical photographs in order to make an argument
about what the people in the photo were going through. For example, from 2:05 in video one
until 4:35, I have them discuss in small groups what they think about a photo that is on the
projector. They have to interpret what they think is going on in these photos and what these
people are feeling now that they are going through the depression. They reach a conclusion
doing this as well since once I am done circling, they must say what they think is going on and
make a conclusion as to why they think this. The same is true for video two, since they are
talking about the Great Depression in a review session. Throughout the entire video, they
answer questions that I put on the white board and must interpret historical facts in order to do
so. They must also come to a conclusion about what the terms mean and how the people of the
Great Depression might have been affected. In these videos, they make lots of conclusions and
interpretations of both historical documents thorough photos as well as from their prior
knowledge. ]
5. Analyzing Teaching
Refer to examples from the video clips in your responses to the prompts.

a. What changes would you make to your instructionfor the whole class and/or for
students who need greater support or challengeto better support student learning of
the central focus (e.g., missed opportunities)?

Consider the variety of learners in your class who may require different
strategies/support (e.g., students with IEPs or 504 plans, English language learners,
struggling readers, underperforming students or those with gaps in academic
knowledge, and/or gifted students).
[For my lesson, I think I would make quite a few changes from my lesson. For one, I would add
more TAG strategies into it so that I could challenge students who are at a higher level than their
fellow students. One students in particular needs this. They are not TAG, but they have the

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 Secondary History/Social Studies
Task 2: Instruction Commentary

same needs as a TAG student. If I add these, they would do much better and not be as bored in
my class. For my ELLs, I would add more sentence frames and make them know what I expect
from them. Many of my students made some mistakes while talking to me as well in their
assessment, and I think if I add sentence frames and use them more affectively, they it will help
every student in my class. I think that when I talk to my students, I talk to them all independently,
it would be more beneficial if I prepare a few questions to ask them. This was that when they
come up, they all talk about roughly the same things. I think this will give me a better focus on
what I want them to learn and give them a bit of preparation when they come up and talk to me.
This would also help me when dealing with students who have a gap in their knowledge. If I
decide what I want them to be able to talk about right from the beginning, then they will be able
to work on what they dont know already.]
b. Why do you think these changes would improve student learning? Support your
explanation with evidence of student learning AND principles from theory and/or
research.
[I think that these changes would help my classroom a lot because they would be able to learn
more affectively. If I add more sentence frame into my lesson, then it would fall more into
sheltered instruction and the ideas put forth by Krashen. All of these will help my students be
pushed farther and help them understand what is going on. They also need the consistency, so
if I ask them the same questions, then they would be able to better prepare themselves with
what I expect them to answer. ]

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The edTPA trademarks are owned by The Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University. Use of the edTPA trademarks is
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