Help! I have a five-minute teaching demonstration I must present for Teach for America and the New Teacher Project and I am not sure what to do? Advice and suggestions welcome.

February 6, 2012 7:03 AM

Help! I have a five minute-teaching demonstration I must present for Teach for America and the New Teacher Project and I am not sure what to do? Advice and suggestions welcome.

So, I have two several interviews coming up for the The New Teacher Project and possibly even one for Teach for America. Both interviews require that the presenter give a five minute presentation explaining some concept in the allotted time period.

The requirements are the following:
1. No longer than five minutes
2. Age appropriate and interactive
3. Lesson should have clear beginning, middle, and end
4. Lesson should clearly communicate and reach objective with student.

I'd like to know if there is anybody on AskMefi who has done interviews and presentations like this before and if there are any lessons they used or saw that were particularly good. Any advice whatsoever would be very appreciated.

Last question: I am terrible at role-playing interviews. You know the ones where someone gives you a situation and you have to act it out in just the precise way that the organization wants. Is there any way to get better at this? Is there any way to prepare and figure out what TFA and TNTP are looking for?

Thanks!

posted by lackadaisical to education (15 answers total)

During your five minute lesson, use a variety of sensory methods of teaching: visual, aural, tactile. Bring props. Be creative! Choose a fairly straightforward objective, and don't try to cram too much complex information into the lesson.

Incorporate a check-for-understanding moment into the lesson where the student is able to help with the demonstration, or take over, or come up with his/her own iteration of the lesson you are teaching. (This might just be a question-and-answer: "So, what happens next in this process?" [after you've clearly demonstrated or strongly suggested what actually happens next].)

Do not teach about fractions using a pizza or pie. This is the least-common-denominator 5 minute lesson, lots of people do it, and it's hard to make it memorable or fun.

Spend lots of time preparing until you are very comfortable with the material you're presenting. Try presenting your lesson in front of a friend or mentor.

Re: role-playing interviews. Practice, practice, practice, practice, practice. Find a willing friend or mentor (or someone who is currently teaching the grade level you're aiming to teach) to give you some scenarios. Try to practice writing out how you would respond to a scenario as well as talking it through in the moment; sometimes writing can help you structure your responses more effectively, and you'll remember what you wrote if a similar question comes up during the interview.

Good luck!
posted by Spinneret at 7:12 AM on February 6, 2012

Keep it simple. What you're effectively demonstrating is a mini-lesson. Which subject would you say you know best? Go take a look at the Common Core standards for each grade, find a standard for the grade level you'd like to teach, and do a lesson that reviews a concept from that standard.

Structure it like so: Launch your lesson by reviewing what you did "last time", have an "explore" section where students could be doing a small hands on activity, and "summarize" the learning experience at the end.

In your back pocket, be ready to talk about how you would assess learning after a lesson like this, and how you would support English language learners and students with different abilities. Think visual vocabulary charts (SDAIE strategy) and pacing.

Good luck! MeMail me if you'd like more help.
posted by These Birds of a Feather at 7:27 AM on February 6, 2012

I agree with Spinneret that you want engaging and interactive. I spent the past couple years interviewing for faculty jobs, where we usually have more time than that, although I did a couple of 20 minute presentations, which felt very short. With 5 minutes, it's going to be hard to show videos or get your audience to do group work. At least one open ended discussion question would be great.

You don't say what field you're interested in, but I think that the National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science has some excellent examples for all different ages of using case studies to teach concepts in science. Obviously, I don't recommend taking a lesson directly from there, but they offer a wealth of examples of different approaches and styles of innovative teaching.

One way to better prepare yourself for role-playing is just to learn as much as you can about the group and their target populations. Read newspaper and magazine stories and blogs about participants to get an idea of common problem situations and how others have dealt with them. I'm definitely not saying that you want to repeat exactly what someine said on their blog, but just that you should be prepared that, for instance, maintaining order in the classroom is a common difficulty and have some ideas already about how you might role-play a "problem student" scenario.
posted by hydropsyche at 7:30 AM on February 6, 2012

RE: role playing, I would imagine that this will be to test your classroom management skills addressing behavior issues. Have a plan for dealing with common situations: actively disruptive/defiant student, quietly defiant or off-task student, sad/withdrawn student, super-excited-but-disruptive student, etc.

Read up on classroom management! Marzano is well-thought of; I was given the Harry & Rosemary Wong book by one of MY former teachers (it's a little behaviorist for my taste, but there's some really good stuff in it as well; it's worth a read). I remember getting a book written by a former teacher as part of a school PD that was pretty fantastic and very practical. Am looking through Amazon to see if I can find it and will link here if/when I do.
posted by smirkette at 9:46 AM on February 6, 2012

I asked basically the same question on behalf of my daughter a short while ago! Sadly, she didn't get in to the program. Memail me if you want details ...
posted by thinkpiece at 9:52 AM on February 6, 2012

SNAP! I can't believe I found it: Rick Smith, Conscious Classroom Management.
This is where I learned the magic 3 minute rule (when you have a student who is driving you up the wall (or even out the window) talk to him or her for 3 minutes every day about something NOT school-related. Over time, this builds a relationship and humanizes you to each other and your interactions with the student will definitely improve. GOLD.)
posted by smirkette at 9:54 AM on February 6, 2012

I did this interview with one of the New Teacher Program sites. I did a lesson on singing a song in a round. I used a song that everyone would know but "refreshed" their memory from "what they
Learned last time." biggest tips are to have a clear goal (sing a song in round) and to follow their suggestions.
The people who did the best did something that people could reasonably follow along in. Ex the guy who chose to teach the past tense in French didn't do so well because people don't know the preset tense which it is dependent upon. They guy who taught the colors in sPanish (reminding the students o the colors they had learned in English) did alright. Medimail me if you have more questions, best of luck.
posted by raccoon409 at 10:45 AM on February 6, 2012

Look at Pecha Kucha, and Ignite Talks, which structure five minute-ish talks via auto-advancing slides.
posted by rhizome at 11:06 AM on February 6, 2012 [1 favorite]

Basically, from what I have heard it's actually a bad idea to have a really interactive lesson since it will mess up your timing. What I've come up with is taking a tape measurer and teaching the students to measure the high of something in inches and then seeing how many feet it is and inches. This would entail dividing the measurement by 12 to get the feet and then taking the remainder as the inch portion.

