Learning Letter

This was probably one of my favorite classes I've taken because it made me think like a teacher. Other classes I've taken make me think about what I will have to think about once I become a teacher, but this class made me feel like I was already a teacher. I got to talk about books I've read that I thought would be great for my future students to relate to. I got to create a unit plan based on a play written by Shakespeare and that might have been my favorite part of the class. It was fun to think about what would be fun for students to do during the unit but what would also be a good way to get them to think. My favorite part of my unit plan was the final project. I figured students would have fun with making their own scripts based off the scenes we talked about during discussions. They would get to have fun with it because of how much sarcasm Shakespeare put into his plays. So, students could add in sarcasm based on language that they use every day with friends and family. If they are extroverted enough, maybe they'd even ham it up during the performance portion of the final project, and that would be awesome. I want my students to have fun in my class because when you are having fun while learning, you actually enjoy school. I know I'm not even a teacher yet, but I think this course helped me become a better one by the different discussions we had and the projects we had to complete. One of my favorite articles we read was Discussion as a Way of Teaching. I love discussions and the different tips and discussion strategies that are talked about in the article were amazing and I hope my future students will enjoy them as much as I like to envision that they will. I still don't feel like I'm ready to be a teacher, but I'm getting closer! I'm excited to get more practice in on lesson plans. I need to become better at explaining how students will or can do things during the sequenced instruction and adding more to lesson connections. Hopefully I can become better with research, too, I wasn't completely confident with my research, but it was fun looking up different activities and ways to teach Shakespeare. I enjoyed this class so much!

Night

I loved this book. It was the first one I read specifically because it is the author's memory from his time in the camps in Germany. I have been kind of obsessed with everything WWII since eighth grade when I learned about the Holocaust. It was completely awful, but I have a random fascination with it which sometimes makes me feel bad because of how sad, awful and wrong it all was. I can't even tell you how many times I've watched documentaries and movies about WWII and the Holocaust. This book was very well written and I thought it was an amazing insight on what the camps were actually like. I didn't know they gave the Jews coffee, soup and bread. To be honest, I had no idea what it was like besides what I had seen in movies like Schindler's List where Nazi's would look out their windows and randomly shoot people in the yard as they were walking through the camps. Wiesel describes how he and his father would trade rations of bread for things like a good bunk or tools. They would be counted every day, they worked every day, they made them run from place to place and if they were going to slow, they would be shot. It was terrifying to read about how they got so hungry that when they were being transferred in cattle cars, the Nazi soldiers threw a piece of bread into the car and men were literally killing each other over it and the Nazi's were using that as entertainment. It was disgusting and I still can't believe something so terrible ever happened. It must have been extremely difficult to relive all that Wiesel went through, but I'm sure so many people, like myself, appreciate it because there is no way we could ever imagine what it must have been like. It's a good reminder of why the history should never repeat itself. I think I would definitely want to teach this book at some point to high-schoolers. I would be interested to know their thoughts and feelings on a book that is the story of someone who went through something as terrible as the Holocaust.

Into the Wild

Into the Wild was a very compelling story. It was confusing at times because it's the author looking into the death of Alex (Christopher) McCandless. Alex had a difficult life with his family once he found out that his father was once a bigamist. He sets out after graduating on a journey with very little possessions. He works odd jobs as he makes his way west to the wild. Eventually he makes it to Alaska where he hitches a ride out to the wild. The man he rides with advises against his plan, but Alex ensures the man that he will be fine. The man gives him his lunch and what cash he has on him. Krakauer writes about Alex's life, what drove him to wanting to live in the wild, and touches on his own life as well. I would definitely recommend this book to my future students.

The Round House

This book was very addicting to read. Books and movies like this have always captured my attention. My family calls them "who done it" movies and that always made me laugh. Although I did like this book, I don't know if I would ever incorporate it into a high school classroom because of all of the issues it deals with, especially rape. I myself don't even like hearing or talking about rape because it makes me very uncomfortable. I know people say that it is important to be uncomfortable because that is when you learn more; when you are put outside of your comfort zone and learn to handle that. And because I know I have a problem with it, I know parents would not approve of this book. Topics of rape, murder and many things done underage, I honestly don't know how a book like that would be allowed in a classroom less than college level. And what if there are kids who have actually been through situations involving rape? God forbid that would ever happen but I know it does. And I wouldn't want to make someone read about it because, odds are, they would relive their own experience and I don't want that to happen. I feel like this book is very controversial, but sometimes these topics do need to be talked about. While some would hate to relive their experience, others could possibly find it comforting to know that it happens a lot, as repulsive as it is. Having something to relate to is very helpful at times.

