Learning Letter Assignment

I have said many times over the last couple of weeks that if I had jumped back into school to pursue this teaching thing without of having taken this class, I would have quit after a quarter, maybe two. I'm not a huge fan of school. I don't like having to sit in a classroom for years until I can get to where I want to be. A lot of it is straight-up pride. I feel like I could teach anything (I really can't, but I feel that way). Most of it, though, is I am just anxious to be out there, doing something real. This preparation stuff isn't always fun. It is necessary though.

This class has reinforced why I want to teach, who I want to teach, and, especially, what I want to teach. This class alone will be enough to push me through the next few years until I am able to be in a classroom. Why? Because I learned a lot about who I am as a person/educator.

With the book talk, I got to speak about a series I highly enjoy reading. It let me explain a little bit about myself while passing on information that hopefully my classmates can use in the future. In the mini-lesson, I learned more about who I was as an educator. I saw a few places that I excelled and, more importantly, I felt sincere joy in creating and teaching the lesson. The unit plan, although a huge drain on my energy stores, was the combination of the two. I was able to take a novel and genre I truly love and use that passion to create a series of lessons that I hope to one day teach. These things have instilled in me the desire to continue. These things alone would have pushed me on.

Luckily, the theories on education we discussed were present, too. They have helped me put words to my thoughts on education and let me know that I was not wrong in how I taught. The first few weeks of class only gave me more and more excitement about teaching and more and more anticipation. Discussion-based teaching is how I have always attempted to teach in my previous opportunities, but I never knew why. It was how I enjoyed learning, it made sense to have students give their own answers. How else would they make the knowledge their own? The reading concerning that theory, though, gave me the words and the confidence to continue that style of teaching.

American Born Chinese

I thought this was a really bold story and I loved the melding of Chinese mythology tradition with Christianity. It is a book that will have its struggles because of its openly Christian slant, but the discovery of self is the true heart of the story.

There are several ways this could be taught, beginning with the medium of graphic novel. Students could create their own or at least blocks of story. Another is in a "coming of age" unit that looks at how Jin grew into himself. Allegory is highly present and this could be a great book to teach that technique also.

I think every student could get something out of the message of being who you are and would highly consider using this in a classroom.

Night Response

I remember reading this novel in high school and really enjoying its story and themes. It is a book that needs to be read at least once by everyone.

That said, I think this book would serve best in a unit with other WWII stories. I would choose some that focus on the war, put Night in for the Holocaust study. I think that is the best way to handle it. It needs to be kept in context with history so that the student can better come to grips with its view of life.

"The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" Response

At first I didn't like the book. At all. I found it redundant and bitter. As it progressed, however, I began to understand my own latent prejudices that I don't like to voice and as the book confronted prejudices and racism, I confronted my own. I would teach this book for that reason alone if none other existed.

That, to me, is its redeeming quality. It forces teens to confront the images of what "white" and "red" and "black" and "brown" are and makes them come to a conclusion in their own mind.

There are so many great talking points in this book and I think Alexie does a great job of bringing these issues to the front in a nonthreatening way (at least to the student). I would spend a lot of time on the quote: "You have to love somebody that much to also hate them that much, too."

Apart from all of that, it is a useful book for anyone (every kid in high school) who is trying to find out who he/she is. Is it redundant? Perhaps. But it's a fresh redundancy that is needed.

"Things Fall Apart" Response

The Pacification of the Primitive Tribes of the Lower Niger is one the greatest endings to any book I have read. Wow. Achebe wrote a fantastic, heartfelt exposure of a culture while making me, a white man, feel outrage at the white man's destruction of a culture. At the same time, I feel for the missionaries that were sent into that culture to try and combat it in the ways open to them.

This book would be an incredible addition in a history class when discussing British Colonialism in Africa. This novel hits on so many emotional levels that every one should read it. This novel alone can serve as a discussion of social justice. In what ways are we still impeding and destroying cultures? How do we speak of respect then beat men's backs? Simply powerful.

I would definitely add this to a list of possible books to use in a classroom.

TPA Guidlines

My first thought when I hear TPA is: "Did you get the memo? We're putting cover sheets on all our TPA reports now. I'll make sure you get a copy."

After reading this (about 5 times), that's still as far as my understanding goes. I'm sure it makes sense, but I can't find the logic that makes it so. Or perhaps I am just missing the necessary exposure to understand it?

Help?

Differentiated Instruction

I read an article on Glencoe's website (found here) and it offered many in-room strategies to foster this idea of differentiated instruction. I'm sure it was Sean's point to get us to this point, but this just makes sense.

I went through high school without being pushed. I could coast (and did) and still get decent grades. I didn't have a 4.0 (because, really, why?), but I did have about 3.6 living on no homework and writing papers the day before they were due.

And that approach failed me in college.

I had to relearn how to study and prepare because I didn't have to use it in high school. The teachers were focused on the ones struggling and I wasn't one of them. What this approach suggests is helping those who are struggling while still challenging the ones who are advanced.

The most widely talked of approach is plan for all types of learners, but it has to be coupled with a lesson that encourages learning for the struggling ones while still challenging the others.

How is this done? No idea. I hope to figure out ways in class.