Title: What Happened to the Roanoke Colony?Date Taught: Nov. 21st, 2019

5th Grade Social StudiesObjectives:By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:

- Articulate what a colony is and what is the purpose of a colony- Recall the major points of Roanoke’s history - Discuss the theories of Roanoke’s disappearance- Argue which theory they agree with the most

Standards/Benchmarks:NM Social Studies Standards Content I: History

1. explain the motivations for the European exploration of the Americas2. describe and explain the reasons for colonization, to include religious freedom, desire for

land, economic opportunity, a new way of life, including the roles and views of key individuals who founded colonies

Common Core English Language Standards- CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.5.5: Compare and contrast the overall structure (e.g.,

chronology) of events, ideas, concepts, or information in two or more texts

Materials:- Roanoke, The Lost Colony by Jane Yolen and Heidi Elisabeth Yolen Stemple

Resources:- Mentor Teacher, Dr. Kendall Taylor- Methods Professor, Dr. Rebecca Sanchez- Website which sparked the finding of the book, http://www.unleashingreaders.com/?

p=1755- Website to assist with definitions and understanding,

https://kids.britannica.com/kids/article/colony/403800/253017-toc

Procedure:1. Introduce what I will be doing for social studies and show the book we will read2. Mini Lesson on Colonies and their Purpose (HELP)

a. A colony is a group of people from another country who build a settlement in another territory or land

b. Why? For money.3. Read Aloud of book

a. Example of one of the first attempts to colonize the New World

b. Checking for understanding for why they decided to colonize Roanoke4. Stop before theories and ask if they liked it, get curiosity building5. Read theories

a. Break everyone into groups to defend the theories based on what they thinkb. Reassure students that we don’t know so anyone could be right

6. Share out of each group on what they think about the theory and why they think it has more potential to be true. Additional questioning from the book:

7. Wrap Up, Check for Feedback, Major Takeawaysa. Ask what is a colony? (a group of people from another country who built a

settlement in another territory)b. Ask what is the purpose of one? (money, gold, farmland, religious freedom, etc)c. Who do we know went to Roanoke? (John White, Sir Raleigh, Virginia Dare,

Eleanor)d. Why did they go there? (gold and farmland are the reasons from the text)

Assessment:Students will restate what a colony is and through discussion share what the purpose of colonies is. As I read through theories, I will build curiosity using the probing questions within the book. Students will argue which theory they agree with more and utilize sections of the story to argue their point.

I will also be keeping field notes to keep track of who is participating.

**This is a lesson plan that will also be used for another class for ADHD accommodations. I utilized check ins, chunking directions, teacher proximity, and written and verbal outline of the tasks within the lesson.

Reflection:I was really nervous going into this lesson. Social Studies was my weakest subject in

school. I was never interested in the material and I struggled to stay engaged. However, I wasn’t

nervous enough that the kids could notice because I was acting very excited and eager to begin

the lesson. Roanoke is my personal favorite point in American colonization. My goal was to

instill that same excitement and curiosity for my students.

I did a few things well. I was flexible. I allowed groups more time for discussion if they

needed it and I adjusted how frequently I was checking for understanding due to the complexity

of the picture book. This made me the proudest because when I did my read aloud for class, I

was nervous and just read through. I didn’t check for understanding until the end and at that

point, if I lost the student, the only way to get them back would be to reread it. I also read the

story with emotion. I wasn’t just reading the words to the children, but I adjusted my tone and

had fun with it. I also got their attention when I was writing the schedule/plan for the lesson on

the board. I explained it verbally and wrote it simultaneously.

Some critiques I have for next time would be to mind my time better, ask for repetition of

directions, and plan my written schedule better. I went over on time for the lesson by about 15-

20 minutes. However, my students and my mentor teacher weren’t bothered by this at all. The

level of thinking in the classroom was sophisticated and engaged. However, if I’m managing a

whole day of school and I let this lesson hang over, it would be problematic. The best way to

adjust this is to plan out how long the “mini lesson” will go, how long the read aloud will go, and

how long the group discussions will go. I also told students directions quickly and many of them

had to ask what I asked for. This is something I am getting better at doing but forgot for this

lesson due to my nervousness. Finally, the plan I wrote on the white board wasn’t completely

planned out. I wanted to give everyone an idea of what we are doing for the lesson, but I didn’t

plan out how I wanted to articulate the lesson in kid friendly language on the board.

An additional section of this lesson plan was my first attempt at full accommodation for

my students with ADHD. While this inclusion was for another course, it was one of the few

times I saw all of my students with ADHD be engaged and curious the whole time. All of them

spoke to how the plan on the board was really helpful for them to keep track of what we were

doing. They also were in close proximity to me or Dr. Taylor which was intentional for their

success. I was very pleased with their quality of discussion. However, due to the nature of

ADHD, one of them was heavily dominating a discussion within a group. However, the other

people in the group found it “annoying” and compared it to the colonists maybe intentionally

leaving behind an annoying person like the student. I diffused the situation and we discussed

how even saying it was a joke doesn’t make the person feel better if the words hurt to begin with.

The group worked well after that, but I would safely assume to not let them work in a group for a

while after this lesson.

Based on the exit tickets and my observations for assessment, I would say that I would

need to reteach some more about what a colony is specifically. All students seemed to

understand what they were after and most seemed to grasp that it was a group of people who

were from another country. There seemed to be a disconnect across most of the class though on

how those resources and traveling from elsewhere were connected.

Overall, I am pleased. This was my first official lesson plan for social studies, and I feel

more optimistic about teaching it for the future. I know how I would adjust for the future and

what I can build upon for the spring semester when we learn about colonization.

Artifacts:

1. Field Notes: The image below is the front and back of my notes during the lesson. I wrote down ideas that I heard through small and whole group discussions.

2. Major Quotes: I didn’t collect any student work during the lesson because the students work well with the discussions. The topic piqued their interest enough that even when I checked for every group member participation, they were all talking and listening to each other. The following are a few quotes that I heard that represented sophisticated thinking:

o “I think that they [colonists] wanted to be able to do whatever religion that they wanted without feeling pressured to do a certain one” (This quote was prior to me teaching them that a reason for colonization was religious freedom. I asked them why they thought people would colonize somewhere else.)

o “Why did [John] White go alone? Something could have happened besides him getting stuck in England. They could have communicated better if more than one person left for supplies.”

o For the “lost at sea theory”: “As a group, we thought that they built another boat, because the pinnace was too small, out of the wood from the houses. That’s why everything looked empty.”

o For the split community theory: “They could have been writing two different places in the trees and just didn’t get the chance to finish. Some went to “CROATOAN” and others went to whatever “CRO” was going to be.

3. Exit Tickets: However, I did do an exit ticket to check for understanding of my big ideas: what is a colony and why did they colonize? Overall, all the students seemed to remember what the resources were (i.e. gold, farmland, wood, etc.). There was disconnect between how gathering those resources are the purpose of the colony. I was surprised to see some responses as simple as “a group of people” for what a colony was. The photo below contains some high-level responses, some low level responses, and the responses of my students with ADHD. I’m really pleased with the high-level thinking with this activity. They made connections for the traveling and their purposes. The low-level responses were interesting as they cited “resources” from the book, but there wasn’t a connection to the colony at all. It also feels unclear whether they understood a colony from their definitions. My students with ADHD answered the question fairly well with one of them defining a colony as a group of people who live together. I may need to spend more time on colonization and colonies as a whole next time.