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What do you do when you have seventh graders who can barely read at a kindergarten level?
What do you do when your students are so low level, they can't even copy letters off a board?
What do you do when you have a student who writes about the memory of his mother beating him with a stick after he skipped school one day?

...I'm not really sure this is what I thought I was signing up for...

The Medium is the Message

This section was a really good one to think about. Postman talks about the students sitting there and listening to the teacher and how they don't have any real opportunity to help decide which problems are worth studying and they never have any opportunities to make observations or perform any intellectual operations (Postman 19). I'm thinking that I want my kids to make at least one test or quiz per semester when I'm a teacher. Why not? Individual students could make up a question or something and if they complain-hey, your friends made it, not me. That sound more engaging to me. Or what if we even let one of the students (kind of) teach part of a lesson or something? That would certainly mean something different for sixth grade than it would for twelfth grade, but wouldn't that be cool? When the students go to do their homework they don't necessarily have someone to keep them accountable or often they don't even see a purpose in it. Some do it just to get a grade and others just because they know the teachers wants them to. But talk about accountability and purpose-if you don't prepare well then you will be in front of the whole class and not know what to say. I mean it probably couldn't be anything elaborate, but why not get students that feel comfortable in front of the class up there doing something that might seem more worth while. Even just explaining what a part of speech is or something. I really want to do that with my students.

9/13/2011

As I was reading Teaching as a Subversive Activity, I found myself saying "wow, that's so true!". I found the chapter on crap-detecting particularly interesting because it made several valid points. I like the idea of "change revolution" because we often fear change, but change plays an integral role in the process of living. However, the degree of change is what has such a drastic effect on the world, and education in particular. I was in a team meeting last week and a history teacher was amazed that her students had never read a map before. When I was in middle school, we used an atlas to locate areas of the world and learn more about geography. However, that same history teacher was explaining that most of her students did not even know what an atlas was. The technology has changed so much since even 10 years ago. Today, students learn from the internet and television. But even looking at that, will we still have computers 10 years from now considering we have phones and tablets that carry the internet? This same idea applies to theory and relevance. The material that students were learning 40-50 years ago is similar but also very different from the information taught in schools today. We're taught about technology because it is essential to life. Students should still learn about classic literature, but added to that need to be lessons pertaining to the lives they face outside of class. My school does a 6-week unit on discrimination and tolerance because the students need to know the issues. To me, something is relevant if it relates to the factors that affect students in their every day lives, both in the present and the future.

Flipping the Classroom with Shakespeare

As I read Ollie's Blog 8 post about "flipping the classroom," it occurred to me that this could be a fun way to share an animated "Play Map" with students the night before we begin Lesson 1 of Shakespeare Set Free. Much of the background info could be learned in the comfort of home and p.j.s for those students who have Internet access at home. The solution for those who don't: I'm thinking I would create a lunch club in my classroom for those students to watch the video lesson. Also, I could remind them of library Internet access on North Duke Street. I'll let you know how it works out!

Rapid Rate Of Change

After reading Teaching is a Subversive Activity, I have to say that the one thing that really stood out to me is the same thing that proves I'm in the 25+ age group! In the "Crap Detecting" chapter, the author talked about how change occurs so fast that by the time we catch up with it, it becomes irrelevant because society has already moved on to something else. I believe the reason for all of this is technology and I guess I can point to our 330/530 reading regarding the digital natives versus digital immigrants as an example. Today's generation grew up on technology and while I am a mix of digital native and digital immigrant, I find myself finally catching up, only to find out I should be learning about something else.

I had to giggle at the quote about if you are 25-years-old or older, "you are a walking encyclopedia of outdated information." To that I have just one thing to say: I may be a walking book of useless information, but I'm pretty good at trivia!

On another note, does anybody else have a page 60 with this book/article? I only seem to have the Introduction and Chapters 1-4, which stops at page 58. Am I missing something?

9/11

At school on Friday my co-op allowed time for students in each of her classes to reflect on their memories from 9/11, and I was really pleased that she allowed for this type of “diversion” from her prepared lessons. My co-op shared her memories with the students (I shared a little too) and the students listened with wide eyes as she talked about her own uncertainty and fear. While the students were pretty young when it happened, they shared a variety of sentimental to silly memories from the day. One student remembered coming home from school and feeling extreme disappointment that her father hadn’t returned from a business trip with the chocolate he always bought for her from the duty free store. Others remembered coming home and seeing their parents glued to the TV for hours. After the students talked about their memories, my co-op asked everyone to complete a short free write about a time in their life that something (big or small) happened that changed them forever. I loved how she was able to talk about 9/11 and then draw an essential question from the discussion to help the students personalize the idea of a life changing event. Everyone wrote and no one complained about not having anything to say. I read the pieces after class and learned something new about each student. Some students wrote about death, divorce and moving to the U.S. from a different country; others wrote about meeting a new best friend and learning to ride a bicycle for the first time. It was an excellent day at school.

"Guess What I'm Thinking" Questions

I really liked the section of chapter 2 regarding what the author calls "Guess What I'm Thinking" questions. I witness this daily in my placement, and I'm sure you all have to. This is when a teacher says "What is the mood of this story?" Different students give different answers none of which are really considered (they're not dismissed but they're responded to with something like "ok that could work") until that one kid says what the teacher is thinking and the teacher responds with a "correct" or "exactly." That student has a achieved a gold star and every other student who contributed has a small chink in their self efficacy. Stronger, confident students will keep participating while more self conscious students with slowly stop participating. Through this age old practice we are killing not only self efficacy, but also critical thinking and creativity. Steve talked last week about kids not being able to think for themselves, well no shit. Everything we tell them is black or white, yes or no. We dictate everything they do from how they perceive a story to whether they can or cannot go to the bathroom. Like the title of the chapter, the medium is the message. What we do in our class is what they learn. So though they may be picking up things like grammar and characterization they are most definitely learning things like "what the teacher says is right," "I don't need to know this because it's not on the test" and "I need to write correctly so i get a good grade."

This reminds me of the quote by Gardner in the reading as well where he says "As society becomes more concerned with precedent and custom, it comes to care more about how things are done, rather than whether they are done." And this is the message these kids are getting about English. They don't like reading because it consists of books and stories they don't choose at a pace they are not comfortable with. The teacher assigns three chapters for homework, while most of the class does it the smartest kid finishes the book and zones out for the next two weeks and the most challenged reader gets through one chapter and quits. They don't like writing because they don't connect with it. It's meant for research pieces and PSSA. Forgive me if this has just been a ramble. This stuff has just been on my mind and perhaps I drew connections to the text that I just wanted to be there so I could get all this out. Either way though.... thoughts?