Any suggestions? Is this good or bad?
posted by lackadaisical at 11:16 AM on February 6, 2012

That sounds OK. Why not have them measure each other's heights?
posted by steinwald at 11:30 AM on February 6, 2012

I have heard about really cool lesson plans. Teaching the Great Compromise using candy-- "Is it fair that your state, Virginia, which has 5 people, only got one piece of candy? NO! Well that's the New Jersey Plan!" I actually do this one in my History class now.

Mine was a little boring, but I stumbled upon the "TFA way" by accident and it was very successful. I taught how to determine if a source was primary or secondary, aimed at a middle school classroom. The worst lessons I saw that day were the ones aimed at elementary aged kids. The rest of the college-aged interviewees are your "class"-- can you reasonably expect them to behave like 10 year olds? No. The answer is no. Teaching addition by drawing crayons does not an acceptable lesson plan make.

TFA's method of teaching pedagogy is basically:

1) Have a clearly stated objective.
ex: "At the end of this lesson, students will be able to determine if a source is primary or secondary."

2) Break the objective into knowledge and skills. What do students need to know to meet the objective? That's the knowledge. You teach this first. What do they need to know how to do? That's the skill. I gave definitions for each term on the board and students filled out a photocopy of guided notes where they wrote the definitions (the knowledge). Then, I gave three criteria for determining what the sources are (applying the skill).

3) Gradually release responsibility to the student. "I (the teacher) do, we (as a class) do, you (alone) do..." I showed students how to apply the criteria to various sources to determine if they were primary or secondary. Then, we did it as a class, asking students to help me and explain their rationale. Then, I gave students the chance to test their application of the skill on their own.

4) Check for understanding. I gave a newspaper article, book, etc. and put a sticky note on the back with the answer and how the criteria applied. We passed these around. Each student got 20 seconds with it and then we switched. I ran out of time, here.

5) With more time, I would have done an "exit slip" where students would answer a few questions related to their mastery of the objective and I could crunch the numbers and look at where understanding was achieved or wasn't.

Anyway, that's the soul-sucking method of teaching a 5-step lesson plan, and it is (or was, when I was a corps member) how TFA likes lessons to be planned. Good luck! The experience was certainly life-changing for me. I met my fiance, am still teaching after 4 years, and still get very little sleep, all because of TFA.
posted by jstef at 11:33 AM on February 6, 2012 [2 favorites]

Oh yeah-- nothing is provided. You might get a whiteboard, you might not. No projector. It depends on the room. I had everything prepared-- notes pages, chart paper with the definitions, and the sources. Writing on the board eats up your time.

I also practiced with a group of my friends beforehand and timed myself. Try to have :30 or :45 seconds left over. Little things like taping up a piece of chart paper can take longer than you think when you're nervous.
posted by jstef at 11:36 AM on February 6, 2012

Thanks for the answers thus far. The responses have been great.

I'm pretty certain I'm going to stick with measuring the height of something (myself for instance) and then asking them to divide it by twelve to get the feet and inches. I am a little weary of asking to measure somebody in the audience as that could eat up the precious time.
posted by lackadaisical at 11:50 AM on February 6, 2012

Honestly, that sounds a little thin for a 5 minute lesson. And boring. Sorry to be blunt, but I'm a high school teacher and have done lots of these demo lessons, as well as been on interview committees evaluating demo lessons.

I think jstef has really good advice - following that format will give them everything they need to see from you. And if you can do it with confidence and presence, you'll be set. It sounds a little heavy on "I do" with nothing in "we do" or "you do" at the moment. Can you expand the concept a little? If you're intent on measuring and dividing into feet/inches, how can you do it in a way that builds in a little participation? Could you quickly grab a few people from the front row and measure them at least? Then have a "race" to see which audience member can tell you the number of feet/inches fastest?

Also, dividing by 12 without a calculator could be tough for some people (yes, even college students and teachers!). What is your plan if they can't do it? Can you have a 12 times table posted while you do the lesson?

And totally practice it. And get someone who will tell you the truth about how it went - if it was boring for them (or for you!) then you're doing it wrong and/or need to rethink it. And don't be afraid to totally throw out that idea and start over if it isn't working. You want to lead with your strongest lesson, and it's better to ditch an idea before sinking hours of practice into it.

If it were me, I'd go to ShowMe and look through their math videos. Or Khan Academy. There are some examples of good short lessons on there, at least for the "I do" part. You still need to build in practice and fun.
posted by guster4lovers at 3:22 PM on February 6, 2012

I don't think it's a thin activity, but I think they need to be involved in the lesson (measure their/ partners' heights).

This is really important though (going with the objectives): What are you teaching? Are you teaching how to measure things? How to do dividing with remainders? Improper fractions and mixed numbers?

This will really help to figure out the lesson and what you need to do.

REALLY think about supplies involves: do you have enough yard sticks? One really long measuring tape? If the lesson is about fractions/ dividing then you can ask them to make a chart with their height as mixed numbers/ improper fractions.

Hint: Whenever you forget some stuff you can throw in, "Remember when we did this yesterday?"
posted by raccoon409 at 8:05 PM on February 6, 2012