EDUC 2220- Educational Technology Lesson Plan

Personal Experience Narratives

Alexa Jackson
Second Grade English Language Arts- Writing

Common Core Standards:

Writing
Production and distribution of Writing
W. 2.6. With guidance and support from adults, use a variety of digital tools to produce and
publish writing, including in collaboration with peers.
Content Statement Elaboration:
Students at this age are writing more independently and have begun to understand that words
are powerful ways to express themselves. They begin to draw their messages less as their
ability to work with text increases. As students learn the craft of writing, they also must
understand the pieces of the Production and Distribution of Writing. Peer editing can begin
at this level. Student writers are capable of providing editing and revision feedback as long as
this has been focused or targeted on specific writing areas.
In the next grade band, students are expected to produce texts that reflect planning,
organization, and evidence of revision and editing. In addition, students are expected to use
appropriate technologies to enhance their messages further.
Enduring Understanding
Writers share information, opinions and ideas through multiple ways and texts. Knowledge of
different genres supports students understanding and writing of text and structures. This allows
them to communicate in appropriate and meaningful ways to their audience to achieve their
intended purpose.
Speaking and Listening
Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas
SL. 2.4. Tell a story or recount an experience with appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive
details, speaking audibly in coherent sentences.
Content Statement Elaboration:
Children develop their abilities to Present their Knowledge and Ideas as their speaking and
listening skills advance. Oral communication (speaking and listening) is a critical part of the
classroom because of its role in social interaction as well as developing and presenting
knowledge. As students develop listening skills, participate in discussions and develop topicrelated questions, they develop the ability to understand a perspective other than their own,
elaborate or expand explanations given by someone else and use evidence-based logic to
explain their ideas or defend points. Oral presentations (by peers, teachers, experts) provide

students with the opportunity to construct meaning from what they have seen and heard, and
to convey that meaning to others.
In the next grade band, students are expected to make oral presentations that include
multimedia components that enhance their topic, and begin to develop an understanding of
formal and informal English and the appropriate purposes and audiences in which each can be
used.
SL. 2.5. Create audio recordings of stories or poems; add drawings or other visual displays to
stories or recounts of experiences when appropriate to clarify ideas, thoughts, and feelings.
Enduring Understanding
Proficient speakers make deliberate choices regarding language, content and media to capture
and maintain the audience in order to convey their message. They are careful to base their
presentations on facts and make sure that everyone in their audience can hear them.
Write narratives in which they recount a well-elaborated event or short sequence of events,
include details to describe actions, thoughts, and feelings, use temporal words to signal event
order, and provide a sense of closure.
Language
Conventions of Standard English
L. 2.1. Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English grammar and usage when
writing or speaking.
a. Form and use frequently occurring irregular plural nouns (e.g. feet, children, teeth,
mice, fish).
b. Use reflexive pronouns (e.g. myself, ourselves)
L. 2.2. Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English capitalization,
punctuation, and spelling when writing
c. Use an apostrophe to form contractions and frequently occurring possessives
Language: Conventions of Standard English
L.2.2.
Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English capitalization, punctuation, and
spelling when writing.
a. Capitalize holidays, product names, and geographic names.
b. Use commas in greetings and closings of letters.
c. Use an apostrophe to form contractions and frequently occurring possessives.
d. Generalize learned spelling patterns when writing words (e.g., cage - badge; boy boil).
e. Consult reference materials, including beginning dictionaries, as needed to check and
correct spellings.
English Language Arts Curriculum Model
Content Statement Elaboration:
Writers and speakers use the rules and Conventions of Standard English, parts of speech,
sentence structure, mechanics and spelling to communicate effectively. These conventions are
learned and applied within the contexts of reading, writing, speaking and listening. As writing
competency increases, young writers begin to understand the importance of the audience for
whom they are composing text. Teacher modeling of the conventions of grammar and
punctuation is critical. Using think alouds as they compose, teachers provide students with the

inner dialogue that occurs during the composition process. Creating an environment that
supports word learning and encourages word play is critical.
In the next grade band, students focus on more complex grammatical constructions (such as
abstractions and complex sentences) and punctuation (quotation marks, underlining, commas)
to communicate text.
Knowledge of Language
L. 2.3. Use knowledge of language and its conventions when writing, speaking, reading or
listening

