Ed Psych 3502 2015

By: Laurel N. Section PQR

Assignment #3
Mini Unit Plan Defense for Ed Psych
Value: 20
How to Submit
From your website mini unit defense plan, you will need to complete this section for EdPsych
and submit your url into Moodle.
For this assignment, you now need to view your lesson plans from the Ed Psych perspective. Review a
CHOSEN LESSON plan analyzing the consideration given to knowledge and skills you have gained in
3502 in the broad areas of child development, learning theories, motivation and classroom structure and
climate. To guide your response give thought to the following.
1. What learning theory concepts are evident/incorporated in this plan? Why?
2. Did I consider the development of a child within the lesson? How?
3. Does my lesson have consideration for motivation of a wide range of learners? Explain.
4. Have I considered classroom structure and climate and potential variables that may derail the
lesson? Consider rules, routines, movement within the class, etc.
Ensure that you fully defend each salient point you wish to bring out.

Rationale: Ed Psychology Defense

Scaffolding Lesson Plans
Lesson Selected: Lesson Two (Field Trip Lesson)
Social Studies, Grade 6
Lesson Focus: Voting and Voter Registration
Description
Lesson
Overview
:

Lesson Outcome:
Grade 6 Social Studies
students will learn about
voting, voter registration
and voter behaviour.
Lesson Description:
Students will attend at
University of Lethbridge
campus, on a field trip.
While there, they will
interview visitors to voting
information booths, to ask
them questions related to
voter registration and

Connections to Learning Theories &

Demonstration of Attention to a Classroom
Structure and Climate
-

Teacher will work to keep students within

the zone of proximal development,
by keeping them feeling safe and secure,
while also stretching and growing, as
they interview adult visitors to voting
information booths in a non-classroom
environment. They will conduct these
interviews by using voting related
concepts they have learned during
previous classes.

Teacher will recognize that per Erik

Eriksons eight stages of
psychosocial development, these 11

voting behaviour.

Instructio
nal
Processe
s

Description of what
teacher is doing:
Attending on field trip with
students, assisting them to
interview visitors to the
voting information booths,
and making anecdotal
records related to her
observations of students.

year-old students are at an age at which

they are dealing with the Industry vs.
Inferiority struggle. Students wish to
learn new skills, or risk a feeling of
inferiority, failure, or incompetence. In
light of this, teacher will work to
reassure students that she, the E.A.s,
and the parent volunteers are there to
support them, and that simply by
participating, they are successful.
Per Minister of Educations Knowledge,
Skills, and Attributes (KSAs) for teachers
seeking interim teaching certification,
teachers must know the following:
-

All students are able to learn, albeit at

different rates and in different ways (KSA
5);

Students have the need for physical,

social, cultural, and psychological
security (KSA 7);

It is important to respect students

human dignity (KSA 8); and

There are many approaches to teaching

and learning (KSA 9).

In light of these KSAs, while at the field trip

location the teacher ensures that:
Students who preferred to use the iMovie
program to record their interview notes
were able to do so;
Students were told prior to, and during,
the field trip that multiple adults would
be present to support them during the
field trip;
The teacher, two E.A.s, and four parent
volunteers were present, visible, and
available to assist the students
throughout the field trip. This included
adults helping students to ask interview
questions of visitors to the voting
information booths, and to record their
answers; and

The adults on the field trip had cell

phones, first aid kits, and an
anaphylactic shock pen with them, all to
assist the students to be safe and
physically and emotionally well, all of
which the students could see.
As the psychologist Abraham Maslow
explained, students have a hierarchy of
needs, one that involves the need for
physical safety and security. This is further
reason for the teacher to ensure that her
students are, and feel, physically safe and
secure while on the field trip.
Description of what
students are doing:

Students are participating

in the field trip, asking
questions of voting
information booth visitors
and recording their
answers for future use, in
the classroom.

