Lesson Plan-First Day Jitters

Lesson Plan/Icebreaker- Teachers have "Jitters" too!

Lesson Plan Topic: Design a lesson plan for the book First Day Jitters by Julie Danneberg. I read this book to my class at the beginning of the school year as an icebreaker. However, I did not make a lesson out of it. (In retrospect I should have!) I teach high school students with low functioning Autism. Because the students in my classroom have social and intellectual deficits I wanted to design a full lesson out of this wonderful book. My lesson plan will use literacy strategies to organizes reading instruction using the P.A.R. framework.

 

Grade level for the lesson: High school students with low functioning Autism accessing the general education curriculum.

Detailed Objectives:

· 9.The student will be able to extend general and specialized vocabulary through speaking, reading, and writing while reading The First Day Jitters by completing a word inventory to indicate unfamiliar words and use these unfamiliar words to complete an assortment of vocabulary assessments.


3f) · 9.4b) The student will be able to summarize text and understand chronological organization and sequence while reading The First Day Jitters by writing about what happened in the book using a graphic organizer.

 

· 9.4l) The student will be able to make predictions, inferences, draw conclusions, and connect prior knowledge to support reading comprehension when reading The First Day Jitters by relating to the experiences and feelings attached to the characters in the book using a pre-readng graphic organizer, answering teacher promoted questions, and completing a KWL chart to asses their prior knowledge.

· 9.4m) The student will be able to use reading strategies to monitor comprehension throughout the reading process while reading The First Day Jitters  by the completion of a guided reading assignment, Facebook page, Venn diagram, the 5 W's, and a comprehensive comprehension quiz/vocabulary quiz.

Written purpose:The student will be able to read and analysis written material while extending their vocabulary through the use of different instructional strategies in the P.A.R framework while reading The First Day Jitters.

Strategies/Activities:
2Preparation: The teacher will asses the student’s prior knowledge and prepare students for the reading assignment by using the following strategies:  Rereading organizer and Know, What to know, Learned (K-W-L) chart. The teacher will assess the student's prior knowledge by asking the students to predict what the story is about based on the pictures and the title to activate their critical thinking skills. The  teacher will ask students how they felt on the first day of school.  The teacher will work with the student's to develop a vocabulary inventory for unfamiliar words. 

Word Wall Words gathered from a word inventory based on student's unfamiliarity with the words.

1.       Jitters: nervousness; a feeling of fright or uneasiness.

2.       Stumbled: to stagger or fall; trip; to walk or go unsteadily:

3.       Fumble: to feel or grope about clumsily.

4.      Moan: a prolonged, low, inarticulate sound uttered from or as if from physical or mental suffering

5.      Clammy: covered with a cold, sticky moisture; cold and damp:

6.      Principal: the head or director of a school

7.      Gush: to express oneself extravagantly or emotionally;

8.      Peek: to look or glance quickly or furtively, especially through a small opening or from a concealed location; peep; peer.

9.      Crowded: filled to excess; packed.
10.      Chuckled: laugh

2Assistance: The teacher will maintain purpose for the reading and build comprehension by assisting the students with the following strategies: Structure of text-compare and contrast the similarities and differences between teacher's feelings about the first day of school and student's feelings using a Venn diagram and a Character Map as a learning aid to assist them indicate key concepts and expand their critical thinking skills.The teacher will teach the important of context clues to look at the words around the unfamiliar identified words to determine the meaning. The students will draw pictures for the meaning of each word to familiarize themselves with the meaning.

2Reflection: The teacher will evaluate and extend the reading experience while activating he student's retention by using the following strategies: Facebook Assignment using word wall words, vocabulary assessment. The big question research map 5w's, comprehension quiz,  final update of KWL chart.

 2Evaluation: The teacher will evaluate the students based on participation and completion of all tasks assigned during the duration of the lesson.

*****Please see my notebook for an example of the Preereading Organizer, KWL Chart, What Happened Organizer, Venn Diagram, Getting into Character Map, The Big Question Research Map, Facebook Assignment, Vocabulary Quiz, and Comprehension Quiz. *****

Websites:

http://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/standards_docs/

http://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/standards_docs/english/2010/stds_english9.pdf