Dark Ages / Feudal System Lesson Plan

Name: Jack Redding Class/Subject: World History Date: 11/13/2012 Student Objectives/Student Outcomes:

• Students will investigate the feudal system and its impact on social structure and the medieval economy • Students will understand the major developments of early medieval history from 480 to 1200 AD

Content Standards: 16.B.3c (W) Identify causes and effects of European feudalism and the emergence of nation states between 500 CE and 1500 CE. Materials/Resources/Technology:

• Animated Bayeux Tapestry video • Projector/Computer and PowerPoint presentation • 1 Large bag of Skittles • Copies of Feudal System handout for each student

Teacher’s Goals: Teacher will give students a strong understanding of the medieval economic and social systems along with a basic sense of the historical events from the fall of the Roman Empire to 1200 AD. Time

~5

Start of Class: Have the Animated Bayeux Tapestry video playing as students come in: http://bit.ly/QKVjUm; Explain purpose of tapestry, then discuss elements of the story in small groups

~20

Lesson Instruction: Give PowerPoint mini-lecture on the Dark Ages including the following: Frankish Empire, Vikings, Feudalism, Architecture, The Church

~20

Activity: Skittle Feudalism Demo: http://bit.ly/REB7oO; Students are divided into serfs, nobles, clergy, and royalty. Serfs receive cups filled with 10 skittles, then each level takes its share to show the flow of wealth in the Feudal System

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Assessments/Checks for Understanding: Distribute Feudal System handout: http://bit.ly/UdD6Vr; Have students fill out during lecture and activity

~5 Closure/Wrap-Up/Review: Exit Slip / Show pictures of trips to Europe if time remains

N/A

Self-Assessment: Check to verify that students were able to correctly complete the Feudal System pyramid as evidence that the activity was successful.

John Redding 11/16/12

CI 403

Lesson Plan Reflection

This lesson was based on a variety of pedagogical principles, including interdisciplinary activities and differentiated instruction. In order to reach the content standard of identifying causes and effects of European feudalism, I included an economic demonstration. I gave the students role cards and cups with Skittles candy in them, and had the students pass certain numbers of Skittles to the person above them in the feudal hierarchy. For example, most of the students were serfs, who had to pass more than half of their Skittles to the vassals who owned their land. The vassals then passed most of their candy to the nobles who had given them their land, and so on. This demonstration really drove home to the students the unfairness inherent in the feudal economy. The worksheet I passed out asked the students to record the advantages and disadvantages of their position, and it also asked them to make observations about students from one of the other social classes. They enjoyed the activity, and it seemed to get the point across quite well. At one point, one of the students exclaimed, “I only have 3 Skittles left, I don’t want to play anymore.” I used this as an opportunity to have the students discuss the fact that this mindset was an everyday reality for the people of the Middle Ages, but that they didn’t have the option to “stop playing.” Another pedagogical decision I made was to significantly differentiate my instruction. Countless studies have shown that differentiation allows a teacher to engage many more students for a much longer period of time than single-format instruction. In light of this, I decided to include a variety of instructional techniques in my lesson. I began the lesson with an art analysis of the Bayeux Tapestry, a significant work from the Dark Ages. In order to make the artwork more relevant to them, I found a video that showed the 230-foot-long thousand-year-old piece in animated video form. I asked the students to watch the video, which had no narration, and attempt to discern the major developments in the story told by the Tapestry. I then followed that by giving them some of the actual facts about the Tapestry, and as a class we discussed the importance of the work and the accuracy of our predictions about its purpose. This served as a warm-up activity for the day’s lesson. I followed that with an introduction to the lesson and a brief “mini-lecture” on the Dark Ages to convey some of the important factual information. This section included a very brief video on the origins of the Vikings and a handout to help the students take guided notes. After that, I moved on to the Skittle demonstration explained above. I ended with a brief “show and tell” session, showing some pictures from my own travels in Europe and explaining the connections between the pictures I showed and the historical points we had covered. Between the written information on the PowerPoint slides and the handout, my own verbal explanations of the information, the visual input from the pictures and videos, and the hands-on activity, I tried to include something effective for every learning style. As is the nature of any lesson, it did not work perfectly as I had originally planned it. During the first period, the daily announcements took 10 minutes, considerably longer

than usual. My cooperating teacher also had to make some announcements to the class, so I had substantially less instruction time than I had planned. I only had time for a very abbreviated version of the Skittles activity by the time I finished the other parts of my lesson. The second period, mindful of the fact that I ran out of time the hour before, I decided to show only a minute or so of the Bayeux Tapestry video and I cut my lecture down by removing some extraneous material. The result was a much extended period of time for the activity, which the students greatly enjoyed and seemed to be very beneficial. After discussing the lesson with my cooperating teacher, I would probably shift the Skittle activity to the beginning of the lesson, and then move on to the lecture only after the activity had run its course. I would also have made some changes to the handout, which I structured as a fill-in-the-blank worksheet. After discussing it, we decided that the worksheet may have worked better in a short answer format, where the students would have to write their own definitions of the key terms used in the lesson. My cooperating teacher’s feedback was mainly positive on my “mini-lecture” section, but she rightly pointed out that running out of the time on the activity was a negative. It was very helpful that she had more than a full page of written notes for each period I taught, which helped me to see not only a variety of strengths and weaknesses, but helped me to see how successful I was at adapting from one class to the next. By all accounts, my classroom management improved from the first period to the second, even though the second hour class tends to have more behavioral problems. I think there was a certain degree of “warm-up” needed for me to hit my stride. I think a lot of my problems first period stemmed from getting thrown off by the extremely long announcements. Usually, recovery and on-the-fly adaptation is a strength for me, but for whatever reason I had a bad morning. The second class, both my cooperating teacher and I felt that I was much smoother and handled every facet of the lesson better. She noted that I am “a smooth and effective lecturer,” and that it is my strength as a teacher. I know that lecturing tends to be looked down upon in today’s pedagogy, but I feel that there is still a necessity for some lecturing, and I am glad that I am able to use it efficiently. I was fortunate to be able to have a long post-conference session with my cooperating teacher after my lesson during her planning period. She was able to clarify all questions and give me extensive feedback.