Per the scaffolding teaching

technique, the teacher ensures that
students learning during each lesson or
task builds on what was learned during
the last lesson or task.
In the case of this mini unit, this Lesson
Two field trip was preceded by deliberate
scaffolding by the teacher during Lesson
One: During Lesson One, the teacher
taught the students concepts and
vocabulary words related to voting,
showed the students pictures of the
University of Lethbridge campus, led the
students in a discussion about the
campus, and reassured students that
she and other adults they knew would be
with them during their field trip
interviews. She did all of this in an
attempt to help students feel
comfortable with what was to come
during the Lesson Two field trip to
scaffold between Lesson One and
Lesson Two.

Note re classroom management and

climate: This field trip lesson does not
occur within the teachers classroom.
However the teacher is still able to help
students to feel comfortable, secure, and
engaged, by using the techniques
outlined in this document.

Sequence of key
questions:
What is the role of the voting
information booth
volunteers?
What is the purpose of the
voting information booths?
What were the answers of
voting information booth
visitors, to the questions
students posed to them
during our field trip last
class?

Evidence of Lesson
Components (opening,
closing, content, timeline)
This field trip lesson was
2.5 hours long.

Per the constructivist learning theory,

as developed by thinkers such as Piaget
and Vygotsky, emphasis is played on the
active role of a learner within her learning.
It views learners as active participants in
their learning, and views social interaction
as vital to learners ability to construct
knowledge.
In the case of this field trip lesson, the
teacher is actively using the constructivist
theory to help her students learn. She is
doing so by involving them in a hands on,
out of school experience on a university
campus in which they are interviewing
adults who visit a voting information booth.
This moves students outside of their usual
comfort zone, causing them to be actively
engaged in social interaction with booth
visitors, as they interview them. The teacher
knows that by having students participate in
this activity, they will learn and grown more
quickly than if they had remained within the
classroom.
The teacher reserved a significant, 2.5 hour
long chunk of time for this field trip in order
to ensure that she had enough time for
thorough and reassuring openings and
closings for her students, to ensure that
no one felt rushed or anxious. She also
made sure to set aside sufficient time for
the body of the field trip lesson, which
involved students interviews of voting
information booth visitors, on campus.
During her support of students at the field
trip location, the teacher worked to fade
into the background, once she saw that her
students were doing alright and interviewing
information booth visitors without a
problem. By doing so she helped students
to remain within their zone of proximal
development and, because of that, continue
to stretch, learn, and grow.
The teacher also remains calm, engaged,
and happy at all times during the field trip.
She does this because she understands that
per the social learning theory of

psychologist Albert Bandura, her

students will be learning vicariously, or
observationally, as they observe the
teachers behaviour. The teacher therefore
models for the students that being on this
field trip and interviewing strangers who
visit the voting information booths is an
engaging, interesting, and acceptable thing
to be doing.

RUBRIC
20

19

18

17

Excellent

Proficient

Adequate

Limited *

Planning
demonstrates a
skillful
approach to
enacting child
development,
learning theories
& motivation.

Planning
demonstrates a
systematic
approach to
enacting child
development,
learning theories
& motivation.

Planning
demonstrates a
simplistic
approach to
enacting child
development,
learning
theories &
motivation.

Planning
demonstrates a
haphazard
approach to
enacting child
development,
learning
theories &
motivation.

Overview of
planning
decisions
demonstrates a
Attention to
purposeful
Classroom
focus on
Structure and
establishing and
Climate
maintaining an
effective
classroom
structure and
climate.

Overview of
planning
decisions
demonstrates a
focus on
establishing and
maintaining an
effective
classroom
structure and
climate.

Overview of
planning
decisions
demonstrates
an appropriate
focus on
establishing and
maintaining an
effective
classroom
structure and
climate.

Overview of
planning
decisions
demonstrates
limited focus
on establishing
and maintaining
an effective
classroom
structure and
climate.

Level
Criteria

Insuffici
ent /
Blank *

ED 3502 Components

Connections
to Learning
Theories

No score is
awarded
because
there is
insufficient
evidence
of course
objectives.