Curricular Micro-Lesson Reflections

 Generally I felt that the curricular micro-lesson went well. For this Reflection, I will summarize and respond to the common themes discussed in our peer-feedback. To more meaningfully interpret the feedback, I tallied up how many responses in each category were not 3/3.

1.       “Clarity of Presentation & Activities” & “Learning Objectives Addressed and Met” – several non-perfect responses.

These two categories complement each other – I suspect that if we had more explicitly stated the learning objectives at the start of our class, the purpose / clarity of the presentation would have improved. Perhaps we could have explained these objectives before jumping into the algebraic definition of things? I don’t think it would have been wise to speak about them before the drumming – I think having it as a cold open was a good way to get students engaged.

2.       Definition was a bit unclear

When we presented the definition, I think there was a bit of confusion regarding the use of ‘n’ as an indexing term. Introducing the relevant terms and their importance is not trivial; students likely haven’t seen any sequences before, and so there is a balance between explaining what a sequence is, how each term can be indexed (with n), and then how we can define / generate geometric sequences.

3.       Bongos was a good hook!

I’m happy that folks were able to engage with the bongos / drumbeat at the beginning! This part of the lesson went well, however if (when) I do it again, I would alter it somewhat. In a class setting, I would take more time and also introduce to a ‘tripling’ drumbeat (the one I showed was a doubling), and then finally a ‘halving’ drumbeat. Or perhaps, in high school, I could choose one drumbeat to start each day of the unit. Generally, I think that exposing students to a wider range of examples will help them ‘hear’ what is making it geometric (for me, it is the ‘exponential’ increase/decrease).

I had also hoped to have more time at the end to explore the relationship between these rhythms and geometric sequences. In particular, I want students to discover that the first term of the sequence correlates to the number of ‘bars’ required to generate each term. In our example I chose 2, but it could just as easily been 1, 3, or anything else. This is a nuanced idea – I’d likely introduced it on Day 2 or 3 of this unit in a high school setting.

In all, I am pleased with how this went and am excited for the opportunity to teach this unit next semester!