Teaching an Effective Lesson for 7-8 Year Olds: Structuring, Methods, and Assessment

This article discusses how to plan and teach an effective lesson for 7-8 year olds with mixed abilities and a special needs child. It covers the importance of clear aims and objectives, coherent structure, suitable teaching methods, learning activities, and resources. It also explains how to assess learners' learning at appropriate stages and evaluate the lesson using feedback from an observer and personal reflection. The article concludes with an analysis of the effectiveness of the lesson and suggestions for further development of teaching practice.

Unit 2 Teaching an effective lesson
Learning outcomes
Candidates will explore the practice of teaching and learning so they can:
 E plan a lesson that has clear aims and objectives and a coherent structure
 F teach a lesson that builds on the learners’ existing learning to develop new learning, with
suitable teaching methods, learning activities and resources
 G assess, in a lesson, the learners’ learning at appropriate stages, using suitable methods
 H evaluate a lesson, using feedback from an observer and their own reflection to develop
future practice.
Candidates will:
 plan and teach a lesson
 arrange for the lesson to be observed and formatively assessed by a mentor to provide
formative feedback for reflective practice.
Your context
Tell us briefly about the learning group you are teaching for your observed lesson.
Tell us their age range, gender, the group size, range of ability, learning needs and
any other information which you think is significant.
Age group is 7-8years
Gender-Girls and boys
Group size-33
Different types of learner.Its a mxed ability class. I have one special needs
child .
Evidence of learning
 Explain how you structured the lesson so it was coherent.
 Explain how the teaching methods, learning activities and resources that you used helped to
develop the learners’ learning.
 Describe how you assessed the learners’ learning.
I started off the lesson with a activity sheet with sentences. The students in
each group had same sheet. They had to read each sentence and write if

it’s a fact or opinion. Then a child from each group was asked to share their
answers and other groups assessed them using a thumb rule like thumbs
up for correct answer and thumbs down for wrong answer. Then we moved
to development where each group was given different activity. Each of the
group was provided with different topics and the students had to go back
home and think about their opinion on the topic (Wieman 2014). They had
to jot down certain sentences related to the topic and the next day the
students would express their opinions on the topic within the group. In the
final stage, the students had to analyse a newspaper article and point out
which were the sentences were facts and which have been put forward as
opinion. The structuring was done so that it can help the students in the
accumulation of more knowledge by making use of a process (Christiansen
and Weber 2017). The activity sheet helped in providing a simple exercise to
the students that initially introduced the students to the concept. It can
help the students in grasping the meaning of the terms and familiarize the
students with the concept that can set the path for them in understanding
different concepts (Richards and Rodgers 2014).
The teaching methods were interactive that helped the student to focus on
the topic. The method of teaching can be called child-centric because it
laid emphasis on the interests of the child. Emphasis was laid on creating
the interest of the students by the usage of video in the class. It can help
the students in focussing further and the audio-visual aid used can be of
great help for the students. The high quality of the video can help in
getting the attention of the students and the use of closed captioning can
help the students can help the students in understanding the meaning of
fact along with opinion. Research has shown that the attention span of
students is very short and hence the video that was shown to them should
be able to appeal to the students (Bradshaw and Hultquist 2016). It can help
in the aspect of understanding of the topic and helped the students in
understanding the difference between fact and opinion. The examples used
in the sentences should be attractive for the students that can help the
students in analysing the meaning of the topic. Before the video being
introduced short synopsis should be provided to them regarding the
content and the aim of watching the video (Tilya and Mafumiko 2018). This
will help the students in focussing on the crucial aspects and help the
student in focussing on the activity.
The learners learning was assessed initially by considering how many
students were able to give the right answers when they were given the
activity sheets. This can help in the process of gauging the intellectual
level of the students and on the basis of which later on they will be divided
into a group (Georgeson et al. 2015). The ones who are more intelligent will
be grouped together that can help the students in understanding the
concepts better. The activity sheets are provided with pictures that can
help in retaining the interest of the students and can help in throwing a

better light on the topic (Holmes et al. 2015). The learners learning was
assessed in the end by providing to them a newspaper article and they had
to point out whether the lines pertaining to an article were on the basis of
some real facts or they were the opinion of some kind of journalist. This
phase will require thorough understanding of the concept pertaining to fact
and opinion and it should be the final stage that can help the teacher in
understanding the efficacy of his teaching (Jerrim and Vignoles 2016).
Word limit: 600 words Word count:
Evidence of reflection
 Analyse the effectiveness of the lesson; highlight the aspects that went well and explain why
you think they went well.
 Evaluate your existing teaching practice; identify which aspects need further development
and explain how you intend to change and develop these in your future practice.
The effectiveness of the lesson was on account of the fact that there was a
steady progression in relation to the activities. The activity sheet in the
initial phase helped the students in understanding the basic concepts
regarding fact and opinion. The students were able to understand why is it
important to understand the difference between the terms that will help
them in their future (Borich 2016). Branding the opinion of someone as a
real fact can pave the path for a lot of misunderstanding and hence any
kind of ambiguity in relation to these two terms should be made clear to
the students at the outset. The effective of the lesson can be attributed to
the successful progression in relation to the structuring of the lesson. At
the end of the session, almost 90 % of the students were able to deliver
the right answer when the analysis of the newspaper was being done
(Temple et al. 2018). This can help in suggesting the efficacy in relation to
the teaching procedure that was child-centred. The students could rightly
answer and point forward to the difference between fact and opinion that
helped in suggesting the effectiveness of teaching. The aspects that went
well was the initial part that was called Activity Sheet which helped in
capturing the interest of the students and helped in introducing the
students to the vital concepts. I think that it went well with the students

because of the interesting activities that were created by the teachers. The
activity that revolved around the video proved to be extremely effective in
teaching essential concepts to the children (Theobald 2018). The video
helped in throwing important light on the different facets of the topic and
this aspect went well as after the session the students came forward to
explain the sentences that were within the video that were facts and the
part that were put forward by other people.
The existing teaching practice was centred around the child as it relied on
a lot of interaction. The child was given supreme importance while carrying
out the activities that helped the students in becoming clear about the
concepts. In the initial phase, the students could not grasp the meaning of
the concepts and the teacher often had to stop and discuss about the
sentence to the students. Dialogue carried out with faculty along with
peers can help me in developing my teaching style (Skinner 2016). The
feedback can be collected from the students that can help in introducing
the resources that can be of interest to the students. The aspects in
relation to teaching that need further improvement is understanding the
viewpoint of the children that can help in bringing changes to my teaching
style. The ones whose IQ level is low can be teamed up with those whose
IQ level is high that can help them in getting help from them. I can make a
concept map in the class that can help the students in understanding
difficult concepts with the help of a diagram. The using of diagrams in the
class can help the students in better understanding of the topic. Online
learning modules can be used in the classroom that can help the students
in understanding the concepts. The students can be encouraged to
understand the link between other concepts that can be of great help for
them in understanding the relation between different words (Perren et al.
2017). Brainstorming should be encouraged in the class and the
integration of these sessions into the classroom can activate the creative
instincts in the students. These sessions can help the students in voicing
their thoughts and they would not worry about whether they are being
right or wrong. The classes can be taken outside that of the classroom and
role play can prove to be another effective method that can help the
students in understanding different point of view along with different kinds
of social context.
Word limit: 600 words Word count:

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Please ensure that you reference a minimum of 3 sources. We advise you to use
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