EDR 523/538 Lesson Planning Sheet

Name___Jillian Goltz____________
Lesson Title:

Date___July 17, 2015__________

Color-Coding Text For Key Details

Grade Level: Second grade

Methodology
Objectives
Clearly stated, easy to understand,
and reflects the teachers
knowledge of literacy instruction
and development.
Active (includes what & how),
specific, and appropriate.
Formative & Summative Assessment
Explains how teacher will
determine whether objectives are
met.
What evidence do you have that the
objectives were met? What,
specifically, are you looking for?

Standards
Includes appropriate Common Core
State Standards

By the end of the lesson, students will be able to: (bold active
verb)
Summarize the main idea of a specified text passage.
Use color-coding in text passages in order to identify
key ideas to answer reading comprehension questions.

Summative: The student will complete a sheet

independently using the color-coding strategy. This will serve as
a tool for the teacher in knowing if the child understands the
strategy.

Model and Guided Practice

Actively engages children during
the lesson and elicits higher level
thinking
Include stopping points & provide
opp. for students to respond to story

/1

Formative: While doing the activity in the small group,

the teacher will be able to observe the students doing the task
and will be able to offer suggestions and praise for work done at
that moment.

Introduction
Activates/builds, assesses
background knowledge
Sets a purpose
(Includes modeling/think alouds as
needed)

Comments/Point
s

CC.1.2.2.A : Identify the main idea of a multi paragraph

text as well as the focus of specific paragraphs within
the text.
CC.1.2.2.B : Ask and answer questions such as who,
what, where, when, why, and how to demonstrate
understanding key details in a text.
CC.1.2.2.E : Use various text features and search tools
to locate key facts of information in a text efficiently

First, the teacher will ask: Who knows what a strategy

is? Teacher and students will listen to answers. Then, the
teacher will define what it is for the students when the discussion
is over to bring all the ideas together.
Then, the teacher will ask students if and/or what they do
to find answers in readings that have comprehension questions.
From this, the teacher can see what students implement and how
they may or may not struggle with the task. After discussion,
the teacher will say: Good readers notice main ideas and
important details. These things help readers understand what
they are reading. Sometimes, kids and adults use different ways
to keep track of the important details to answer questions.
Today, I would like to show you a color-coding strategy to help
you answer questions about important details.

/2

/1

/2

Modeling
The teacher will read The Elephant out loud. At the
end, the teacher will summarize what she thought the main idea
was: This was all about elephants. It told me about where they
live, and it told me a lot about what they look like. After
summarizing, the teacher will say: Now, I will read the
1

(if appropriate)
Includes modeling /think alouds
(Write exactly what you will

say.)

Includes guided practice

(students try strategy or skill w/
support)
Includes closure (teacher asks
students to summarize what they
learned)

questions (teacher reads through questions). Hmm, I think I can

find the answers in the paragraph I just read. To help, I will
color code my questions and text. The teacher will use
different colored crayons to highlight each question one at a
time. Then, she will go back into the text to find the answer.
Example of a question think aloud: Question one says Where
does the elephant live? I will color code this question purple. I
remember reading where it lives above. Let me go back and
read. The elephant lives in Africa. I think I found my answer! I
will color code this purple, too. The teacher will repeat this
same think aloud process for questions two through five, as well.

/6

Guided Practice
The teacher will hand out five different colored crayons
to each student. Next, as a group, the students and teacher will
read The Polar Bear. The teacher will read the text while the
students follow along. The teacher will ask: What are your
thoughts on what this piece was about? What did you learn?
The teacher will wait for answers. Next, the teacher will prompt
the students to select their own color to code the first question
and answer in the text. The teacher will remind them of the
thought process she went through.
To begin, the students will work with a partner on the
first two questions and agree upon the answer. A pair will share
with the group for each question. For the third question, the
students will do the question themselves and then will concur
with their partner to see if they agree. Again, a pair will share
with the group. Next, the students will do four and five
independently and will be checked after each by the teacher for
accuracy.
While doing the activity with the group, the teacher will
insert a mistake on her worksheet to model to the students that it
is okay to make a mistake and how one can fix it.
Independent Practice
The teacher will ask the students to read The Lion
independently and color code the questions and text for key
details to answer comprehension questions.
Note
Pending time, I would have the students write out the
answers to the questions separately and verbatim onto a separate
sheet of paper to further reinforce the skill and information. I do
not think I will have time to implement this portion, so I will do
it on Monday. This will reinforce the strategy, after reviewing it
again of course and also help with writing skills.
Closure
The teacher will ask the students what the purpose of
the activity was. The teacher will say: I hope you found this
strategy helpful. Can you think of any other ways a reader can
keep track of key details?

