Kaleigh Warner

Personal Narrative
7th Grade ELA
 Table of Contents
Contextual Factors Analysis 1-17
Overview 18-21
Learning Goals 22-23
Assessment Plan 24-25
Design for Instruction
Lesson One
Lesson Two
Lesson Three
Lesson Four
Lesson Five
Lesson Six
Lesson Seven
Instructional Decision Making
Analysis of Student Learning
Reflection and Self-Evaluation
 Teacher Work Sample Overview

This teacher work sample showcases a series of seven narrative lessons taught

to a group of 7th grade ELA students. These lessons encompass a multitude of

activities through the start of a personal narrative unit. Students at the beginning of

the work sample are striving to generate ideas, in the middle they are focusing on

organizing and formatting their narrative with technology, and at the end they are

working towards completing a first draft of their personal narratives with specific

requirements. Students will be choosing a story that has a distinct theme and has truly

happened to them in which they have come out on the other side having learned a

new lesson, experienced a change, or grown in mindset. After revisions and editing of

their written work, students will create a digital narrative. This unit takes place over

four weeks; however, the work sample only covers seven days in the unit.
 October 2019
Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednes Thursday Friday Saturday
1 2 day 3 4 5

6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Pre-Unit Writing Pre-Unit Writing
Activity Activity #2
(Pre- (Pre-
Assessment) Assessment)

13 14 15 16 17 18 19
Indigenous
People’s
Day

20 21 22 23 24 25 26
Generating Generating Generating No B core Theme
Ideas: Self- Ideas: Drawing a Ideas: Vocabulary
Assessment and Map and Writing Shoes and Lesson
Compass Challenge #3 Writing
Partners Challenge #4

27 28 29 30 31 1 Nov 2
Personal Drafting: Vocabulary No B core Quiz, Peer
Narrative Writing Practice Feedback, and
Mentor Text Workshop and Writer’s
Self-Assessment Workshop

3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Personal
Narrative
Draft Due
(Summative)
 My Contextual Factors Analysis informed much of my decision making and planning for the

lessons I taught. After learning more about my selected group of students, I became aware that out

of 22 students 10 are identified as needing accommodations or modifications from IEPs or 504s and

3 students are enrolled in the gifted and talented program. This data meant that my lessons need to

be organized, structured, and heavily scaffolded to be accessible to all my students. A routine for

writing and assessing was manufactured to support all students, where I would only need to teach a

structure once and then proceed to reinforce the structure throughout the unit. Adding too many

new structures for this group of students would make the writing process more difficult and less

focused. I considered data from the multiple intelligence survey I conducted. This data informed me

that I needed to include many visuals in lessons to connect meaning and minimize the variety of

noise produced in the room in order to have effective writing times.

 Teacher Work Sample:
Goals
Goal 1: Students will be able to generate many ideas on a topic through the writing process.
Standard: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.7.5
With some guidance and support from peers and adults, develop and strengthen writing as needed by
planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach, focusing on how well purpose and
audience have been addressed. (Editing for conventions should demonstrate command of Language
standards 1-3 up to and including grade 7 here.)
Supporting Lesson Learning Target
Lesson One I can generate many ideas and write at least a
full page of writing.
Lesson Two I can generate many ideas and write at least a
full page of writing.
Lesson Three I can generate many ideas and write at least a
full page of writing.

Goal 2: Students will be able to organize and draft a personal anecdote.

Standard: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.7.5
With some guidance and support from peers and adults, develop and strengthen writing as
needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach, focusing on how well
purpose and audience have been addressed. (Editing for conventions should demonstrate
command of Language standards 1-3 up to and including grade 7 here.)

Supporting Lesson Learning Target

Lesson Five I can analyze a mentor text and use it to draft
my personal narrative.
Lesson Six I can organize my personal narrative anecdote
into a distinct beginning, middle, and end.
 Goal 3: Students will be able to identify and appropriately use new vocabulary words.
Standard: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.7.6
Acquire and use accurately grade-appropriate general academic and domain-specific words and
phrases; gather vocabulary knowledge when considering a word or phrase important to
comprehension or expression.

Supporting Lesson Learning Target

Lesson Four I can write specific sentences and examples
showing word meanings.