Lesson Summary:
Students will further develop and expand their writing and grammatical (specifically
irregular plural nouns, reflexive pronouns and exclamatory) skills by recounting a
favorite experience from their own lives about a special vacation adventure or holiday
break memory and creating a personal narrative. A trip to the ocean or a cruise, a
camping trip in the mountains, baking Christmas cookies and caroling, and learning how
to ski are some example topics for their narratives. The class will put all of their writing
skills to use by partaking in creative writing technology activities. Students will develop
a hand-written rough draft, compose a typed final draft on Microsoft Word, partake in
peer editing, and share their story using the VoiceThread digital tool as well as a formal
oral presentation in front of their peers.
Estimated Duration:
The writing lesson and activities will take place over the course of 4 days (M, T, W, R)
during the 50-minute writing block part of our daily schedule. There will also be two 20minute blocks (M, T) dedicated to grammar study and application. (240 minutes total)
Commentary:
A challenge I anticipate students to encounter is forming descriptive details in their
narratives. I want students to go beyond just writing a monotonous paragraph about
how their family went to the beach per say, but rather share details about specific
family bonding experiences from the trip, funny moments, vivid environmental
descriptions to help the reader/listener visualize the setting, delicious meals from
restaurants, sites and tourist attractions they saw, etc. Writer blocks may occur for
some students, so I will foster an environment for creative and focused thinking as well
as provide necessary academic tools ranging from thesauruses to thought
provoking/generating web applications. I will encourage students to add diversity to
their sentence structure as much as possible too. I will get students hooked on the
lesson by reading two example narratives each about a page long. Details are found in
the instructional procedures below.
*Technology incorporations are highlighted in bright lavender throughout this document
Instructional Procedures:
Day 1 Writing Block

Hook /Introductory Activity (15 minutes)

Students will listen to two exemplar personal narratives read aloud by me. The first one
will be dry and repetitive with dull vocabulary and no expressive punctuation. The
second one will be exciting and thrilling full of exclamatory moments and rich detail. I
will have students vote on which one was more entertaining and fascinating to listen to
using the Poll Everywhere web application on their individual/personal MacBook Pros
provided by the school district they have at their desks, ultimately showing how the
majority of people prefer writing styles like demonstrated in the second piece in the
form of a bar graph. The results will be generated, synced and displayed on the Smart
Board showing feedback in real time. The purpose is to show students how crucial it is
to captivate the reader or listener by using creative and descriptive writing skills and
grammatical functions.
https://www.polleverywhere.com
Short pre-assessment activity aimed to activate creative writing skills
(benefiting the student) and provide a referencing point for teacher (20
minutes)
Students will be utilizing the Story Bird Artful Story Telling technology tool. Instruct
students to go to Storybird.com on their laptops. The sites home page will be up on the
Smart Board and I will give them a brief walk through of the site and what can be done
with it. Students will select a creative artistic image to help trigger a special event or
memory for their narrative and begin writing whatever comes to their mind. If none of
the immediate images appeal to them, they can use the search engine on the site to
find an illustration/piece of art that pertains to an idea they already have in mind e.g.
the beach, Christmas Eve, Skiing. About 5-10 sentences are expected.
https://storybird.com
Foundational Writing Skills Portion (15 minutes)
Using the Smart Board, model to students how to form diverse sentence structure and
add detail. Explain to them the importance of using rich language and descriptive detail
to help the reader or listener create a visual image in their mind and appeal to their
emotions. If you are writing about a fun, relaxing, memorable experience, you want the
reader/listener to feel that and understand as much as possible. Example: Turn basic
wordage and structure such as this My favorite part was playing in the sand. I liked the
beach. into I enjoyed building a huge sand castle with my brother Michael. We built a
mote around the castle and filled it with the salt water from the bright blue ocean.
Following that we walked down the shore. I adore beach vacations in Florida with my
loving family. Brainstorm several more ideas on the board with the class. Be sure to
incorporate at least three different student narrative ideas for this e.g. a student who
wishes to write about a trip to Disney World, a snowboarding trip to Mad River, sailing
on a cruise ship, building a snowman, scuba diving, etc. Also point out the importance
of using transition words and brainstorm some of those. Save and share the document
with students via Google drive/Google docs, assuming every student already has their
account set up and activated, so they can refer to it. Also provide printed copies for

those who wish to use them. Spend a couple minutes showing students how to utilize
dictionary.com and the thesaurus application on the site.
Day 1 Grammar Block (20 minutes)
Reflexive Pronouns
Administer the 10-question pre-assessment to the whole class which is found in the PreAssessment section below. Students are to work independently with no help from
outside resources.
Introduce the lesson by reviewing the basic pronouns. Call 2 students up to the Smart to
write short example sentences e.g. He was proud. Have students write two examples
in their grammar journals. Explain the definition of a reflexive pronoun in the most basic
manner. A reflexive pronoun is used when the subject in a sentence and an object in a
sentence are the same person. Modify the 2 examples e.g. He was proud of himself.
Make a t-chart of the pronouns and their reflexives.
Two activities will be used from a Teacher-Pay-Teacher download I purchased titled
Reflexive Pronouns- Activities for the Second Grade Common Core. What they do not
finish turns into homework for the night. Have them log it in their planners. Screen
shots of the activities entail are below.

