State Standards
and Objectives Covered
Reading Literature
standard 1:
“Ask
and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring
explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers.”
Learning
Objectives
- Students will identify their singing voices.
- Students will create a basic 5 sentence story line for their opera.
- Students will become more familiar with Dinosaurs (one of the main topics of their opera).
Lesson
We started
by playing “Oh here we all together” and having them quickly sit in their
chairs. The children all loved it!
 |
| Kaylee singing the living thing song |
1.
Once I was a living thing, living thing, living
thing. Once I was a living thing small small small. (Action: shrink down to the ground)
2.
Soon I started growing, growing, growing. Soon I
started growing, tall, tall, tall. (Action:
slowly grow taller)
3.
I learned that I could move around, move around,
move around. I learned that I could move around, all the way around. (Action: Spin around)
4.
Living things breathe in and out, in and out, in
and out. Living things breathe in and out, so that they can live. (Action: Move your hands towards your body
and then away)
5.
Living things reproduce, reproduce, reproduce,
Living things reproduce or have a family. (Action:
rocking a baby)
6.
And we all like to eat, like to eat, like to
eat. And we all like to eat, yum, yum, yum! (Action: act like you are eating).
After learning the song, we read a
story about a group of children who traveled in a time machine to the time of
the Dinosaurs. I chose this book because the children had talked about setting
their opera on a land of Dinosaurs, and I hoped this would give them some ideas.
After reading the book we continued discussing ideas for their opera. I had
hoped to solidify the 5 main sentences, but we ended up only coming up with
one: “College students go to an island of Dinosaurs.”
Overall, this lesson was not very effective. The beginning game and Living Things Song went fine, but looking
back, it may not have been what the children needed. I had originally planned on
helping them identify and improve their singing voices; however, I forgot and I think we took too much time reading the story about Dinosaurs.
The story was fine but it probably was not the most effective use of time.
I also tried to have the children vote for the ideas they liked. This worked well, but Mr. Knight suggested afterwards that if someone suggests a really good idea that will work well with the story, I should accept it even if there isn’t a majority vote.
I learned a lot from this lesson.
I especially realized how important it is to help every child be involved. It is easy to feel like the lesson is
going well when you have 6 or 7 kids who are really involved; however, I need
to be more aware of the other 15 children who are not saying anything.
Laurann,
ReplyDeleteAlthough I see what you mean about the effectiveness of the lesson, I still felt like your ideas are really good ones! I think you are on the right track getting the children learning and thinking about dinosaurs. It can be quite difficult to get children to come up with ideas when put on the spot. If you are looking for a good storyline, think about starting the story and going from child to child to finish the story. For instance, you would say "the college students found themselves stranded on an island of dinosaurs and then..." pass to the next child, who should respond with the next part of the story. Even if they don't all have good ideas, they are all involved and then you can help the children pick and choose which 5 ideas to use in the opera. Overall, I think you are doing an amazing job! Keep it up!