Goal 4: Students will be able to peer revise their drafts to strengthen their writing.
Standard: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.7.5
With some guidance and support from peers and adults, develop and strengthen writing as
needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach, focusing on how well
purpose and audience have been addressed. (Editing for conventions should demonstrate
command of Language standards 1-3 up to and including grade 7 here.)

Supporting Lesson Learning Target

Lesson Seven I can work with a peer to revise and edit my
personal narrative draft.

Rationale of Goals
These four goals are appropriate for my students because they are directly taken from 7th grade
Common Core State Standards in writing and vocabulary. By the end of the unit students will
produce a narrative for their writing standard that demonstrates their proficiency. Students will also
be taking a test on vocabulary words to demonstrate their understanding of the word through
sentences and in real world situations. Students start this unit under the first stages of Bloom’s
taxonomy through recognizing, describing, and understanding content in narrative writing. As they
complete the unit, they will demonstrate their mastery of narrative writing through creation of their
own product.
 Assessment Plan
Lesson Goal Assessment
1 1 Self-Assessment, Circulating the Room, Asking for Clarifying Questions, Turn
and Talk
2 1 Review, Circulating the Room, Turn and Talk

3 1 Review, Asking for Clarifying Questions, Generating Ideas Assessment, Self-

Assessment, Circulating the Room
4 3 Circulating the Room, Thumbs Up

5 2 Whip Around, Fist to Five, Circulating the Room

6 2 Turn and Talk, Asking for Clarifying Questions, Circulating the Room, Self-
Assessment, Organizing and Drafting Assessment
7 3,4 Vocabulary Homework, Vocabulary Summative Quiz, Thumbs Up, Peer
Feedback, Circulating the Room, Check-In
 Tool Assessment Scoring/Feedback
Type
Long Write Pre-Assessment Students were scored on a 1-4 proficiency rubric scale for their
ability to generate ideas.
Self-Assessing w/ Formative/Self- Students, using an attached rubric on a scale of 1-4, assess
Rubric Assessment themselves for immediate feedback on their work and progress.
Circulating the Formative Students are individually, and as a collective, monitored for
Room verbal and non-verbal feedback.
Asking for Formative Students are given a time after lecture to ask clarification
Clarifying questions in order to gain better understanding of directions,
Questions instructions, or processes. Immediate feedback.
Turn and Talk Formative Students speak with one another while I am able to gauge
where they are at in their writing process/generating ideas.
Review Formative A check-in to review how much students retained from the
previous class—provides immediate feedback.
Peer Feedback Formative Students, using the same rubric on the scale of 1-4 from their
self-assessment, will give peers immediate feedback on their
writing.
Thumbs Up Formative Students’ feedback on comprehension from direct instruction.
Whip Around Formative Students give immediate feedback on the progress of their
writing/generating ideas.
Fist to Five Formative Students’ feedback on comprehension from direct instruction.
Homework Formative Homework is graded on a 1-4 scale for HOWLs but is formative
feedback for me on their comprehension.
Vocabulary Quiz Summative Students were scored on a 1-4 proficiency scale on standard
L.7.6.
Individual Check- Formative As students work independently, I am checking in with them to
In probe deeper thinking.
Personal Summative Students are scored on a 1-4 proficiency scale with the same
Narrative Draft rubric they have been self-assessing with relating to standard
W.7.5.
 PRE-ASSESSMENT
For students’ pre-assessment they were asked, two separate
times, to free write for 10 minutes about a given prompt.
This pre-assessment demonstrated students’ ability, or lack
Student Score
thereof, to generate ideas—a skill they needed to progress
throughout the rest of the unit and part of standard W.7.5. I
1 would note that this standard is one they have previously
2 been assessed on in 6th grade; however, students’ ability to
3 generate ideas fluctuates over summer and into the next
school year. Students were also given no rubric or
4 guidelines to follow while they wrote which allowed me to
5 look at their writing and assess what stage they were at in
6 understanding of narrative writing and narrative
techniques.
7
8
9
10
Rubric Criteria for Standard W.7.5:

11 Developing (1): My writing was not on topic or was less than half a
12 page.

13
Approaching (2): I answered the prompt, staying on topic, but
14 need more words to develop an answer. I wrote between a half page
15 and full page.

