For this benchmark, write a 750-1,000 word narrative about a cross-disciplinary unit you would implement in your classroom. Choose a minimum of two standards, at least one for the content area of your field experience classroom and at least one supportive literacy standard to focus on for the unit narrative. You may use your Topic 3 “Instructional Strategies for Literacy Integration Matrix as a guide to inform this assignment.”

Your narrative must include:

• Unit Description and Rationale: Complete description of unit theme and purpose, including learning objectives, based on the content area standards and literacy standards.
• Learning Opportunities: Description of two learning opportunities that create ways for students to learn, practice, and master academic language in content areas
• Collaboration: Description of how you would facilitate students’ collaborative use of current tools and resources to maximize content learning in varied contexts
• Support: Description of support that would be implemented for student literacy development across content areas
• Differentiation: Description of how the lessons within the unit would provide differentiated instruction
• Strategies: Description of strategies that you would use within your unit to advocate for equity in your classroom
• Cultural Diversity: Description of the effect of cultural diversity in the classroom on reading and writing development. Describe how the unit capitalizes on cultural diversity.
• Resources: Description of current resources and tools that would enhance the learning experience for all students.

Support your findings with 3-5 scholarly resources.

Prepare this assignment according to the guidelines found in the APA Style Guide, located in the Student Success Center. An abstract is not required.

This assignment uses a rubric. Review the rubric prior to beginning the assignment to become familiar with the expectations for successful completion.

You are required to submit this assignment to LopesWrite. Refer to the LopesWrite Technical Support articles for assistance.

College of Education (COE) program competencies and national standards assessed in the benchmark assignment:

COE 2.3 

Create opportunities for students to learn, practice, and master academic language in their content area. [InTASC 4(h), 4(l); GCU Mission Critical1]

COE 2.4 

Facilitate students’ collaborative use of current tools and resources to maximize content learning in varied contexts. [InTASC 5(c), 5(l), 5(q), 5(s), 10(g); ISTE-T 1b, 2a; GCU Mission Critical 2]

COE 2.5 

Develop and implement supports for literacy development across content areas. [InTASC 5(h); 5(j); 8(h); GCU Mission Critical1]

https://www.diversitycouncil.org/diversity-lesson-plans-high-school

Clinical Field Experience C: Literacy Activity Implementation

Darius Washington

Grand Canyon SEC: 540

July 16, 2019

Clinical Field Experience C: Literacy Activity Implementation

This was a very fun and exciting activity for me and most importantly one that helped me learn a lot. I would confidently say that a lot of what I expected to deliver with excellence went well and my mentor can also agree with this. I would greatly agree with one major observation that my mentor made and that is the fact that I was able to apply good differentiation strategies and meet the diverse needs of the students. I was able to achieve this by making sure that I had as much information as possible about the students beforehand. Understanding the students and their needs is the basis of effective differentiation and this proved to be true in this case.

From this experience, I learned the importance of proper planning. This planning beforehand by setting goals and objectives for the lesson helped me in one main way. Having clear objectives served as a measuring instrument. It helped me to evaluate very well and easily my teaching methods and how effective they are in meeting the objectives of the lesson. True to what the mentor said however alongside my observation there is a need for improvement in enhancing classroom engagement and also integrating literacy.

On this, I believe that I tried my best to do well but achieving the desired results proved to be difficult. The challenge with classroom engagement was creating a safe environment where students would feel freer to engage and open up (Semeraro, Coppola, Cassibba & Lucangeli, 2019). The challenge with integrating literacy was time based on the fact that there is limited time to deliver a certain portion of content and the fact that proper integration requires constant and consistent practice. Both of these challenges are challenges are issues that cannot be overcome in one single session and therefore in the future, I will be more keep on consistently applying strategies that promote literacy development and engagement over time. For example, offering more exercises that involve reading and writing to promote more literacy.

References

Semeraro, C., Coppola, G., Cassibba, R., & Lucangeli, D. (2019). Teaching of cursive writing in the first year of primary school: Effect on reading and writing skills. PloS one, 14(2), e0209978.

Sarıca, H. Ç., & Usluel, Y. K. (2016). The effect of digital storytelling on visual memory and writing skills. Computers & Education, 94, 298-309.