Department of Teacher Education & Learning Sciences

Elementary Education Program

Formal Observation Reflection

Directions: Complete the reflection questions and submit your response to your observer prior to having a post-
conference to discuss the observation. If a conference is held immediately after the observation you will submit
your responses to the observer the following day via email.

Name: Bailey Zyvith Date:11- 15-17

1. To what extent were learning outcomes appropriate and achievable to your students?
Students were able to understand and talk about the uniqueness of each other and discuss
similarities and differences.
2. How effective were your instructional strategies? What changes would you make in
your instructional approaches if you taught this lesson again? Why?
I tried to make my expectations clear to the class before the lesson and I think this helped and
made a big difference because they knew what I wanted from them.
3. Evaluate the effectiveness of your oral and written communication with students.
(Consider how well you communicated learning objectives, clarity of directions, use of standard English, quality of
questions and effectiveness of discussion techniques.)
I made sure the students understood the activity by showing them and example and having
them repeat back to me what the instructions were. I tried to make sure the students
understood why we were reading the book.
4. Evaluate the level of student engagement in your lesson . (Consider how you presented the
content/skills, the activities and assignments for students, grouping of students, and structure and pacing of the
lesson.)
The students were very eager to answer the questions that I asked throughout the story and
were very excited to create their puzzle pieces and see them come together in the classroom
puzzle.
5. How effectively did you use instructional materials, resources, and/or technology?
I used the book Where Oliver Fits and the students used paper and crayons to design their
personal puzzle piece.
6. To what extent were your assessment strategies effective? What changes would you
make in your assessment approach if you taught this lesson again? Why?
My assessment ended up being mostly oral asking the students what similarities and
differences they saw once we put the puzzle together. If I did this with an upper grade I would
have them write about but with the kindergartners at the time asking them orally was best.
7. To what extent was your feedback to students accurate, substantive, constructive,
specific, and/or timely?
While the students were working on their puzzle pieces I walked around and monitored their
progress and made sure that they were on task and following all of the requirements that they
needed to have on their puzzle piece.
8. To what extent did the classroom management and environment contribute to student
learning? (Consider your classroom procedures, your use of physical space, and the students conduct.)
Having the students come to the carpet to listen to the story got them out of their seats and
moving around. They were very attentive and listened to the story. I tried to make sure that
when they did go back to their desks to work on their puzzle pieces I wanted them to stay quiet
so that they could work hard but I think I could have done a better job of noise control in the
classroom.
9. Did you make modifications to your lesson plan during the lesson? If so, what were
they and what motivated these changes?
I followed the plan as I had written it, I dont think that I diverge from the lesson that I wanted to
teach and the students were able to understand what I wanted them to and they created their
puzzle pieces with all the requirements.
10. Was your Teaching Behavior Focus goal met?
I think I meet it I tried to give the students lots of opportunities for classroom discussions and
making sure the students were heard and understood. I think the questions that I asked I could
have elaborated on more.