Thelen - Lesson Overview #2

Thelen – LESSON OVERVIEW #2
For this lesson, I had two focus students because it was a time intensive lesson. At this time, my class is in the process of writing their own mystery stories after they have read a couple mystery novels in class. After revising some of their story plans (required before they are allowed to begin a rough draft of their story), I found that many students were struggling with character development. This relates to reading because people have to read the stories they are creating and they have to make sense and have a good plot. Characterization is a key part of those plots.
I chose Student 1 because she is a good writer and I think she will have an easier time developing her characters through my scaffolding and the activity in the lesson. She will also help Student 2 in this way because she has a lot of good ideas for her classmates’ stories. The two students also work well together and can benefit from reading each others’ stories. They both also have similar main characters which will make the exercise flow better.
This lesson also relates to the articles of Stahl and Neufeld because it deals with comprehension, but in an opposite manner. The students have to make their stories more comprehendible for their peers who have to read them, and the main part that they need to work on is characterization in order to make their stories better. Some of their stories did not make sense as I read them because the plot and characters were not developed enough, making it tough to read and comprehend; thus, having the students focus on characterization will aid in the level of comprehension that can be attained by those reading their stories.