Video+Critique

Video Critique

Instruction Video Critique – TCH 501 Ron Reynolds 2/17/2012

The video, “Alternative Passage Reading (3rd grade)”, which was found at [], seemed like a straightforward lesson to a group of eight-year-olds. The teacher had some good points to her lesson, and what I saw as bad points to it, too. I will begin with Classroom Management. She made the rules and procedures known to each student, more as a reminder during the reading with the thumbs up / thumbs down technique. She didn’t actually //inform// the students of any rules or procedures. She responded in a timely manner to students who needed guidance during the lesson, too. Finally, she was able to monitor the entire class, mostly by walking around the room instead of standing at a podium like many of the English and Reading teachers at my school do. The next section I will look at is Instruction. The instructional activities she used were demo and modeling. She seemed to get a little flustered with the students at one point when they started reading out loud at the wrong time. Apparently, she didn’t go over that expectation often enough. The student learning activities revolved around the kids working both as a group (reading out loud together), and discussion (talking with their neighbor about word meanings). This went pretty well, and the kids stayed on task. I wonder how much of their good behavior was due to the fact that they were being videotaped that day? The teacher explained the expectations clearly in the beginning of the video lesson, so the students knew what was expected of them. The white board presentation was kind of lame, in that the light from the overhead projector was really bright and made looking at the words on the board rather uncomfortable. Finally, she was able to engage the students in mini conversations to get them to follow along and participate in the lesson. The technology integration for this lesson was pretty pathetic, in my opinion. What was the point in using the overhead projector? To avoid having to erase the white board when she was finished? I saw several iMac G3 computers against the wall. If using technology would have been desired, the teacher could have put the books on the computers and had the kids read them from there, or have the words that they were trying to define on the computers, maybe with pictures that could be chosen to go along with the words. Teachers at my school use Smart Boards and other expensive technology for no other reason to show people that they can turn the machines on and click the remote. Much of what they do can be accomplished with a dry erase marker and white board. The teacher in the video could have made transparencies of the book pages and projected them, so she could have walked around the room more freely instead of burying her face in her little book. The teacher in the video spoke loudly enough, but not in a shrill way. She varied her tone and speed, so as not to bore or lull the students. She walked around the room, interacting pretty well with the students. She didn’t have a lot of eye contact, mostly because she was reading from her book the entire time. She didn’t really use a lot of expressions or hand movements. Once in a while she would smile broadly or something, but nothing to really wake the kids up. She was obviously enthusiastic about teaching, because she knew her subject matter, and was dressed professionally. Overall, I would say this teacher did a mediocre job teaching the lesson. She wasn’t a bad teacher, but she was kind of boring, and used technology in a way that really was not necessary. Maybe it had a lot to do with her age, but I did not think she was an outstanding teacher, and I wasn’t overly thrilled at the lesson.