Running Head: REFLECTION FOR MODULE TWO 1
Erika Lopez
Reflection for Module Two
Arizona State University
REFLECTION FOR MODULE TWO 2
Abstract
This reflection is a synthesis of weeks four through six in our RDG 323 course, which
covered the following topics: engagement and motivation, face to face and digital learning
environments, deep and surface learning, formative assessment, text complexity, content and
language objectives, explicit strategy instruction, and frameworks for planning instruction.
Week Four
This week covered creating engaging and motivating learning environments in literacy
tasks. It’s important to learn about our students’ interests in order to find topics that will motivate
them and engage them in their learning. Most academic reading and writing assignments are not
motivating or engaging to them so we must find relevance to their lives, in what ways can we
help them to find connections to the readings or writings? (Irvin, Meltzer, & Dukes, 2007).
Another strategy to help students with engagement is to create a safe and responsive classroom
where students will be acknowledged and have a voice. Authentic tasks are also very important,
this means that tasks must be real-world tasks with a personal purpose, students can work with
each other by stimulating questioning, creating predictions, summarizing, visualizing, clarifying,
among other tasks (Irvin, Meltzer, & Dukes, 2007).
In this week we also went over the differences between surface learning and deeper
learning. As educators, we must create the right environments that allow for deeper learning;
there must be a strong school culture, teachers must work as professionals in a collaborative
community, and we must design meaningful learning experiences. This will create deeper
learning environments where students are working collaboratively, thinking critically, building
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their academic mindsets, among many other great skills to prepare them for the real world
(Wickline, 2015).
Week Five
During week five we addressed how literacy practices can be used as formative
assessments. Formative assessments can give us instant data and feedback on how a student is
doing or what level of understanding they have on a certain topic. We dived into some digital
tools that can be very useful as formative assessments, these include: GoFormative, Flipgrid,
Mentimeter, Edpuzzle, among others. There are different types of assessments; for example,
these are the most common three: assessment for learning, assessment as learning, and
assessment of learning (Fisher & Frey, 2014). In more understandable terms; one is before the
learning takes place to see how much the student knows on the topic, the second is as the
learning is taking place to see if the student is understanding, and the last one is after the lesson
or topic has been taught to see what knowledge the student retained.
Week Six
In this week we learned how to create lesson plans for differentiated instruction. We
dived into content language objectives which show what a student must know and be able to do
in a specific content and also explains what language skills they will be using to get there. It’s
important for a lesson plan to include content language objectives as well as have a B-D-A
framework. This structure has strategies for preparing students to get the most out of a reading
task. The “B” stands for before, the “D” for during, and the “A” for after the reading process
(Heik, 2020). This is so helpful for the students because it guides them throughout the entire
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reading process and helps them understand it to the best of their abilities. This framework is not
only great for reading comprehension but also for viewing videos or understanding other texts.
REFLECTION FOR MODULE TWO 5
References
Fisher, D., & Frey, N. (2015, May). Assessments That Highlight Strengths and Challenges.
Retrieved October 10, 2020, from
[Link]
[Link]
Heick, T. (2020, May 15). 40 Viewing Comprehension Strategies. Retrieved October 10, 2020,
from [Link]
watching-videos-like-you-read-a-book/
Irvin, J. L., Meltzer, J., & Dukes, M. S. (2007). Student Motivation, Engagement, and
Achievement. In Taking Action on Adolescent Literacy: An Implementation Guide for
School Leaders. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum
Development. Retrieved October 10, 2020, from
[Link]
Engagement,-[Link]
Wickline, H. (2015, March 04). Creating the Conditions for Deeper Learning. Retrieved October
10, 2020, from [Link]