Review answers using the SmartBoard and/or ELMO. Emphasize the ending of the word
changed for many of these lves. I believe these two activities are perfect for students
to practice using reflexives and understanding how they fit into context. Students will
be informed that they are required to incorporate at least 2 reflexive pronouns into

their narratives.
Day 2 Writing Block
Warm-Up (15 minutes)
Provide students with the following graphic organizer to start generating ideas for their
rough drafts, focusing on main points including setting, who was involved, sequential
events and coordinating details.
http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/sites/default/files/posts/u133/pdfs/personal_narrativ
e_graphic_organizer_snapshot.pdf
Rough Drafts (25 minutes)
Students are to generate hand written rough drafts referencing their graphic organizers.
I will monitor students work and progress by visiting each student at their desks and
quickly revising their work. During this time I will also have a composited visual display
of both irregular plural nouns and reflexive pronouns on the Smart Board for students to
refer to while writing.
Introduction to Peer Editing (10 minutes)
Students will be strategically assigned partners to trade narratives with to peer review.
This remaining time of the block will be dedicated to instructing students what to look
for while peer editing. Circling grammatical errors, suggesting words that could be
substituted for richer language, checking for proper capitalization of proper nouns,
appropriate grammar usage particularly of reflexive pronouns and irregular plural
nouns. Display and model an example using the ELMO.
Day 2 Grammar Block (20 minutes)
Spend 5 minutes reviewing reflexive pronouns. The remaining time will be spent
teaching irregular plural nouns. There is no rhyme or reason to these, so instruction will
best take place in a drill and practice manner. Using virtual flashcards to study with
the class as a group incorporates technology. Then have students break off into partners
and use iPads to review the flash cards with each other. Each iPad will need to already
have the web application ready to go and students will be given login information for
the site. Students are required to incorporate at least 1 irregular plural noun into their
narrative, the easiest being men or people.
https://www.studyblue.com/online-flashcards
Examples to be used in the creation of flashcards:

Day 3 Writing Block

Peer Editing (20 minutes)
Very briefly review major points from Tuesdays peer editing lesson. Send students off to
work with their partners and peer edit and conference with each other.
Final Draft Composure (30minutes)
Students will type their final drafts using Microsoft Word, following all of the standard
MLA rules e.g. 12 point font, double spacing, legible font style, proper margins, etc.
Microsoft Word is something they will frequently use to write papers for the rest of their
academic lives, so it is best for them to get familiar and experience with the tool at an
early grade level. They are to finish their final drafts for homework as they are allowed
to take their personal laptops home with them for use.
Day 4 Writing Block
Narrative Presenations
Printed final drafts are due within the first 5 minutes of class, and most should already
have them printed from home or taken care of it in the morning. Students will be
randomly selected to read aloud their narratives for the rest of the majority of this
block. They will be assessed on how well they speak with clarity and expression for this
oral presentation. Formal grading of their content will take place at a later time. The
readers will select two students for commentary or questioning. Each student will make
at least two bullet points for the presenter including one critique and one compliment.
These will be recorded on notecards and complied so each student can review them at a
later time and use them to help create an improved virtual presentation. With the last
10 minutes of class students are to open their laptops and follow along as they are
introduced to VoiceThread. They will be utilizing this technology tool in their follow up
homework assignment. Description is in the Homework section below.

Pre-Assessment:

The creative writing pre-assessment using StoryBird described earlier will show
how well students form and produce complete sentences with detail, utilize
punctuation such as exclamation points, and if they use reflexive pronouns or
irregular plural nouns at all in their writing. Scoring is teacher judgment although
they should track grammar factors.

10 question grammar pre-assessment and summative assessment

Write the plural form of the word and use it in a sentence (irregular plural nouns)
Child- Children *The children swam in the pool.
Fish- fish *We caught fish from the ocean.
Foot- feet *My sister and I buried our feet in the sand.
Man- men *The men set up the campfire.

Person- *People The people applauded the singer.

Write the reflexive form of the following pronouns

I- Myself

She- Herself

He- Himself

We- Ourselves

They- Themselves

Score as a percentage.
Post-Assessment:
The post assessment is broken down into four parts:
1. Administer the same 10=question assessment as the Pre-Assessment. Compare
percentage scores tracking growth.
2. Post-assessment pertaining to the usage of grammatical content would be the
grading and evaluation of their final personal narratives. The teacher will score 1 point
for every correctly used irregular plural noun and reflexive pronoun.
3. Analyze the writing style and composition of their final drafts. Is there rich detail
present? Are unique thoughts expressed? Ultimately this assessment is in the form of
teacher judgments.
Performance assessment takes place on their oral presentation and VideoThread. If
students participate, they pass, but a rating scale of 1-10 applies and much assessment
takes place in the form of personalized comments and feedback. Approximately 5-7
feedback points should be made for each student and typed out and shared via email to
the student as well as a printed copy.

