Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Mr. Tran had an excellent lesson on mummies. He listed easy-to-understand content objectives, posted key vocabulary words, then brainstormed about the words, and added words to the wall the students selected during their reading. He frequently referred back to the words. The students made a sequence chain, which broke down and explained steps used by the scientists and used the words from the word wall (further review). The students worked with a partner, and then shared their graphic organizers with other peers to help make corrections or additions.
The students seemed to enjoy reading the text and each other’s papers and finding new words for the word wall. They had great discussions about the meaning of the words, such as the different meanings of the word “tissue.” Also the different forms of the words, such as “embalm,” “ embalmer,” and “embalming.”
Mr. Tran had a number of informal assessments during his lessons, including listening to the group’s individual discussions, full group discussions, and their graphic organizers. He gave appropriate feedback and corrections throughout the lesson, then at the end of the lesson he reviewed and evaluated the vocabulary and content objectives.