Reflection on Planning and

Instruction
Reflections are clearly,
thoughtfully, and thoroughly
written, while referring to class
discussions and at least 1 reading.
Provides a rationale for selected
strategies, activities and materials.
Were the objectives met? What evidence
do you have that learning occurred?
What went well? What would you
change? How could this lesson be
improved?
All parts of the lesson are
adequately described and easy to
follow with no punctuation or
grammatical errors.

Reflection on Planning
I came home Monday evening, exhausted from a long
day of school and work and stared at my computer with no ideas
in my mind of what to do for a lesson plan! I had resources and
tools from the teacher but no ideas of my own. After searching
the Internet later, I found an idea from a teachers blog about
coding the text to identify answers to reading comprehension
questions (http://www.surfinthroughsecond.com/2014/02/colorcoding-text-evidence.html). My cooperating teacher had
mentioned how she wanted her learners to be able to answer
comprehension questions. I thought that for the second grade
class I was with, this would be easy. Thinking of it now before I
do the lesson though, I think this could be a struggle. As our
textbook tells us, there are plenty of strategies good readers use
before, during, and after reading. One of those is identifying key
details and implementing different ways to remember them, for
example, by using a graphic organizer or in my lessons case,
color-coding the text. Strategies need to be taught hence this
lesson.
These children are going into third grade, and it seems
like a few have a hard time staying focused. Though the answers
are clearly stated in the text, the children may have a hard time
recalling what the answer is. Some learners are visual, so
hopefully this method of color-coding will be helpful. If some
learners are auditory, hopefully the mixture of hearing and
coding the text will reinforce the answers.
Ms. Perhacs, my cooperating teacher, gave me some
worksheets with very simple passages about animals. I always
hear about how worksheets are a no-no, but hopefully with this
interactive lesson, it will serve well and only encourage the
students to use the strategy it in their future academic careers.

/3

Reflection on Instruction
I felt like my lesson went well! I believe I met my
objectives, and I know learning was occurring because I was
seeing it happen, and the children were able to tell me what they
were doing and how it was helping. It was nice to know that
some of the students have used this method before in school, so
for some it may have been reinforcement in the application and
importance of the strategy.
One thing that I always feel I can work on is how I say
things. It was important for me to realize the language I was
using with the students, so they would understand. Like I told
you, asking the students to define the word strategy made me
wonder if they could, but I was pleasantly surprised when pretty
much everyone knew what it meant!
Another thought I had involved the crayons and when to
distribute them. I knew they could become a distraction, and
they did for a few, but overall, the crayons were used for their
purpose. I was not sure if handing out crayons one at a time
would have been more effective. If anything, it would have
been time consuming, I think, and possibly more distracting.
I also noticed students moving ahead, which was
encouraging because that meant they were understanding the
task, but also, they were getting ahead of me, so I had to try to
reel them in to completing each question one at a time. One of
the boys finished rather quickly, and I was trying to figure out
what I could give him to do to keep him occupied. Next time, I
could have another sheet available for him to complete.
Also, throwing in the mistake was completely adlibbed. I
3

thought it would help the children to see that to be a good reader,

one has to pay attention to what is read, in order to answer the
questions correctly. I thought it was funny when the one student
looked at me like she could not believe I could have done
something wrong! Along with that, I was impressed with how
my partner corrected my mistake. She showed me in the text the
correct answer, as well as made a connection to the picture of the
polar bear to show me the color of its nose. I loved that!
I was so impressed with the ideas that the students gave
for other ways to keep track of their reading. School and the way
children learn has changed plenty over the years, and I am
always so taken aback by how children think and what they can
actually do.

Observation of the Lesson:

Teacher demonstrated enthusiasm
and interest while teaching!
Student was prepared and
provisioned with necessary
materials at hand.
Lesson was carried out in a clear
and logical manner.
Students were engaged throughout
and were aware of what to do and
what was expected of them.

Total

/5
Not Observed

/15

Observed

/20