This unit is designed as an introduction to developing a self-regulated learning dialogue in the classroom. The concept of self-regulated learning reconfigures the teacher controlled classroom to refocus power on the student. It emphasizes the development of independent learning and self-monitoring, attempting to redefine the teacher as coach or facilitator as opposed to manager or ultimate authority. Through participation in this series of lessons, students should develop a beginning framework and vocabulary they can use to approach academic, social, and problematic tasks. Along with vocabulary, students will begin to acquire a reservoir of concrete examples that reinforce the usefulness of these behaviors in fiction stories and non-fiction texts they read. The ultimate goal of this unit is that students begin to transfer these behaviors from concept to practice. Essentially, the unit is constructed to slowly scaffold students so that by the end of the unit, they can work to solve a task or problem with at least one new learning tool, i.e. finding the hero in themselves.
(Developed for Reading and Language Arts, grade 4; recommended for Reading and Language Arts, grades 4-5)
