Lesson #3 didn't go quite as planned, but it was definitely a learning experience for me.  The first few lessons in the soil unit are very similar- or at least the activity portions are similar.  They involved slight variations of observing of soil and soil components.  So in effort to switch things up, we planned an alternative/fun lesson for this week where we taught about soil layers through making an edible soil model.  It seemed like such a good idea in theory, but for 2 beginner teachers to try to pull of that lesson, we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into!

Overall the objectives of the lesson were met, but the "carrying out the lesson" portion, which was a good majority of the time, was chaotic.  It's ironic that this week one of the focus skills was classroom management, because it was definitely the area where we struggled the most in this crazy lesson.  There was constant chatter throughout the activity and it was super hard to keep the conversation focused on only soil.  With candy and the food we were using, the third graders were SO distracted.  Which is to be expected- they're kids, and we gave them candy!  Not to mention they'd come back from a week off, and they had a substitute teacher.  We discovered this week that classroom management is a lot tougher without the presence of their regular teacher.  In the past she hasn't had to chime in much, but this week's lesson was particularly hectic and we definitely could have used her help.  

The second focus skill this week was process skills, which was another area where we made a bit of a mistake.  We wrote in our lesson plan that the process skill we wanted to focus on this week was "drawing conclusions" but the teachers who observed us pointed out that it would have been much more relevant for us to have taught "making a model".  It seems so obvious now, I with we had thought of that!  It would have been a really great way to explain the point of the soil activity, and this activity would have been a great way to learn about the process skill, making a model.  It was hard to use this activity to explain "drawing conclusions", and I'm sure the students were confused. 

To look on the bright side, I think the lesson conclusion went well.  The conclusion this week was definitely key for our objectives to be met.  We revisited all of our key questions and all of the points we wanted to cover had been represented in the activity.  I think it would have been much more powerful if we had been able to preface the activity better and more clearly.  By the conclusion when the models were completed, we were able to show them what we were looking for, but if they had known what we were looking for from the beginning I think the whole activity would have been much more meaningful.  

Having gone through that, I still think this would be a tough lesson to try to pull off.  It would take a lot of rethinking and restructuring.  It's not something I would recommend to a beginning teacher.  Full authority in the classroom is a necessity for this one!

This has provided us with an opportunity for drastic improvement for next weeks lesson! Live and learn, and progress.