I Read It, But I Don't Get It

I actually read this book in Dr. Beth's class The Composition Process last winter. From what I can remember, the book is about how students are reading things without actually understanding what they are reading. I remember going through the motions and not understanding what I was reading because in elementary school, we were always being timed to see how fast we could read a paragraph but we never had to summarize what we read. They just wanted to see how fast we could read. Because of that, I always wanted to read as fast as I could and I never got good at retaining what I was reading unless it was something I was interested in. Even when I got older and had to write papers, most of the time I would start reading what was assigned, but then would just look up the text on Sparknotes and was able to write the paper from that. Sometimes it was even worse and I was able to take bits and pieces of what I was supposed to read and somehow come up with enough BS to write a paper and somehow got a good grade on it.

Hopefully this has changed. I don't know very much about what they are doing in elementary schools nowadays when it comes to reading and comprehension, but hopefully they are actually focusing more on the "comprehension" part so that by the time kids get to high school or even college, they can actually understand what they are reading and they don't just look up summaries or just skim what is assigned so that they are able to full contribute to whatever assignment that it is attached. For this book itself, there are some awesome tools in the back of it, so I'm planning on keeping this book for my own personal use in my classroom someday as something to refer back to.

Book Talk #2

The Summer I Turned Pretty

Summary: This book is actually three books in one. The stories are about a girl named Isabel (Belly), her older brother Steven and her mother who spend every summer with their mother's best friend, Susannah and her two sons, Jeremiah and Conrad at a beach house. For as long as she can remember, Belly has been in love with Conrad, the older of the two and Jeremiah has always been her best friend. Conrad is the bad boy. He's tall, has dark hair, and this summer he is constantly in his room when he isn't busy smoking or getting drunk. Another difference this summer is Jeremiah is acting awkward around Belly and she, stupidly, can't figure out why. Nothing really happens until Belly gets a boyfriend named Cam and tension builds in her relationships with both Conrad and Jeremiah. Secrets start to reveal themselves from all of the characters including Conrad and Jeremiah's mom, Susannah. Jeremiah and Belly eventually end up dating and have some highs and lows like any relationship does. But is Jeremiah who Belly ends up with at the end of the trilogy?

Rationale: I chose this book because it is a coming of age novel and I think it is a great book for teen girls to relate to. Belly is a girl who is dealing with secrets, a love triangle, and just figuring out her feelings in general. I think girls who are between, maybe 12-18 would relate best to this book. Belly herself is 16 in the first book. 12-18 is a general age for girls to start dating, figuring out what they aren't looking for in relationships, figuring out who they are as individuals. And even though figuring out these types of things go beyond the age of 18, I feel like the range of 12-18 is where that process starts. I feel like this book could be important for teen girls because of how relatable it is with what Belly goes through as a teen girl herself. Boys could read this book too, heck, even my 12-year-old brother wants to read it, but I think girls would better relate to it because it follows the story of a teenage girl and her summers that are filled with romance, heartbreak, confusion and everything that seems to come with being a girl. 

Teaching Ideas: I personally would not teach this in a classroom just because it seems more like a book someone would read for pleasure and not for a class. However, if I were to teach it, I would maybe do a lesson on themes and see what kinds of themes my students could see throughout the book. Themes like friendship, love and moving on are themes that could be talked about in this book. Or, perhaps a lesson on conflicts. Internal and external conflicts are both very apparent in this story and students could find specific quotes and explain how it is either internal or external. 

Challenges: A challenge that could arise with using this book is parents feeling like underage drinking and smoking are being promoted. There will be challenges with at least one parent I'm sure, but it is not that the book is promoting it. In fact, if they would actually read the book, it shows how much of a negative affect drinking and smoking have on the character that does it. If anything, this book should show the students the dangers of drinking and smoking and the affect it could have on your emotions. However, I would definitely try my best to have a meeting and talk with the parent(s) before they wanted to take it straight the administrators. I would like to have a chance to explain my perspective, listen in person to what the parent has to say and see if we could come up with some kind of compromise for their child. I really enjoyed this book, and I think most teen girls would, too. It really is a PG written story and it was very fun to read. It's always nice to be taken into someone else's world to escape your own. Even better if you can relate to something a character is going through. 

edTPA Guidelines and Good Choices

Not gonna lie. This was A LOT of information to take in and this is probably going to be a shorter post because of that. I don't really know what to say besides that I'm glad that this is one of our reading assignments because I had no idea what the edTPA entailed. I even said it wrong in class one day because I said the edTPA instead of saying the TPA lesson plans for the unit plan we are working on. I had no idea that the edTPA was an actual assessment, I always thought the TPA lesson plans and edTPA were the same thing. But, the TPA is just the formatting we are learning because it's the format used on the assessment we will take to show that we can create a formal lesson plan. All of the information from the "Making Good Choices" one was awesome because it tells you the good choices to make during the assessment. It also says there's a handbook we will be given? Didn't know the handbook was even a thing, but I'm eager to start reading it so I can be fully prepared to take the edTPA assessment! How and/or when do we even get the handbook for that? I read there's more than one and you need it for your content area, so do we get them in a future class? Is it something we can buy ourselves? Is it given to us only when we have paid to take the edTPA? So. Many. Questions...

