The Lessons

Here you can learn more about my lessons arranged according to grade level. As you read through these lessons it would be wise to refer to the Program of Inquiry and also the entire Mapped Curriculum. You can click on their names to access them.

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Year Plan:

The units I cover follow the same timeline as the homerooms. Generally 6 weeks per unit, with 2 lessons a week. This means 12 lessons per unit. Click the link for the Year Plan.

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Units:

As mentioned previously the units are generally 12 lessons. They follow this basic structure:

• ​Lesson 1 and/or lesson 2:

  • Pre-Assessment:​

    • Find out how much the students already know. This can be through activities or discussions.

  • Provocation:

    • This can be a powerful way to get the students excited - an inspirational video works wonders.​

  • Unpacking the Central Idea:

    • Strategic questioning is essential here. You do not want to give the students the answers straight up but allow them to inquire themselves. 

• Lessons 2-6:

  • Slightly more teacher-directed activities to cover the basic elements of the unit. EG: For Invasion Games - the teacher sets up the activities to introduce them to attacking, defending, planning etc.

• Formative Assessment (half-way through the unit)

  • Keeping in with my belief in student-choice, students have a choice on how they would like to demonstrate their current level of understanding of the unit. The formative assessment gives me an indication of where I should go for the second half of the unit.

• Lesson 7:

  • Introduce the summative assessment. The summative assessment can be a project, an event etc. EG: For Movement Composition, students needed to design, execute, refine and film their movement sequence. They were taught a variety of actions and positions prior and now they need to create their own movement sequence.

• Lesson 8-11:

  • Self-directed lessons with the teacher primarily being a facilitator of learning. ​EG: For Athletics, students have a basic understanding of their events and now it is time to train. They need to record their training and consistently indicate their best attempts at the end of each session.

• Lesson 12 - Summative Assessment:

  • Summative due and/or competition, presentation etc.​

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Individual Lessons:​

My individual lessons vary according to where we are in the unit, EG: more teacher-led or student-led. However, they do follow this basic structure:

• 5 minutes: A team run. 1-2 laps of the field jogging as a team. A lot of our activities involve teamwork and this is a great way to set the tenure of the lesson.

• 5 minutes: 

  • Breakdown/Review the Central Idea and go through the previous lessons (if any). Emphasise big ideas, learner profiles, attitudes.

• 10 minutes: 

  • Activities.

• 5 minutes: Refresh: 

  • ​Review activities, emphasise key elements again. Address key issues or praise. This step is useful if the class starts getting out of hand.

• 10 minutes: 

  • ​Activities.

• 5 minutes: 

  • ​This step is very important. Key issues are addressed and praises dispensed. You always want to leave a little carrot dangling in front of them to get the students excited for the next lesson. You want to leave them with a key thought in their head.