Running head: INSTRUCTIONAL OBSERVATION 1

Instructional Observation and Conferences

Jonathan S. Martin

California State University San Marcos

EDAD 614, Professor Wallace

Summer 2017
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Instructional Observation and Conferences

For an instructional observation, I chose to observe a veteran Physical Education (PE)

teacher at my school site, who we shall name Mr. P. Mr. P was selected since he is a fellow PE

teacher that I am familiar with, making the observation more comfortable or natural and not feel

evaluative or intrusive. I am also familiar with PE content and standards, as a PE teacher myself.

Additionally, since we have a level of trust built, it was easier to engage in questioning regarding

the lesson and instructional strategies, plus be able to provide feedback during the pre- and post-

conferences. Lastly, I elected to observe Mr. P to gain better insight into his instructional

strategies, student engagement, and classroom management techniques. The class that I observed

was a 54 minute period that was during the second period of one school day in August. The

class was held in an empty classroom, K-4, that is utilized for indoor activities during hot days

for PE and used to teach a character education unit at the beginning of each year.

Pre-conference

In my pre-observation conference with Mr. P, I began by asking about the goals and

objective(s) of the lesson that I would be observing. Mr. P stated that his lesson derived from the

character education unit, and he would be discussing “focus and perspective.” I followed up by

asking him if the students had any prior knowledge or previous lessons that I should be aware of

or that might be referenced in the observed lesson. He stated that students already had engaged

in lessons on rules, expectations and responsibility. Also, Mr. P mentioned that as part of the

lesson he would be reviewing the main learning from the previous lesson on responsibility.

When asked about what evidence of student success Mr. P would be looking for, he

stated students were making progress toward understanding the role of having good character in

PE, as well as in school and society. Mr. P expected to visually check for understanding by
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observing students demonstrating the knowledge gained about responsibility, focus, and

perspective during the activity portion of the lesson/game. Additionally, students should be able

to verbally communicate following the activity, reflecting on experiences from the game and

how it relates to focus and perspective.

I concluded our conference by asking what instructional strategies would be utilized

during the lesson. Mr. P stated he would be using direct teaching to teach the concept of

perspective to the whole class, first through an activity where students were seated, and then he

would review what responsibility looks like and what the expectations were which led into a

group discussion on the new topic of focus and perspective. Next, he would have partners’ pair-

share in an activity that was more active; following, students would reflect in small groups and

share out to the whole group. Lastly, the teacher would engage the entire class in a

debrief/review, reflecting on their experience and identifying the main ideas of the lesson.

Lesson Summary

Mr. P had his class line up outside the door in two lines, where he explained this

formation was practice for how to line up outside locker rooms for PE. As the students entered

the classroom, Mr. P gave each student a high five and reminded students to place their backpack

along the outside wall of the classroom and to have a seat in the middle of the room so they

could see the whiteboard. When I entered the room there was a plus sign (+) written in the

middle of the whiteboard. Mr. P instructed each student to close one eye and extend their arm out

with their thumb up so it covers the “+” on the board; students were asked to focus on their

thumb, which covered the “+,” with their open eye. Once the teacher saw all students had one

eye close, arms extended, and thumbs out, he asked the students to switch eyes. Students quickly

realized the “+” had appeared, seeming as if it moved or now visible. Chatter began amongst the
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students quickly began, impressed with how they could now see the symbol when they previous

couldn’t. Mr. P called on a few students to share their experience with what occurred to the “+”

when they switched eyes. Mr. P connected this to the lesson: students would be learning about

the concept of perception and focus. The teacher connected the lesson to real-world experience

by stating how people might have different perceptions, allowing us to see some things that

others may not. During this first activity, most students were actively engaged and on-task, but

there were some students that were talking in the corner during the discussion on perception.