Social Justice

https://blog.ed.gov/2011/08/education-is-social-justice/

I didn't really know where to start with looking for social justice and why it's important in the classroom. I came across this blog and the title is "Education is Social Justice." The title caught my attention right away because I was only thinking of finding things that talk about what social justice is and why it's important in our classrooms; however, this blog states that education is social justice in itself and I thought it was very intriguing. It starts off with a quote from 2009 by Secretary Arne Duncan, "I believe that education is the civil rights issue of our generation. And if you care about promoting opportunity and reducing inequality, the classroom is the place to start. Great teaching is about so much more than education; it is a daily fight for social justice."

The blog explains that social justice is a collective goal to protect the dignity of human beings while maintaining core pillars of equality and solidarity. I agree that if we want to protect equality and solidarity, it starts in the classroom. Us, as teachers, need to implement equality in our classrooms to make sure our kids feel safe in the environment that we are creating. School is the place where kids go to get away from their home lives because many of their home lives aren't good. Hopefully I can create a safe space in my future classroom where everyone can feel equal and free to speak as they wish or come to me with whatever is acting as a weight on their shoulders.

Pop Culture

I don't remember much about pop culture or being taught it when I was in high school. All I can really remember is one day during my 11th grade English class, my teacher had us read lyrics from songs that were popular at the time. She had us try to analyze what we read like analyzing a poem. Then, she had us analyze it again while we listened to the song because when people are singing the lyrics, you can feel what they are feeling by the way they sing. You can tell whether they feel angry, sad, happy or excited. It was one of my favorite days that year because it was fun. I think pop culture is important to bring into the classroom because it's another way to make learning fun for students.

I like the way this article used a couple different projects to explain why pop culture is important for students in secondary education. The article gives a quote directly from the student report from the hip-hop project. The students who conducted the project said that it is important to understand the world you live in, your ideology changed. When your ideology changes, your actions will change and then it is possible to change the world you live in. I personally think it's a stretch to say that you'll change the world you live in by changing your ideology, but I don't think it's impossible. I just think that someone has to be motivated to try to make changes in their world. Just because someone's eyes are opened and their views change, doesn't mean that they will do anything about it around them. It's one thing to be sympathetic, but another to be active.

I want to use pop culture in my classroom, but I want to use it to make learning more fun for my kids. I don't want them thinking because they learn something new, that they are obligated to do something about the way that they feel. If so, that's great, but my main objective is to make sure my students are learning and having fun while doing so.

Pedagogy of the Oppressed

I had a hard time with "banking education" because the article made it sound like students are just objects that we give information to. The article made students lifeless and I honestly felt very uncomfortable reading it because I strongly disagree with the "attitudes and practices" of oppressive society. Part of the article, which I placed below, is everything that shouldn't be part of how teaching and learning between teacher and student should be:

• the teacher teaches and the students are taught;
• the teacher knows everything and the students know nothing;
• the teacher thinks and the students are thought about;
• the teacher talks and the students listen -- meekly;
• the teacher disciplines and the students are disciplined;
• the teacher chooses and enforces his choice, and the students comply;
• the teacher acts and the students have the illusion of acting through the action of the teacher;
• the teacher chooses the program content, and the students (who were not consulted) adapt to it;
• the teacher confuses the authority of knowledge with his or her own professional authority, which she and he sets in opposition to the freedom of the students;
• the teacher is the Subject of the learning process, while the pupils are mere objects.

I never want my students to feel like I am all knowledgeable because I do not know everything. I want them to understand that I am just as much of a human as they are. I'm going to make mistakes that they will hopefully correct me on. I will learn from my students just as they will learn from me. It's not just me feeding them information for them to write down, memorize and repeat. I'm not trying to create robots, I want to help my kiddos grow into adults, and have actual conversations with me about what we are talking about in class. There will be days when I have to talk at them when learning a concept, but I want them to feel free to ask questions, speak up when they don't understand because that's what learning is. I believe learning should be a conversation or discussion about things that are being taught because not everyone will understand the teacher right away. 

