Post-Reflection

When thinking back over the entire collaborative planning process, I am pleased with how the collaboration went. From the start it was very nice to have someone to bounce ideas off of and someone who could give honest and constructive support/criticism to the unit as a whole. As the SLMS, I had many ideas and skills that I wanted to implement into the lessons. It was hard to narrow down my focus to what I wanted to actually cover and Dave was a great resource for this. As the classroom teacher, he had many time elements in mind that were easy for me to loose sight of in the planning process. I was thinking globally and trying to fit in as many benchmarks as I could; however, he was thinking day-to-day and how many benchmarks would be feasible to cover. I found it crucial, to do this collaborating together, as teachers and SLMS's may have different thoughts in mind as mentioned above. Coming together and sharing ideas, benchmarks and time frames, helped to make the project beneficial to all parties involved.

When developing the lessons, having the classroom teacher as an active participant was wonderful in order to share the teaching of the material. This unit would not even be possible if all elements were to be completed solely in the media center. It was great to have the flexibility with Dave to plan out when and what we would teach in each location. I focused more on the technology piece, whereas he focused more on the language arts portion. Having the flexibility as an SLMS to participate in the classroom instruction was also a huge asset to this project. When media specialists have the time and ability to go out into the classrooms and offer assistance to the classroom teacher, many units such as this one could be a huge success.

I really enjoyed having a partner in order to discuss the assessment portion of the unit. Discussing the benchmarks covered and how to word descriptors on the rubric were very beneficial to me. I often have a hard time thinking about how to accurately communicate student performance. While Dave and I bounced ideas back and forth in this area, the achievement level that I was looking for became much clearer to me. Dave and I both had the same ideas in mind while discussing assessment, since the grading descriptors (exceeding, meeting, approaching, and does not meet) we used are consistent with our district report card.

Overall I thought it was a great experience to collaborate with my teaching partner on this unit. Even still, there were a few road blocks we faced, but were able to work through over the course of the unit. First, it was often hard to find time to meet to discuss the project. Even though Dave is my husband and we live together, that almost gave us more reason to procrastinate and think that we would have plenty of time later to do the task at hand. We also collaborated at specific times throughout the unit and I felt that he was a step behind when we would meet together. I wish we would have discussed more informally throughout the planning process, so that Dave would have been up-to-date with the progress I made on the unit since the last time we met.

I am anxious to continue collaborating throughout my future career as an SLMS. I loved having the opportunity to see what collaboration involves and has the power to be. I can see how beneficial this type of work is to students and their overall achievement. It is great to see a SLMS at work and how valuable our jobs are!