Teaching Rationale

The approach to this lesson is based around the pupils getting a clear understanding of how and where Hydrogen Fuel Cells could be used as an alternative energy resource. The first aspect of this lesson was to captivate the students and motivate them so that they would be engaged throughout the lesson. It “is the teacher’s role to motivate the student by encouraging them to see the value of what they are about to learn, and to believe in their own capacity”( Marzano).This is done by means of a video clip that is played before the lesson topic is introduced. The clip shows our current status in relation to the future crisis of our non-renewable energy resources. This clip leads on to the introduction of the lesson on Hydrogen Fuel Cells (Orientation). The introduction will inform the pupils where this topic lies in relation to previous lessons and to future lessons. A short task at the beginning of the lesson (learning strategy) will be given to the students asking them to name types of non-renewable energy resources used at present. Positive feedback will be given to all their responses as it is shown to increase pupils’ grades by 2 grades (Effect size 1.13).

A Hydrogen Fuel Cell will be present in the class for demonstration purposes which will form part of the lesson. This will provide pupils an opportunity to observe how these fuel cells function. This will gain the students attention (motivation). Information on the working principles of the fuel cell will be presented to the pupils orally while they observe the fuel cell operating.The fuel cell will be passed around to the pupils to give them an opportunity to examine the device. Whilst this is commencing, information will be shown to the pupils through the Powerpoint presentation about the applications of Hydrogen Fuel Cells. The visual images will assist the pupils’ long term storage. The next stage of the lesson is activity based (Learning by doing). Direct instructions will be given prior to pupils’ engaging in the task as this is shown also to improve pupils grades (Effect size 0.82) It will be based around an activity sheet that requires the pupils to answer questions and give their opinions on what they learned to date. This makes the learning visible to the pupils and the teacher so enabling correction and improvement. The pupils will be divided into groups to encourage group discussion where the focus will be on teaching by asking and not (teaching by telling). This will encourage the pupils to brainstorm, another form of active learning that will allow the groups to contribute ideas.

After the activity is complete, slides showing extra advantages and disadvantages will be shown so that the key points are strengthened by emphasis and repetition. The pupils’ opinions will be added to the presentation so they get a sense of achievement when they see that their opinions form part of the lesson. This will form part of the review where emphasis will be on making the link of what was discussed in the lesson with former learning in the previous lessons and future learning in the upcoming lessons (Evaluation/Orientation). Pupils will be briefed on what will be covered in the next lesson. The activity sheets will be collected and assessed to determine whether students have achieved the learning objectives? This will be a formative assessment that will form part of the continuous assessment throughout this topic.