I don't want to "oppress" my students. I want them to be involved with their learning because it's THEIR learning experience. I want them to question me if they feel like something I said wasn't right, I want them to be part of the decisions I make when it's appropriate and I want them to have fun in my classroom. 

Assessing and Evaluating Students' Learning

I liked the idea of using informal writing as a way for students to scribble down their thoughts and reactions to what they are reading. I think this is a great way for students to work through their thoughts about things they want to discuss without worrying about being graded on spelling or grammar. This also helps for teachers to really see what their students are absorbing and understanding. I think this is a great idea, but not a lot of kids enjoy writing with pencil and paper anymore. I know so many people who prefer typing on a laptop because they can type faster than they can write, and they feel like it's helps to keep up with how fast their mind works. Hopefully, if I am allowed to, I would like to use a blog like the ones we're using for this class when I become a teacher. I would have them post journals on there, maybe use it for discussions that we didn't get to fully finish in class, or to post on there as questions arise and I can check in the evenings to answer any questions when I can. Blogs are fun, too, the students would get to pick whichever backdrop they want and make it their own (as long as it's appropriate). I really like the idea of using technology as part of the classroom.

California State Standards

I really enjoyed how this article showed how they scaffold the reading and writing process. First, it outlines what it will be talking about, then goes into detail for each section and gives more information and possible things that could help the students. For example, for Prereading, one of the things for that section to help the students is to try to get them to make a connection between their world and the world of the text. I love this because I believe that when you make a personal connection to something you are reading, it makes learning more fun. Another section I really appreciated was the "Noticing Language" section because I honestly am nervous about dealing with language that students will not understand. I know there will be times when I don't have an answer for my students and I hope it can be something we learn together and they don't lose their trust in me whenever I do not know something. However, I really liked the different tips the article gave in this section. It's definitely something I would like to refer back to if I need help with focusing on language that might be difficult for my students.

"Annotating and Questioning the Text."
I was never taught how to annotate or question a text, even in college. I was always told to just make notes whenever things didn't make sense, look up a definition of a word I didn't know and write it down, but this article gives instructions on a possible way to structurally analyze a text. It says to label the different parts of the text throughout it on the left margin; things like, summary, introduction, problem(s) being addressed, examples and conclusion. Then, it tells you to put your own thoughts about the text in the right margin. I think this is a great way to take notes as you are following along with the text, plus it keeps you and your thoughts organized (hopefully).

I think this article is a great resource when it come to the reading and writing process. I think I will definitely refer back to it when my students are struggling with a specific portion of reading and/or writing.

Book Talk #1

Sweep: Book of Shadows

Summary: At the beginning of this book, Morgan Rowlands is described as a typical teenager who is the complete opposite of her sister and parents. Her family has light hair and eyes while she has dark hair and eyes, they are morning people and Morgan isn’t, her family likes to have more of a healthy breakfast together while Morgan’s go-to breakfast is a Pop-Tart and Diet Coke. However, what is similar between them is the fact that she loves going to Sunday morning mass with her family and they always go to lunch afterwards. One day, a new student named Cal starts going to her school and Morgan is immediately drawn to him, along with many other girls. After Cal makes friends, he has a party at his house where he reveals his Wiccan origins by inviting everyone at the party to join in a circle to celebrate one of the Wiccan Sabbaths. Many of the people there are discomforted by the witchcraft and leave, but Morgan and her friend Bree decide to stay. After this, Morgan shows that she has a natural knack for witchcraft and Cal becomes very interested in her. As Cal and Morgan become closer, Morgan and Bree drift apart because of Bree’s jealousy. Later, Cal and his friends form a coven called Cirrus and during another circle, Morgan discovers that she is a blood witch, which is a person who is born with magical powers. She starts to learn more magic using herbs and earth’s elements. Soon, Morgan realizes that she was adopted and everything that makes her different from her family all starts to make sense. As the story goes on, Morgan suspects that Cal is keeping secrets from her that could possibly put them both in danger.

Rationale: I chose this book because it is about a girl finding out her true identity. Although it is a work of fiction and about magic, teenagers can relate to Morgan figuring out who she is along with love and friendships throughout the story. Teens often have problems with finding out the person they are going to be, friendships drifting apart, relationship issues and gaining life experience in general. I also like the fact that it is the first book of a 15-book series. Anyone who loves reading series would have fun with this one as they follow Morgan through her journey of love, friendship and magic. I read this series in high school and it was often my escape when I was dealing with things I wasn’t ready to face.

