Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Group 1 HW
I really hate grammar, but reading these few pages in Noden’s book gave me a little bit of confidence that I may be able to understand grammar personally as well as teaching it. I liked the concept of the “5 brush strokes,” and I realize how important grammar really is when dealing with how to effectively communicate my ideas to others through writing.
Monday, September 24, 2007
Indy Teach
Indy Teaching Planning-
Main Ideas-
1. Focus on setting up a “literacy friendly” classroom environment.
2. Bring the students into this environment with the idea that they are active contributors to their learning experience.
3. Use new and old ideas to maintain literacy among a large spectrum of different learning abilities.
Possible Essential Questions-
1. Why focus on literacy at the middle school and high school level?
2. What is the importance of a classroom focused around literacy building and reading
comprehension?
3. Why is it important for students’ to take responsibility for their own literacy?
Activities-
Identify what indicates a “good book”-
1. Give students a variety of short stories written for different reading levels.
2. Ask students which text they enjoyed more and why?
3. Compare the “level” of the text, to the content in the text? (I.e. was the text more enjoyable because it was easy or because the content in the text was interesting?)
Pick a literacy issue-
1. Students are broken up into groups of 4 or 5 students.
2. In these groups students are given an example of a literacy issue that may occur in their particular classroom.
3. Students must assess the issue and give examples of how they would address the literacy problem.
Main Ideas-
1. Focus on setting up a “literacy friendly” classroom environment.
2. Bring the students into this environment with the idea that they are active contributors to their learning experience.
3. Use new and old ideas to maintain literacy among a large spectrum of different learning abilities.
Possible Essential Questions-
1. Why focus on literacy at the middle school and high school level?
2. What is the importance of a classroom focused around literacy building and reading
comprehension?
3. Why is it important for students’ to take responsibility for their own literacy?
Activities-
Identify what indicates a “good book”-
1. Give students a variety of short stories written for different reading levels.
2. Ask students which text they enjoyed more and why?
3. Compare the “level” of the text, to the content in the text? (I.e. was the text more enjoyable because it was easy or because the content in the text was interesting?)
Pick a literacy issue-
1. Students are broken up into groups of 4 or 5 students.
2. In these groups students are given an example of a literacy issue that may occur in their particular classroom.
3. Students must assess the issue and give examples of how they would address the literacy problem.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
My Link
If anyone would like to learn more about teaching in inner city schools, this is a website I discovered last year while writing a paper dealing with urban schools. I found this website very straight to the point and helpful. Their mission is valid and important with today’s picture of inner city schools.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Technology in the classroom
This quote is from the article "Unleashing Potential with Emerging Technology."
“I write as much for getting my ideas out as I do to see the comments and responses of those who are listening and reacting. In school, writing is about handing something in. Here, it’s about having something to say.”
When reading this statement it reminded me a lot about my high school experience with writing. I had a hard time finding real relevance in writing papers during class. My papers were always better when written on my own time. I feel like the pressure of writing something sporadically, led to a misunderstanding of the meaning behind it. Incorporating technology in my future classroom before reading this article was not a priority on my list of things to do. Now I see the relevance it has, because incorporating technology is geared towards helping the students bring personal skills into the classroom that they acquired outside of the learning environment. By doing so this strengthens the classroom environment because students are bringing relevant learning skills from home into the school.
“I write as much for getting my ideas out as I do to see the comments and responses of those who are listening and reacting. In school, writing is about handing something in. Here, it’s about having something to say.”
When reading this statement it reminded me a lot about my high school experience with writing. I had a hard time finding real relevance in writing papers during class. My papers were always better when written on my own time. I feel like the pressure of writing something sporadically, led to a misunderstanding of the meaning behind it. Incorporating technology in my future classroom before reading this article was not a priority on my list of things to do. Now I see the relevance it has, because incorporating technology is geared towards helping the students bring personal skills into the classroom that they acquired outside of the learning environment. By doing so this strengthens the classroom environment because students are bringing relevant learning skills from home into the school.