16 Meeting (3): I wrote with the goal of getting a lot of ideas and
17 words about the topic on the page, not necessarily the very best
words (yet!) For each prompt, I wrote a page or more.
18
19 Exceeding (4): I am independently able to do all listed under "3," I
20 also did one or more of the following: developed more than one idea
connected with the prompt, wrote more than one page, deepened or
21 extended the prompt by connecting it to a theme, lesson, or another
22 idea that is still on the topic.
Student Lesson One Lesson Two Lesson Three Lesson Four Lesson Five Lesson Six Lesson Seven
(Student Self- (Generating (Generating (Vocabulary (Drafting and (Drafting and (Vocabulary
Assessment) Ideas, Map) Ideas, Shoe) Sheet) Organizing, Organizing, Quiz)
Graphic Document) GOAL FOUR,
GOAL ONE GOAL ONE GOAL ONE GOAL THREE Organizers) GOAL THREE
GOAL TWO GOAL TWO

1 2+ 2+
2 missing 2+
3 2+
4
5 missing
6 2+
7 2+ 2+
8 2+ ABSENT
9 missing
10 2+ 2+
11 missing 2+
12 missing
13 2+ ABSENT
14 2+
15 2+ 2+
16 ABSENT
17 missing
18 ABSENT 2+ 2+ 2+
19 3+
20 2+ 3+ ABSENT
21 2+ 2+
22 ABSENT
 SUMMATIVE ASSESSMENT

Student Score
1
2
3
4 Rubric Criteria for Standard W.7.5:
5
Developing (1): I wrote a story that is not about me. My narrative
6 does not yet develop an idea or theme.
7
8
Approaching (2): I wrote a true story about me that includes
9 realistic people, tension or conflict, and change. My narrative does
not yet develop an idea or theme.
10
11 2+
12 Meeting (3): I wrote a true story about me that includes realistic
people, tension or conflict, and change. My narrative develops an
13
idea or theme.
14
15
Exceeding (4): I am independently able to do all listed under "3," I
16
also did one or more of the following: Commented on a social issue
17 or teach a lesson, modified time in purposeful ways to bring out the
meaning of my story and affect my audience, or included character
18 flaws and strengths to convey complexity.
19
20
21
22
 Instructional Decision Making
Examples of Modifying Instruction

1. In lesson one many students did not complete their self-assessment of their ability to
generate ideas. This let me know that students were affected by one, or many, of these
options: not enough time, lack of interest due to misunderstanding or no connection made,
or class distraction. Because I believe self-reflecting is important for students taking
responsibility for their work, I knew that I would need to adjust the procedures for filling
out these worksheets to make ensure that all students are participating. Part of standard
W.7.5 includes planning for writing and reflecting/making goals is just that. When students
are able to reflect on the work they are doing with generating ideas better arms them to
identify where they need improvement in writing – and ultimately support from peers or
adults. In lesson three, the next time students were self-assessing on generating ideas, I took
more time to make a connection to why I ask students to reflect and make a goal. I let
students know that I think it’s imperative that they understand how they will be assessed
and that they can recognize where they struggle and where they are having plenty of
success. After providing students with more of a connection, or as teachers call it, the “why”
of work, I placed their self-assessing time before moving on to a “filler” activity that was not
extremely necessary to have in the day. I organized the lesson this way so I was better able
to monitor the room to ensure that all students were filling out their feedback with plenty of
time to do it. Because of these adjustments, there was much more engagement on the
feedback the second time around and students also understood that there was more value to
the assessment than before.
2. After reflecting on students’ ability to generate ideas with little to no support, I came to the
conclusion that most students showed a struggle when asked to produce on a blank page.
After having them long write multiple times, I knew that students would truly benefit from
having a variety of graphic organizers to be able to visualize what details needed to be
included to generate a successful story, especially in order for students to reach learning goal
two. The graphic organizers were scaffolded for all types of learners, yet specifically targeted
towards students who struggle with task initiation. The least scaffolded organizer only
consisted of 5 boxes labeled: beginning, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution.
The most scaffolded organizer looked similar to a mad libs sheet where students were asked
to fill in specific details of their story/memory. Providing students with the graphic
organizers provided a way for students to visually organize their details into a story format
to produce a draft of their writing. Without the organizers, I knew many students would
struggle to produce writing in an organizer manner to produce a coherent draft of a
narrative. Students, when given the choice to use organizers, were thrilled and nearly every
student asked to use one – which also turned out to be great evidence towards their writing
standard for demonstrating organizing and drafting of their writing. I am happy to see, from
the formative data taken in lesson five, that several students were able to exceed the daily
target and half the class either met or almost met the target. Using this new data, I was able
to target specific students that were not meeting the target in order to figure out what they
needed to meet it.
 Analysis of Student Learning
(GRAPHIC DATA)
Lesson One: 0 out of 22 students exceeded the objective.
(Goal One) 7 out of 22 students met the objective.
8 out of 22 students partially met the objective.
6 out of 22 students did not meet the objective.
1 out of 22 students was absent.