Teaching Ideas: I honestly don’t think I would teach this book, but I would highly recommend it to my students. However, if we are being hypothetical, I think it would be fun to teach a unit on fiction itself, have students read this and discuss the themes that are relatable to high-schoolers. Another idea would be to have my students read the book, partner up and do a presentation on an idea, topic or theme we talked about during discussions as we went through the book.

Challenges: Some challenges that could arise from using this text would be students not being comfortable with the use of magic, same as parents and if the parents are not comfortable with their kids reading about magic that could be more realistic than the magic that is in Harry Potter, then the administration will have a problem with me teaching it at all. Again, I honestly would not want to teach this in my classroom because I feel it is more of a series that is good for reading for pleasure and not analyzing.

Common Core State Standards for ENGL 6-12

Before reading this article, all I had ever heard about the Common Core State Standards was that they taught to the standardized tests that were given every year. I also heard how much my teachers didn't like Common Core because of this same reason. However, I like how this article explains the pros and cons of the Common Core State Standards and how they are supposed to work. What I personally like about the CCSS is that they are laid out for you, but you as the teacher (along with your fellow colleagues and districts) get to decide how to go about teaching to those specific standards depending on what grade you are teaching. I loved how this article emphasized that the CCSS is for setting high expectations and not standardizing. 

One of the sections I found interesting was "Learning in the 21st Century" because it gave an example of how students were given the option to choose what issue they wanted to discuss that they felt strongly about, concerning learning in the 21st century. They wanted to talk about how the school blocked certain sites on the internet and how some of those sites prohibited their research process sometimes. Their teacher then gave them roles as students and administrators, and they all had to talk on an approved site about why there shouldn't be a block on the internet and why the block should be required because of the possibility of students looking at pornography. Using the internet this way was an awesome way of using technology in the classroom and I thought it was a great idea because the students learned how to use counterarguments through role playing on an issue that they felt strongly about. It always makes learning more fun when the students actually care about what they are talking about. 

Other than this, I felt that this article was more cons than pros for CCSS. The examples they gave that could make the CCSS seen as a bad thing. The examples that stood out to me were homogenization, fragmented curricula and teaching to the test. Although these are ways not to teach, I feel like as long as you are a teacher who truly cares about learning and is excited about it, then the CCSS really shouldn't effect the way you teach, but just guide you and you do the rest. 

Graphic Novels

I personally haven't had very much experience with graphic novels. However, I am extremely excited about The Graphic Canon! After looking through Dr. Sean's copy of it, I was fascinated by all of the stories that were in them. I am still waiting to get them from the bookstore, but I can't wait to permanently have them for my classroom someday so that those who have a hard time understanding stories by just reading them, hopefully they will have fun reading them out of The Graphic Canon.

I tried looking up information about graphic novels, and pretty much what I found was that graphic novels are pretty much just book-length comics. When I kept looking, I thought it was cool that there are all types of different ones to choose from. The range of the novels go from books for boys and girls and by grade level just like regular books and I think that's amazing. I hope that when I have students who struggle with reading, I can see if a graphic novel would work better for them so that they have a visual of what is going on in the plot and they don't get bored just reading a regular book. I know so many people who have trouble getting through books because they lose their train of thought or get bored because they don't enjoy reading. I hope I get the chance to introduce graphic novels to my high schoolers someday.

Discussion as a Way of Teaching

At the very beginning, I really liked how the article made you think back to the different discussions you have been a part of, what made those discussions good or bad. When I thought back to the different group discussions I have been a part of, one of the things that always made it more fun was when everyone was involved, listening and responding to each other and a professor who knew how to guide the discussion when the conversations or topics died down and we didn't know where to go from there. I feel like group discussions would be hard to facilitate sometimes because you can prepare and prepare for all different kinds of directions that the discussion could go, but you never know where it will actually go. So I guess it would be good to be prepared for those times when the discussion trails off, you can have multiple points ready to get the discussion back on track. I used to be very uncomfortable with group discussions because I was shy and I felt that my thoughts and opinions weren't good enough or wouldn't sound smart enough and that can hinder a group discussion if everyone feels that way. After being part of different classes where discussion was a major part of the class, I grew more confident in speaking my mind when I had a different opinion than others. It's nice to hear different opinions and different sides. I think discussion can be very helpful with certain things, like poetry or trying to analyze Shakespeare. With things like that, I feel it would help students to hear what others think when they are struggling to understand what is going on. However, discussion isn't always helpful, so I think it is good to keep in mind when a good time for discussion is and when not.

 This article was awesome and I definitely plan on looking back on it someday when I'm a teacher for tips on how to lead good discussions when I feel I am struggling leading the discussions.