Monday, September 17, 2007
I am from
I am from a huge oak tree with green leaves
I am from wooden swing-sets and tire swings
I am from new bikes on birthdays
I am from short nights followed by long days
I am from apple fight that end with cries for mercy
I am from smores, with generic chocolate not Hershey
I am from tattered clothes that don’t last a week
I am from playing tag in-between the laundry sheets
I am from small fights that are made up with forced hugs
I am from fly swatters used to kill every form of bugs
I am from let’s share, to no let’s not
I am from “move your feet lose your seat” to keep my spot
I am from long nights at the table because I would not eat my food,
I am from “no one goes outside, until you clean your room!”
I am from dirt between my toes
I am from insect repellant sprayed up my nose.
I am from sorrow when the sun goes down
I am from lonely nights when my siblings are not around.
I am from old cars that seem brand new
I am from the “bunny method” taught to tie my shoe
I am from family pictures that last so long
I am from a beautiful family that keeps me strong.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Where I'm From
Where I’m From: Inviting students’ lives into the classroom.
“In my classrooms at Jefferson High School, I’ve attempted to find ways to make students feel significant and cared about as well, to find space for their lives to become part of the curriculum. I do this by inviting them to write about their lives, about the worlds from which they come (19).”
Making students feel significant is a task that all teachers take on in the beginning of their careers. I can relate to this quote because in high school, I had a teacher who used these same tactics in our 11th grade honors literature course. Being able to bring my personal life into the classroom was a relief. At school students are expected to turn off home life and turn on learning but it is not that simple. Having assignments that revolve around sharing experiences at home let students know that it is okay to combine the two in order to have a beneficial learning activity. This style of learning also allows English educators to learn more about the individual students’ home life. Understanding where students are coming from and what type of environment they have to deal with on a daily basis allows teachers to assess the individual needs of the student. Opening up the students solitary “worlds” permit’s the teacher to understand and evaluate students writing more effectively, in order to uplift the educational experience for both the student and teacher.
“In my classrooms at Jefferson High School, I’ve attempted to find ways to make students feel significant and cared about as well, to find space for their lives to become part of the curriculum. I do this by inviting them to write about their lives, about the worlds from which they come (19).”
Making students feel significant is a task that all teachers take on in the beginning of their careers. I can relate to this quote because in high school, I had a teacher who used these same tactics in our 11th grade honors literature course. Being able to bring my personal life into the classroom was a relief. At school students are expected to turn off home life and turn on learning but it is not that simple. Having assignments that revolve around sharing experiences at home let students know that it is okay to combine the two in order to have a beneficial learning activity. This style of learning also allows English educators to learn more about the individual students’ home life. Understanding where students are coming from and what type of environment they have to deal with on a daily basis allows teachers to assess the individual needs of the student. Opening up the students solitary “worlds” permit’s the teacher to understand and evaluate students writing more effectively, in order to uplift the educational experience for both the student and teacher.
Sunday, September 9, 2007
Best Practice/ Being a Writer
What is best practice?
Best practice in my opinion is the surveillance and upkeep of the education system. I use the term surveillance because best practice teaching, skims the traditional education system, keeping the good parts and repairing the bad. When I think of the best practice teaching system I like to relate it to an auto mechanic. The educational system could be described as a classic used car that needs that only a certified mechanic can fix. To the untrained eye the educational system today looks unfixable. To a trained mechanic, such as best practice teaching the solution is simple. Incorporate 7 tenants of teaching to be used in the classroom. Reading-as-thinking, representing-to-learn, small-group activities, classroom workshop, authentic experiences, reflective assessment and using integrative units are the 7 aspects of best practice teaching. Non-Best practice teaching in my opinion is teaching one dimensional. Learning requires more than a book, caulk, and an overhead projector. Of course these are tools to be used but not obsessively. They get the ball rolling but are not enough. Creating a 3-dimensional classroom environment that enables students to incorporate most of their senses while uplifting cognitive abilities is a goal that best practice teaching strives to accomplish. The area of best practice teaching I believe would be most effective in an English classroom is using authentic experiences aspect to allow students to link life experience with the literature. By using this aspect, students will be able to authenticate the literature with personal situations, which will enable them to retain the information more effectively.
