Reflecting on my Teaching Practice Today

My Mini lesson was beatifully planned. Our learning target was “I can make a graph”.  I used the giant floor graph that I created with highlighter yellow duct tape. This was a guided release lesson plan. We have used this interactive graph many times. We have graphed our shoes, we have graphed shape blocks. Today my plan was to have the children help me graph the different colors of puff balls in a container and then ask them to graph Skittles independently. They have done Skittles graphing with a partner before. As we began, I called the children over to the interactive graph. I had several kids help me lay the puff balls out o the graph. Together, we filled out the “My puffball Graph”. This was easy for the kids and I was very happy with how they were guiding me to draw on the graph. They were even telling me different options I could use for recording the data on the graph. I could draw colored dots to represent the puff balls, I could color in the bars on the graph, or I could use X’s to represent the puff balls.

I wanted to see how they would do independently. I gave them a different graph, “My Skittles Graph”  and some Skittles in a paper cup. I asked them to go to work graphing the different colors of Skittles in their cup.  I noticed that the children seemed to know what they were doing. They were working very independently. Chaudry made a wonderful bar graph. David did not have any yellow Skittles in his cup but he intuitively knew that he needed to designate a column for yellow Skittles and leave it blank.  I noticed that Gavin laid his skittles out on the graph, colored in the labels for each color, but left the entire graph blank. He ate the Skittles and declared “I finished!”  I need to pull Gavin aside next time we do graphing and work with him one on one. Was this a bit too much to ask the kids to graph puff balls on the interactive map and then graph Skittles on their own today?  My mantra is usually “less is more”. I really feel that most of the kids can do our next graphing activity independently. I will give them more independence and Gavin more support.

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