Abraham Lincoln Lesson Plan

By Debbie BratbergWindsor Creek Elementary10725 Old Redwood HighwayWindsor,Ca 95492Dbratberg@aol.com

Introduction

I have been teaching second grade for six years.I choose this lesson plan because it fits with statewide second grade standards and Lincoln is one my favorite presidents.I choose to be part of CTAP because of my personal interest in technology and my believe that integrating technology is very powerful.

http://ctap295.ctaponline.org/~dbratber

Expectations

I expected to be able to create a web page that would be useful for myself and for other teachers.I expected that I would be able to take this knowledge and apply it to designing a web page for my school.I expected that my students would benefit from this coarse.

Actual Learning

I learned how to use a template to make a web page.I learned how to use Netscape Navigator and PowerPoint.I learned about and bookmarked many new web sites that I will continue to use for research and information.I am better at narrowing my searches on the net.

Successes

I strengthed an existing lesson plan on Lincoln by integrating it with technology.I am more confident about web designing and I plan to work on a web page for my school.I have figured out better ways to surf the net.I have obtained a valuable piece of software – Microsoft Office –by completing this project.

Shortcomings

The restrictions of using a template were frustrating at times. (I never did find a spell check in the web template itself and I really needed it.)There are too many sub-pages attached to the main lesson plan page which makes navigating for information less efficient.Lack of adequate school internet access made this project challenging.

Student Data

The red bars are pretest scores for each of my 18 students. The blue bars are the corresponding posttest results. The chart shows that 15 students improved their scores. The 3 students who did not improve their scores already had pretest scores of 90%, 100%, and 100%.

Reflections and Revisions

REFLECTIONS: The pretest and posttest results along with my own observations indicate that this was an age appropriate, interesting unit for my students. It added depth to an already existing unit that I teach. It made sense to me to take a unit I already teach to design a web lesson plan, rather than starting from scratch.REVISIONS: I want to refine my assessment to include a rubric for the writing aspects of the plan.

Conclusion

I was able to use a template to design a web lesson plan about Abraham Lincoln. Anyone can do this project if they have lots of time :) , adequate access to the net, and tech wizard to help guide you.The lesson plan fits well with second grade state benchmarks and I hope other teachers will find it useful.I was able to strengthen my own unit on Lincoln and integrate it with powerful technology tools.