After discussing perception/perspective, Mr. P reviewed responsibility by drawing a box

on the board and placing the words “right, good, within rules, okay” inside the box and the words

“wrong, bad, against rules, not okay” outside the box. The teacher then led a discussion with

students on identifying why students might exhibit behaviors “outside the box” or outside of

expectations. Some student responses included: “we don’t want to listen,” “to see if that is really

the line,” and “to get attention.” Mr. P focused on the seeking attention example given by a

student, and how it is one’s responsibility to make sure we are seeking positive attention not

negative attention by acting inappropriately. Mr. P then explained that his fourth grade teacher

taught a lesson once, and Mr. P began to write what his former teacher wrote on the white board.

He wrote the multiplication facts for nines and purposely made an error in one of the

computations. While students were trying to get Mr. P’s attention regarding the mistake, he just

continued writing and ignored the students blurting out that he had solved the problem

incorrectly. Once he was complete, the teacher asked the students what the teacher was trying to

prove by writing this on the board. One student said he was teaching Math. Another said it has to

do with focus because if you don’t focus you’ll get answers wrong, even with simple tasks. Mr. P

then explained that all of those were great but that wasn’t it, until finally a student said that
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everyone focused on the negative. Mr. P confirmed and focused the discussion to how at school

and in life people are quick to point out your negatives and that many times people have a

negative perspective because it is easier. He continued stating it is more difficult to always have

a positive perspective but that should be our goal. At this point, all students were actively

listening to the lesson during this time.

Mr. P then began to discussion the idea of personal goals and how we need to be focused

on specific tasks to achieve such goals. This led to an activity/game called Partner Tag. Students

were paired up. One student was identified as the “walker” and the other was the “chaser.” Mr.

P explained that this was played just like tag but with a few exceptions. The first was students

could only walk. Secondly, students could only tag your partner, no one else, and students had to

stay inside the room (no going outside). Mr. P then demonstrated it with a student and had the

students begin playing. During this time, many students got so excited that they began to run

and jog after their partner, but all students were participating. Mr. P quickly blew his whistle and

all the students stopped, except a few. Mr. P reminded the students that the whistle meant freeze,

and he discussed that many students were not focused and not being responsible. The teacher had

the students repeat the rule of no running and staying inside only. He switched roles and told the

class to begin again. Students once again were actively participating, mostly walking with a few

still pushing the limit of jog-walking. Mr. P then blew his whistle again and this time each

student stopped with the exception of one, who had not stopped before as well, to which Mr. P

said for the student to wait outside the room. Mr. P then explained a new variation of the game

in which students had to close one eye and hold their hand like a circle around their open eye to

create “tunnel vision.” The rest of the rules were the same: walk after partner, if tagged you’re it,

spin twice, go find your partner again. Mr. P got the group moving again with this variation,
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asking the Teacher Assistant (TA) to fill in for the male student sent outside. Mr. P then stepped

outside and had some words with the student who later returned to his partner. After speaking

with the student outside, there were no further issues. Mr. P blew the whistle to have students

freeze and switch roles again; this occurred every so often, just in case a student was not able to

ever tag their partner, allowing each student to be in the various roles.

After a few rounds, Mr. P had partners find another set of partners to make a group of

four and had them sit down in a circle. He then asked the class/groups to discuss which game

was easier and why. Most groups were on task but other groups began to engage in off task

conversations. He then asked one person from each group to share out. Most groups had the

same answer, the time when “both eyes were open.” Mr. P then led a discussion on how it is

good to have goals, but if we get too focused on just that goal, then we sometimes miss the

bigger picture. He related this to PE through use of winning as the goal and losing sight of the

fact that we are in PE to also learn sportsmanship and teamwork. The teacher then applied the

discussion to larger scale situations, such as not focusing on just yourself but also the greater

community; not just your community but also our nation; and not just the nation but our world.

During the discussion students were starting to eye the clock and knew it was about time to go,

so many weren’t as engaged as in the previous discussion and many students started to slide on

the ground toward their bags as soon as the bell rang. Mr. P then released all students to their

next class.

