Mayuri P.
Professional Practice 5
Lesson Delivery and Management
The Pacing of a Lesson by the Teacher
In this section, I will be reflecting on what I have gathered from observing the pacing of a lesson by my mentor teacher(s). According to the Cambridge English dictionary, the pacing is the speed at which someone moves or something changes. In terms of education, pacing or instructional pacing is the speed or rate at which a teacher presents the task(s) in a lesson. Having enough pacing from one point to another is crucial, as a teacher, we have to know how much time is needed by our students in order for them to grasp what is being taught. To know this, the teachers should know the proficiency levels of their students.
Adapting to an appropriate pace has always been an important component of a successful lesson. This particularly applies to groups of high achieving students who are more than able to cope with at least an hour of rigorous activity. These students thrive on the demands of a lesson that asks them to move quickly through exposition and review to get to a new learning objective and to spend time developing and extending new ideas and concept (Dixie, 2012). However, I did not manage to observe this when I was placed in SK Seafield 3 as I was assigned to the lower ability classes. From what I observed, pacing in a lower ability class is equally as important as pacing in a higher ability class.
From what I have gathered observing my mentor teachers, the pacing of the lesson that they have is fairly good. I say this because as they are slow learners, not much content is taught in the one hour period. Referring back to the lesson I mentioned in A1, for the one hour lesson, students only brainstorm on the essential things needed by one when they lose everything in a fire. Therefore, the pacing for this lesson was between the introduction, the brainstorming and for the students to copy the mind map into their exercise book. Hence, I would say that the one hour is sufficient for a lower ability class.
During my placement there I was given thirteen students to work with by Pn. Tamil. I remember while I was planning a lesson for the students, I asked myself repeatedly, “how much time will the kids need to complete this part”. Here I realized that pacing a lesson is synchronized with lesson planning. When we are planning a lesson for our class, we do not only cater to the students’ needs by know their proficiency level but also cater to them by knowing how much time will they need to complete a task or digest an information.
Planning lesson
Time is crucial when it comes to teaching because the students only spend a certain amount of time in school, in SK Seafield that would be about five to six hours in school. Within this period of time, there are several subjects to be taught, hence, lesson planning and setting a proper pacing for the lesson is equally important. Therefore, when planning a lesson, we should include a column for estimation of time to be spent at for those criteria. For example, when we have a class of low ability of challenging students, and where we are teaching multitask lesson, it is strongly advised that we produce a task list. By this method, we can have a reduced number of students shouting “what do we have to do now?”. This is because having students shout out anything will be a form of disruption which would indirectly slow down the lesson and not having enough time to complete the lesson planned for the day.
As mentioned in A1 I also had the chance to teach a small group of students from 4 Tekun while I was in SK Seafield 3. While I was planning lessons for them I asked myself how fast or slow should my lesson go. At that time I did not know much about the abilities of the students, thus, in the first three days my lesson was not all so effective and as the week past, I got to know the students in more depth and made my final lesson on Friday more effective. The research on pacing suggests that a moderate pace of instruction is best. That is, too fast a pace does not promote learning or on task behavior, nor does a pace that is too slow. A moderate pace of instruction that provides (in a direct instruction lesson) about six to nine learning tasks per minute would be optimal.
When asked about pacing during my placement, most of the teachers said the pacing is something that gets easier with experience you develop and practices your lessons. With knowledge of previous modules, micro-teaching and also my one year experience volunteering at tuition for the needy, I have an ideal way to pace my lesson in the future.
First and foremost, we always need to have the materials ready. Preparing all your materials ahead of time is a huge time saver and will help you make smoother transitions during the lesson. For example, in the lesson where I asked the kids from 4 T to rearrange consonants to match the phonic ‘ight’ and make words that they are familiar with, I would have to make flashcards of those consonants and ‘ight’ for each of the students before the lesson begins. Researchers said that it is also a good idea to spend some time creating materials that can be used again in the future. Since the lesson on rearranging the letters went well, I decided to safely keep the letters in small plastics to store and use in the future. I had the opportunity to look at the ample of art collection that the principal of SK Seafield 3, Pn, Tee had with her. Before becoming a principal, she was an art teacher and about over 10 years later, she still keeps all her student’s artwork in bins and files.
Rearranging consants to match '-ight'
Second, at the beginning of the lesson, always share lesson plans with the students. It is advised that teachers should share lesson objectives and outline the plan so that students can independently transition from activity to activity. This prevents waiting time and gives the teachers more freedom to work with students individually and in small groups without holding up the rest of the class. I personally find this very helpful as I do practice this in my tuition and the class would run almost smoothly and I will have the time to attend personally to students who needs assistance.
Ultimately, the pace of the lessons should depend on your students. If they are mastering concepts quickly, we should move along faster. If they’re struggling with something, we will need to slow down and incorporate additional activities to help them develop those skills. The fastest way to check for student understanding is to incorporate formative assessments throughout a lesson. Formative assessment refers to the on-going process students and teachers engage in when the focus on learning goals and take action to move closer to the goal. It is not used for grading; instead, it provides an opportunity for them to learn before they are graded on how well they have learned. Research on the use of formative assessment has shown that when teachers practice good formative assessment and students participate in it, both achievement and motivation increases. In Understanding by Design, Wiggins and McTighe (2005) show how formative assessment is an essential part of teaching and learning. They emphasize planning instruction and assessment around desired understandings. These desired understandings are the learning targets that should focus both formative and summative observations. Have students to work on whiteboards if not on rough papers and hold them up for the teacher to check. We can also check for understanding by asking them to indicate their comfort with a topic by giving a thumb up or thumbs down.
References
Dixie, G., (2012). Introducing Pace and Purpose into Your Lessons.
Lignugaris-Kraft, B., & Rousseau, M. K. (1982). Instructional pacing: Definition and research needs. Journal of Special Education Technology, 5, 5-9.
Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by design (2nd ed.). Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.