Lesson Two: 3 out of 22 students exceeded the objective.

(Goal One) 16 out of 22 students met the objective.
2 out of 22 students partially met the objective.
1 out of 22 students did not meet the objective.
0 out of 22 students were absent.

Lesson Three: 1 out of 22 students exceeded the objective.

(Goal One) 8 out of 22 students met the objective.
12 out of 22 students partially met the objective.
1 out of 22 students did not meet the objective.
0 out of 22 students were absent.

Lesson Four: 2 out of 22 students exceeded the objective.

(Goal Three) 4 out of 22 students met the objective.
13 out of 22 students partially met the objective.
2 out of 22 students did not meet the objective.
1 out of 22 students was absent.

Lesson Five: 4 out of 22 students exceeded the objective.

(Goal Two) 7 out of 22 students met the objective.
5 out of 22 students partially met the objective.
4 out of 22 students did not meet the objective.
2 out of 22 students were absent.

Lesson Six: 0 out of 22 students exceeded the objective.

(Goal Two) 17 out of 22 students met the objective.
5 out of 22 students partially met the objective.
0 out of 22 students did not meet the objective.
0 out of 22 students were absent.

Lesson Seven: 0 out of 22 students exceeded the objective.

(Goal Three 14 out of 22 students met the objective.
And Four) 5 out of 22 students partially met the objective.
1 out of 22 students did not meet the objective.
2 out of 22 students were absent.
 Analysis of Student Learning
(NARRATIVE)