What does it mean to be a writer?
From the article “crafting a life,” Murray gave me the impression that writing is all about the aspiring author. There is no real definition, or blueprint to a writer, it is whatever one person desires to be.
(Quote from article)-“The reason I continue to write is not so much for publication, for fame, for money, but for surprise. And in surprise, understanding; and, in understanding healing (15)”
This statement is exactly how I feel after accomplishing the task of writing a paper or writing project. The surprise element of writing always hits me immediately after completing the assignment. I say to myself, “I can’t believe I got it done.” I now realize that I am capable of writing more than what I thought I could. Not only that, I realize that my writing is better than what I believed it could be. When looking back on one’s own writing, confidence grows. A person who once may have doubted their abilities now embraces them. This chain reaction of surprise to understanding to healing is a process that every writer goes through. It takes strength to write but going through this process allows writers to continue to press on, knowing that understanding is coming. The healing part of the process is the long awaited exhale when a final period is placed on a piece. This gives one the satisfaction of knowing that something that has absorbed so much time and effort is now complete and finished. These are three stages that allow potential author’s/writers the time to reflect on their work through the element of surprise which transforms unto understanding and healing all geared towards making a person a better and more confident writer.
Best practice in my opinion is the surveillance and upkeep of the education system. I use the term surveillance because best practice teaching, skims the traditional education system, keeping the good parts and repairing the bad. When I think of the best practice teaching system I like to relate it to an auto mechanic. The educational system could be described as a classic used car that needs that only a certified mechanic can fix. To the untrained eye the educational system today looks unfixable. To a trained mechanic, such as best practice teaching the solution is simple. Incorporate 7 tenants of teaching to be used in the classroom. Reading-as-thinking, representing-to-learn, small-group activities, classroom workshop, authentic experiences, reflective assessment and using integrative units are the 7 aspects of best practice teaching. Non-Best practice teaching in my opinion is teaching one dimensional. Learning requires more than a book, caulk, and an overhead projector. Of course these are tools to be used but not obsessively. They get the ball rolling but are not enough. Creating a 3-dimensional classroom environment that enables students to incorporate most of their senses while uplifting cognitive abilities is a goal that best practice teaching strives to accomplish. The area of best practice teaching I believe would be most effective in an English classroom is using authentic experiences aspect to allow students to link life experience with the literature. By using this aspect, students will be able to authenticate the literature with personal situations, which will enable them to retain the information more effectively.
What does it mean to be a writer?
From the article “crafting a life,” Murray gave me the impression that writing is all about the aspiring author. There is no real definition, or blueprint to a writer, it is whatever one person desires to be.
(Quote from article)-“The reason I continue to write is not so much for publication, for fame, for money, but for surprise. And in surprise, understanding; and, in understanding healing (15)”
This statement is exactly how I feel after accomplishing the task of writing a paper or writing project. The surprise element of writing always hits me immediately after completing the assignment. I say to myself, “I can’t believe I got it done.” I now realize that I am capable of writing more than what I thought I could. Not only that, I realize that my writing is better than what I believed it could be. When looking back on one’s own writing, confidence grows. A person who once may have doubted their abilities now embraces them. This chain reaction of surprise to understanding to healing is a process that every writer goes through. It takes strength to write but going through this process allows writers to continue to press on, knowing that understanding is coming. The healing part of the process is the long awaited exhale when a final period is placed on a piece. This gives one the satisfaction of knowing that something that has absorbed so much time and effort is now complete and finished. These are three stages that allow potential author’s/writers the time to reflect on their work through the element of surprise which transforms unto understanding and healing all geared towards making a person a better and more confident writer.
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