Buyung A. N Sudrajat - E-Reflection 2

2^nd E-Reflection Session 2

Planning for Instruction

            After attending the second meeting of PETA course, I learned many things about the topic that we discussed. In the second meeting we discussed about how to plan an instruction before we teach. First activity that we did was watching a video about how to conduct a thematic learning. The video was showing teaching learning activities of elementary school students. In thematic learning video the students did not learn by knowing the subjects but they learned by knowing the theme of learning. In the thematic leaning students could learn more than one subject in one topic.

            After we watched the video, we discussed in a group of five to identify the advantages and disadvantages of thematic learning. We also discussed about what we were going to do differently, if we were the teachers. From the video and discussion with my group I learned that one of most important part in teaching is planning the instruction. Based on the video I know that in thematic learning the teacher has to make very well preparation and planning before teaching. Besides that I also learned that when we are planning or designing the learning activities, we can collaborate with other teacher to create meaningful learning like in the video.

            From this session I also learned that there are several elements that must be included when we are planning for instruction. Those elements are the topic or the learning content, the activity, and the assessment. We need to determine those three aspects clearly and linked each other to avoid two mistakes or sins in designing a curriculum. The mistakes or sins are activity focused in which we too focus on the activity but we do not learn anything or without minds on. The second is we avoid doing coverage approach in which we only teach, giving test and hoping good result. I learned this from discussion activity in which we analyzed some cases where the design or planning was not run well.

            The last thing that I learned from this session is the steps of planning for instruction. There are three main steps when we are planning for instruction based on Understanding by Design framework. The first step is identifying the objectives of the learning process. We have to set the learning output like what students need to know and be able to do. Second, we have to determine the standard or evidence that can explain what they understand and can do. The third is planning the learning activities. I can say that this part is the most important because if this part is not well planned those two steps will be useless.       

            So, from all my explanation above, I can sum up that before we can be an effective teacher and conduct effective teaching, we need to prepare and plan the instruction well. From this session I learned a lot about how to plan for instruction. I think there is no part that I do not understand. I just want to know more in detail about how to design or plan good instruction for effective teaching. This session was really interesting because it opened my mind that there are a lot of knowledge that should be known as an educator besides the content knowledge such as planning instruction. The topic of this lesson really helps me to prepare SEP program, since I also have to plan or design a lesson plan that is part of designing instruction. All my expectation was fulfilled in this lesson. I hope in the next lesson I can learn about the model of instruction and know how to do it appropriately. That is all my reflection for this session thank you.   

By : Buyung A. N. Sudrajat - 2011120010