Since most of this work was independent students were not placed in groups, but rather,
given partners at the beginning of this unit so they would be able to meet to share their work
quickly and efficiently throughout the unit as part of their standard. Formative data, when officially
recorded, was kept on a student chart attached to a clipboard. Students frequently would be
assessed, not on standards, but on their HOWL targets of respect, responsibility, and perseverance
during their writing in an effort to keep students on task and working.
My pre-assessment results showed that most of my students struggled in generating ideas for
narrative writing. With little ability to generate ideas, I came to the conclusion that students would
need to be more guided in their writing to be successful at creating a personal narrative and
reaching the other goals for the unit. To supplement more foundation writing for students I
introduced them to a 7th mentor text, an authentic manner of how other writers produce ideas, and
included multiple drafting organizers for students to become more successful in generating ideas.
All of these tools and strategies came about from my daily formative check-ins of observing
the room as students wrote. Daily observations allowed me to gauge how successful students were
or were not with the tools I was giving them to write. Reading over what students were writing I
was also able to analyze what parts of writing students would need to be given mini-lessons on as
the drafting process came closer, targeting small, yet specific, parts of writing the group struggle
with as a whole in order to strengthen their collective work. It was understood from formative data
that students struggled with associating a theme to their narrative story, which is why it was decided
that students would simultaneously work on theme vocabulary to hit another standard while
gaining some background knowledge for their own writing.
The data in my graphic tells me that students are still continuing to learn how to generate
ideas and draft their work, which is why the unit will be stretched out a bit longer than these 7
lessons. The strongest day for meeting goal one was in lesson two, which tells me that 17 of 22
students were successful in generating ideas while using the strategy they were given. As I switched
the strategy for writing in lesson three, I could see that this was one strategy that showed to be less
successful in getting students to meet the goal since only 9 of 22 met. The graphic told me that
students still needed to find more success in their drafting and organizing narratives. While most of
the class met, it was critical for all students to be meeting in order to be successful in writing a full
narrative and to meet their standard in the writing process.
 Reflection and Self-Evaluation
Students in my class were most successful in the completion of goal two: students will be
able to organize and draft a personal anecdote. Success in this goal I believe comes from two
different strategies used during instruction. For two full weeks students spent a lot of time writing
and practicing generating ideas. This practice left students with many ideas to expand on when it
came time to choose a personal anecdote to expand on. The accumulation of ideas led way to
students fleshing out a story over generating a new one due to disinterest. Teaching goal one,
generating ideas, and goal two in this order, rather than mixing them, encouraged students to have
more success when drafting a story. I also think the effectiveness of this goal comes from the
scaffolded tools provided for students as they began drafting. The number of differentiated tools for
students allowed them to have autonomy on which tool would be more beneficial to their success
in their drafting and organizing process. For this group of students, having visuals is important to
their learning, so using a graphic organizer to visualize their ideas supported their success in
organizing ideas into a drafted narrative.
As much as students experienced success, there were certainly moments where they
struggled. The least successful goal was goal one: students will be able to generate many ideas on a
topic through the writing process. While we spent the most time on this goal, success for students
varied on the topic or manner in which they were asked to write. Like it was said before, this group
of students are highly visual learners, and most of the times they were asked to generate ideas they
began from a blank page. Having nothing to work from or no prompt seated in front of them,
students struggled to even begin writing ideas because they were unsure of structure, organization,
or where to begin their story. Thinking back, I realize that these students needed written directions
or organizers to help them better generate ideas on topics I asked. This could’ve been as simple as a
small sheet of paper to tape into writer’s notebooks with directions or I could’ve made all writing
prompts come from images and visuals – similar to the generating ideas from a map (which had
much success), Another reason for lack of success could also be from students missing their self-
assessment from lesson one. Some students had a goal to look back on as they moved into a writing
challenge, which is a great strategy for keeping focus to achieve that goal. My instruction on that
day was rushed by the end of the block, which led to many students leaving the room quickly and
not putting their reflections away properly. When students returned to class to reflect on their goal
over half had misplaced them and were unable to see where they needed to work more diligently.
Because I understood the importance of goal setting in learning, I should have taken more time to
ensure all students put the reflection sheet where I had asked, or better yet, asked students to pass
them in for me to hold onto. Both of these moments I had reflected on and modified for the next
few lessons to ensure students had more opportunities for success based on their learning styles.
One professional learning goal that has been identified from this teaching experience is the
need to give effective instructions for assignments. While I may have been explaining things well,
my students did not learn best through auditory means, therefore, my attempt was not as effective.
This was a goal I had identified starting my student teaching and something I would like to continue
working on as I move through my career. To accomplish this goal, I will need to monitor students
immediately initiating the task(s) I have asked of them in order to see how effective my directions
were. Another professional learning goal that I have moving into my career is to establish concrete
routines and continue to follow through with them to maintain and organized classroom. Routines
and procedures are important to teacher and student success in the classroom. With established
routines my students will find that they know what to do without being asked and feel more
comfortable in class. Routines and procedures define my expectations clearly for students and create
a community in the classroom. Part of my original goal sheet was to work on classroom
environment where students respect each other by participating in active listening. While this goal
has been encouraged through peer assessments, I believe having a strict routine established in the
beginning of the year will make this more successful. Ensuring that routines and procedures are
explained, posted, and modeled are helpful ways to complete this goal. I need to make sure that I
am following these procedures and that students are held to that expectation from the get-go.
From this full teaching immersion, I have learned a lot on my own and a lot from my
students. I asked for their feedback in multiple areas and was impressed with the level of feedback
for me. One thing that was overwhelmingly clear to me is that I have exceeded in the area of
making strong relationships with the students I have been teaching. I could feel this bond before I
had them give me feedback and was only reassured when reading through their comments. I believe
relationships are the most important when getting students to participate in the classroom and on
the assigned work. Half of the students reflected that often I spoke a bit too fast when giving direct
instruction – something I myself have been aware of and recognize that I need to slow down to be
effective. As part of my delivering clear instructions goal, this task is something I have been working
on with strategies such as taking a breath, asking for direct feedback through thumbs up or fist to
five to ensure all students have understood, and asking students to repeat directions for clarity. One
other suggestion from students was to work breaks into class. The times in which I have given
students breaks has lessened them asking to leave and has shown them staying more focused during
instruction. When students feel mentally refreshed and ready to learn they are able to achieve more
during the period as they are able to stay on task. It is important to keep this in mind as giving
students mental breaks helps them understand that I value their mental status just as much as I
value the content. My consistent feedback, written and verbal, is so important to be an effective
educator and motivating students to complete their work. This is also part of maintaining a good
relationship with students, so they recognize that their work is important.