Post-Conference

At the initiation of the post-conference, I asked Mr. P how he felt the lesson went. He

said it felt rushed but other than that, he felt it went well. I then reviewed my anecdotal notes of

the lesson. I noted for much of the lesson, most to all students were engaged; when students were
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off task, he would immediately correct their behavior. I asked about the student he sent outside

the classroom during the lesson, and if that was a typical behavior. He said it was abnormal but

that student had been off task often that week and that he simply reminded him of expectations

again and assigned him a lunch detention where the student would call his parent to explain his

behavior during class. I am familiar with procedure because it is the first step of discipline for

the PE department, which follows a reminder and a warning.

I then addressed his comment on feeling rushed and asked him to elaborate. He shared

that because of school pictures taking place during PE class during the week, he lost a full day of

instruction and he wanted to catch-up by combining the perception/perspective lesson and focus

lesson. He stated he didn’t get as in-depth as he would have preferred. He explained these are

usually separate lessons divided over the course of two days, rather than one. I added that I did

notice the pacing seemed too quick, rushing student responses and time for debrief. I also noted

students disengaged while watching the clock and gathering their backpacks near the end of the

lesson.

Next, I asked Mr. P what evidence he was using to check for understanding and that the

object was met. He shared students knew the information/met the objective based on the verbal

discussion. He added that he will truly know if students learned the lessons character education

when they begin engaging in outside PE activities by showing good sportsmanship, teamwork,

and citizenship. If they did not retain these lessons, he would address these concepts again during

the activity.

In order to progress his lesson, I asked what he thought about adding a writing

component; if used at the end of the lesson, this piece could be used as a ticket-out-the-door to

check for understanding. He stated that he prefers not incorporate writing but rather have
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students learn to communicate verbally with each other to build relationships between students,

especially for those who may not know each other. I asked if he did any writing during these

lessons, and suggested that if not, he might want to consider trying to balance some writing with

verbal communication to support improvement of writing scores, which is a school wide goal.

He agreed to disagree on that suggestion.

Finally, I thanked him for allowing me to observe his class and taking the time to meet

with me, supporting my administrative experiences. I complimented him on his instruction, class

management, and creativity. I followed that with a recommendation again to try to support the

school-wide writing goal by possibly requiring a written reflection piece at the end of the

character education unit and to slow the pacing of the lesson. I noted all students seem to truly

enjoy the physical activity of the lesson. Mr. P agreed on the enjoyment the kids had playing the

game and acknowledged his pacing was too quick. Since he didn’t mention the writing, I believe

we still agreed to disagree about the written component of the unit. I ended with another thank

you for everything he does for our school and department.

Reflection

In reflection, the pre-conference was a little awkward because we have planned many of

these lessons together the previous school year, so when I was asking what was going to be

taught during the lesson, he kept telling me “you know what I am going to teach.” I edited that

from the pre-conference because I kept reminding him to pretend that I didn’t know anything and

explain it to me. However, there was a sense of comfort because I’ve worked with him in

previous years, and even team-taught a few times with him last school year. It seemed easy to

put on an administrative-hat while observing and conferencing, and as the new Department Lead

this school year, it is one of my tasks to support the school-wide goals. I knew he didn’t support
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writing in his curriculum, so I used the opportunity to embed suggestions to advance his lesson

and the school. Incorporating writing has been a part of our department’s conversations since the

start of the school year. I will model writing in my lessons and continue to encourage my entire

department with seeking ways to incorporate writing across our curriculum as Department Lead.

Through this assignment, I learned my strengths was in my ability to make my colleagues

feel comfortable and be none threatening in my demeanor. I also was able to give suggestions

that I felt would better our school and increase student outcomes. I wasn’t worries about Mr. P

getting upset because I was direct and would frame it with compliments. In the future, I need to

do a better job of capturing more detailed notes on specific student behaviors and student

responses. I found myself, much like one of the students, looking at and listening to the

instructor when I need to be more aware of the students’ behaviors and responses. Furthermore,

I will have to remain silent during the lesson, not correcting students, allowing the teacher to

correct behaviors. Overall, this was a great learning experience. I plan to try to view at least one

lesson this year of each of my other PE teachers, since I learn a lot about them and me during

observations. This isn’t a typical practice for our department, but one that I hope to create as a

norm in future years to improve each of our professional practice.