The purpose of these lessons is to increase student understanding of the diversity of peers with disabilities through a book study.  My Thirteenth Winter by Samantha Abeel explores the author's journey with dyscalculia. I separated the book into four sections and created four corresponding inquiry-based lesson activities. Each learning activity is supported by an ELA II TEKS.  Jigsaw and choice board activities are demonstrated in these lessons.

During my student teaching semester, I was included in the ELA I PLC.  I developed a lesson based on the CBA-prep lesson that reviewed ECR writing. I created a collaborative activity that gave students a chance to evaluate various thesis statements based on a rubric. Students used critical thinking skills to evaluate strong vs. weak thesis statements before writing their own thesis statements.

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This highly detailed lesson plan uses the Danielson Framework for Teaching format required by Texas State University student teachers. You may want to skip to page 5, Domain 1 & 3 Lesson Flow Section where the actual lesson begins. 

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Within the lesson plan are links to a Jamboard, a review, and lesson slides. Attached at the end of the lesson plan are copies of handouts, group activity materials, and answer keys I created to support the lesson.

As part of my graduate studies, I had to create both a direct teach and discovery teach (or indirect teach) lesson plan. My assignment required me to find a Texas ELA high school textbook and create a lesson based on a unit in the book. I chose the "Tone of Terror" unit from the Holt McDougal Literature, Grade 10 (2010) textbook, I developed a lesson to teach Edgar Allan Poe's The Pit and The Pendulum. 

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• Poe's text is rich with interdisciplinary learning opportunities, as you will see within the lesson plan (especially in the supporting Prezi). The text begins with a Latin quatrain, is set during the Spanish Inquisition, and ends with the French Revolution. My lesson has one group build a pendulum so students can compare it to Poe's vivid pendulum description. 

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This Prezi facilitates the Jigsaw activity for this lesson. 

This is the direct teach lesson plan I created using the same textbook unit mentioned above. My approach to teaching Poe's The Pit and The Pendulum is teacher-led for this direct teach lesson, as required by my professor.  Creating both a discovery teach and a direct teach lesson of the same material helped me learn the difference in teacher-focused versus student-focused lessons.

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These Google Slides facilitate this direct teach lesson. 

During my Content Literacy class, I was able to use both the direct teach and discovery teach lesson plans above as a basis to create a unit plan. As a final project, I created this Digital Notebook that includes all of the resources students would need to complete the unit including texts, videos, audio recordings, and reading and writing strategies. I enjoyed creating the digital notebook and think it is a useful way for students and teachers to keep digital files and resources organized.

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