Differentiated Instructional Support

Gifted students would be instructed to incorporate dialogue into their narratives.

This would entail them reaching a higher level of creative thinking and writing and
utilizing more challenging punctuation such as quotation marks and commas to
start and end dialogue. These students would also be required to write longer
pieces of work.

Gifted students could be assigned multiple peer editing assignments and given
opportunities to peer review with struggling students during silent reading time,
recess, or first thing in the morning.

I would provide flash cards for students who are struggling to use in class and
take home of images of singular and irregular plural nouns and have students
verbally identify which is which e.g. one card would be a picture of 1 mouse and
another card would be a visual of 3 mice.

For students who are struggling with creating rich detail and vocabulary
expansion for their narratives, they could be assisted in making a word web to

expand their stories. For example students could put happy or fun in the center of
their web and then use a thesaurus (virtual or hard copy) to find synonyms for the
branches e.g. exuberant, joyful, blissful, pleased, overjoyed. This is geared
towards students who complex and flexible vocabulary does not come natural to.

Struggling students would be required to write shorter length narratives, focusing

their time on creating quality sentences rather than striving for a certain page or
paragraph number.

Extension
This web application may be used to help students with future creative writing
endeavors and provoking writing ideas and content:
http://www.creativity-portal.com/prompts/imagination.prompt.html
Wordle Beautiful Word Clouds is a fun end of the lesson or extension activity students
will enjoy seeing a visual display of their frequently used vocabulary in from their
narratives.
http://www.wordle.net

Homework Options and Home Connections

Students will create a VoiceThread in which they share their narrative and incorporate
at least two visuals (images or artifacts) to support their story line. For example, they
may use their webcam to record their actual physical selves presenting their narratives
and hold up materials such as seashells or souvenir. Another option is to not use their
webcam but upload photos pertaining to their stories and do a voice over where they
record themselves. The point of this is for students to practice reading and speaking
with expression and emotion, acknowledging all punctuation, to convey a message to
the listener. Parents will be sent an email and letter home explaining the weeklong
lesson and its components on Monday. They will be encouraged to engage with their
students while they are prepping for their VoiceThread and provide brief critiques and
positive feedback. They may assist with the visual displays. Homework assignments for
the following week will involve students viewing at least 8 of their classmates
VideoThreads and leaving constructive feedback.

Interdisciplinary Connections
Art cross-curricular connection
The art teacher could chose an art medium or aesthetic such as watercolors, oil pastels,
or sketch pencils for students to create a piece or work depicting their personal

narratives. Symbolism could be taught and students could be required to create a

symbol representing their overall topic or theme found in their narratives.
Social Studies Cross Curricular
Students could chose a time frame from history e.g. Civil War time period, The Dark
Ages, WWI, etc. and create a version of their narrative matching that time period. They
would take into consideration the social and political climate of the time period they
have chosen for their narrative take place in and create details derived from their story
but incorporating historical facts.
Materials and Resources:

For teachers

Class set of MacBook Pro Laptops/iPads

SmartBoard
ELMO
Poll Everywhere technology tool and account
StoryBird web application and account
Wordle
VoiceThread web application and account
Teacher Pay Teachers account

For students

MacBook Pro laptop/iPads

Pollster technology tool and account
StoryBird web application and account
Wordle
VoiceThread
Writing/grammar journals

Key Vocabulary
Irregular Plural Nouns
Personal narrative
Reflexive Pronouns

Exclamatory text and expression

Transition words
Descriptive detail/rich language

Additional Notes

There is no doubt we are living in the Information Era and Educational technology
tools are flourishing. I believe it is important for teachers to take the initiative to
stay up to date and utilize tools relevant to the curriculum. Incorporating
technology to benefit students and strike their interest is important, however I
believe that traditional, paper-pencil writing skills should be instilled. Being able to
generate original thoughts and transcribe them with nothing but ones own
brainpower is tremendously important. Knowing how to actually write is a skill
that should not be lost or swept under the rug despite the in the use of keyboards,
typing and virtual messaging. Hence why I required students to create handwritten rough drafts.

Time restraints may be an issue according to this guideline, so work time may be
necessary for students perhaps during extension time or if the class schedule has
a study hall part of the day.