College and Career Competency Instructional Plan

College and Career Competency Instructional Plan

My Plan for Assertiveness Instruction

Name:____EXAMPLE School: ___ EXAMPLE

Setting
e.g., Biology 1, counseling, advisory / Language Arts
Learners
e.g., grade level(s) / 9th grade
Competency Name & Essential Components / Assertiveness
Even when it’s difficult, express my wants, needs, and thoughts.
Even when it’s difficult, respect others’ wants, needs, and thoughts.
Results
Why do you want students to get better at this competency? What do you want to improve through your instruction on this competency? Be specific (e.g., assignments submitted on time, better understanding of content, increased engagement in class discussions, students’ increased confidence in content). / Assertiveness is part of a complex set of social skills that allow children to engage in effective interpersonal communication. Assertiveness training has been shown to reduce bullying.
Students will be able to identify behaviors of characters in plays that respect and/or disrespect other’s wants, needs, and thoughts.
Students will reflect each week identifying times they expressed their wants, needs, or thoughts in an assertive, passive, or aggressive manner or a time they respected or disrespected someone else’s wants, needs, or thoughts. Students will journal what they could have done differently to be more assertive.
Initial Instruction (I do)
How will you teach the essential components of the competency (e.g., model by giving examples, brainstorm strategies around components)? How will students understand their strengths and areas for growth related to competency components (e.g., give competency questionnaire and facilitate student reflection)? / Reference the assertiveness poster, and tell students that there are two essential components, or key points, for assertiveness: 1) expressing our wants, needs, and thoughts—even when it’s difficult; 2) respecting other people’s wants, needs, and thoughts—even when it’s difficult. We’ll be thinking about how this is represented in the plays we’re looking at, and also in our own lives. Show the assertiveness video[NP1].
Practice with Feedback (We do and You do)
How will students practice the competency components over time during your class? How will you provide feedback on students’ demonstration of competency components? / Introduce the key terms: assertive, passive, and aggressive behavior. Organize students into groups of three to four and have them develop a list of what might characterize each of those behaviors. Afterwards, show this tool: Read and analyze dramatic texts to identify (a) examples of assertive, passive, and aggressive behavior, and (b) instances where characters succeeded and failed in respecting other character’s wants, needs, and thoughts. The behavioral analysis questions in the above resource can be a starting point to scaffold students’ understanding of these concepts. Draw particular attention to how so-called villains are perceived and to how specific language and stage direction in the play suggests respecting and disrespecting others’ viewpoints. Look across multiple texts to help students see that disrespect and misunderstandings of other characters’ perspectives can drive the dramatic motion in a play.
Encourage students to perform these important dramatic moments in order to role play respecting and disrespecting others’ wants, needs, and thoughts. Important: make sure to emphasize at the same time that the goal is to act assertively, which means being respectful of others’ wants, needs, and thoughts, even when it’s difficult.
Guide students to connect these concepts to their own lives by comparing how they have acted in ways similar to the characters and by analyzing instances in their own lives where they had trouble respecting the perspectives of others. It may be helpful to guide students in thinking about fellow students they routinely disagree with.
Finally, organize the students into small groups and tell them they will be creating and performing a short play demonstrating assertive and non-assertive behavior. The topic could be open or could relate to one of the key texts. The rest of the class and I then determine which moments in the short play demonstrate assertive and non-assertive behavior and provide evaluative feedback on their performance. Conclude the unit with the assertiveness questionnaire. After students complete the questionnaire, guide them to understand and discuss their own ratings, the class ratings, and what these might mean for their assertiveness in the future.
Reinforcement
Outside of instruction, how will you recognize and reinforce students’ demonstration of the components? / Continue to emphasize assertiveness in future English units. Instances of these can be found in virtually any work of literature. Have students reflect upon the assertive, passive, or aggressive behavior of one of the characters and how it relates to an experience in their own lives.
Materials and Resources
What materials and resources will you access or create to develop this competency? /

Selected dramatic texts
Assertiveness video:
Assertiveness poster:

Plan Addresses:  All components  Ongoing instruction  Feedback to students  Opportunities to demonstrate

[NP1]Is this our assertiveness video for teachers or one that you found for students? Ours wouldn’t be appropriate likely.

[LMA2]Link is not working