Department of Teacher Education & Learning Sciences
Elementary Education Program
Formal Observation Reflection
Directions: Complete the reflection questions and submit your response to your observer prior to having a post-
conference to discuss the observation. If a conference is held immediately after the observation you will submit
your responses to the observer the following day via email.
Name: McKenzie Weed Date:11/18/1027
1. To what extent were learning outcomes appropriate and achievable to your students?
I think that our learning outcomes were achievable to the students. While the
outcomes were simple, I think they were important learning points for
2. How effective were your instructional strategies? What changes would you make in
your instructional approaches if you taught this lesson again? Why?
I think my instructional strategies were much clearer then they have been in the past. I
think this reflected on the success of the lesson as a whole. If I could change anything
about my approach to this lesson, I would have given the students a chance to get up
and move around more often throughout the activity. This would have ensured that the
students were fully engaged throughout the entire lesson. Although I think it was an
engaging lesson, there were times throughout the lesson that they would have
benefitted from moving around.
3. Evaluate the effectiveness of your oral and written communication with students.
I think I was effective with my oral communication with the students about the lesson
itself, however I think that I should have been more clear about my expectations for
behavior during the lesson and the consequences of not following those expectations.
4. Evaluate the level of student engagement in your lesson .
I think the students were engaged at about a level 8. Although we had to refocus the
students a few times throughout the activity, they were able to display their learning
throughout their assessment and were full of energy during the entire activity.
5. How effectively did you use instructional materials, resources, and/or technology?
I think the books that we read to the class were extremely effective in this activity. It
brought in the ELA standards that the students had already been working on and was
the base of instruction for our lesson. I think we did a much better job at having all of
the materials ready at the start of the lesson rather. This made for smoother transitions
throughout the entire lesson.
6. To what extent were your assessment strategies effective? What changes would you
make in your assessment approach if you taught this lesson again? Why?
I think our assessment was very simple but appropriate for this lesson. Have the
students fill in a sentence starter was a quick and easy way to ensure that they had
learned something from the books we had read as well as the discussion that followed.
The students completed their assessments on the carpet in a circle. If I taught this
lesson again, I would have the students go back to their seats to complete the
sentence starter. This would be an effective and purposeful way of getting the students
moving between parts of the lesson.
7. To what extent was your feedback to students accurate, substantive, constructive,
specific, and/or timely?
As soon as students filled in their sentence starters they turned them in. I immediately
read each one and told the students that they had a great idea of what it means to be
kind. The students all wrote every meaningful statements.
8. To what extent did the classroom management and environment contribute to student
learning?
There were a few times when the classroom management became a little bit
overwhelming. Although we reminded students of the rules for when we were
teaching, we should have revisited those rules several times throughout the lesson just
to remind students of our daily expectations.
9. Did you make modifications to your lesson plan during the lesson? If so, what were
they and what motivated these changes?
We decided to have the students complete the assessment before the activity so that
we could end the lesson with a discussion about the activity. We decided it would be
better to have the conversation close the activity to spark critical thinking about
kindness after the lesson was completed.
10. Was your Teaching Behavior Focus goal met?
I think we were able to create an engaging environment for all the students. I
consistently made sure to call on different students and ask probing questions to
students who did not volunteer to answer some of the questions. I think this is a
teaching behavior that I will always revisit but I think we were successful in it with this
lesson.
