Summer to Fall

I’m getting ready to start the fall semester on Thursday.  “Getting ready” means fighting the urge to stay up and sleep in really late, especially now that Eric’s home with me for the time being.  It also means I’ve been working out a lot more.  I had a little bit of a slowing-metabolism-wake-up-call, so I’ve been trying to eat food that is good for me.  I’ve been running a couple miles every other day and on the in-between days doing strength training.  Through all this I am reminded how totally not hardcore I am when it comes to fitness goals, athletic ability, etc.  But this is the best I’ve EVER done in the area of athletics, and I’m so pleased that I am actually capable of exercise since my surgery.  (Longer story than I want to explain, but I used to have absolutely no athletic endurance due to this condition — although not nearly as crazy as that picture!)

My class list for this fall is as follows:

Classroom Management

Action Research II

Special & Diverse Populations

Rethinking High School

Language Arts Pedagogy

Issues in Human Development

Teaching in the Middle

This is in addition to my Practicum – part-time student teaching at L.O.J.   I met my teacher, Ms. E, last Wednesday and I’m so excited to get started there.  The school seems so high-energy.  It also just so happens that the principal’s assistant is the mother of one of Eric’s childhood best friends – she has known their family since before Eric and David were born, and she recognized me from the wedding.  I got to meet the office staff, principal, vice principal, and a couple of the custodial staff.  Next week is the inservice week and I will be hanging out with my teacher and the other teachers in her team, attending meetings, and generally learning about the way the school runs.  The week after that, the kids arrive.   We have plans to try to get me up in front of the class teaching soon -  Ms. E suggested that if she teaches the first 2-hr class period (block schedule), I could teach the second or third after observing her.  I told her that sounds like a wonderful arrangement.  Also, I found out I will most likely be teaching my work sample during the Anne Frank unit, which sounds like an awesome unit to teach.  It’s especially cool that, since Ms. E is a language arts and social studies teacher, there’s a good chance the social studies curriculum will be integrated into the language arts unit.

Now to the shower and to bed (hopefully before midnight).

A month off.

Now that I have completed my 30 hours helping out with summer school,  I am “free” for a month.  Of course, “free” means I have to complete a 3-week-long unit plan I began during the semester, as well as writing several reflections and a “case study” on the students in my summer school classrooms.   I think when I am finished with my unit plan, I may post it on here, but I haven’t decided yet.  It is a unit on the American Dream and The Great Gatsby.  I know, I know, not the most original novel to choose, but it is one of my very favorites and I know it well, so I thought I should start with a strong base of knowledge.  After all, I have never actually taught a novel; I may as well start where I’m comfortable.

I chose The Great Gatsby because:

1.  I have a horrible habit of choosing to do things academically that are way over my head just because I don’t want to choose the “obvious” route.  A good for instance (and the most tragic example, probably) is my choice of topics on Richard Wright’s Native Son in 11th grade AP English.  I should have chosen color symbolism, or weather, or anything basic.  Instead I wrote some nonsense on the 1930′s black community in Chicago and their dependence on the church and how that was somehow symbolic (?)….  I don’t know.  But I got a C, because I didn’t really know what I was doing.

2. It’s a darn good book, enjoyable on the surface but with layers and layers of depth.  It’s all about how far you decide to go.

3. I’ve read it at least twice in the last few years, including an extremely thorough reading/re-reading for a research paper I wrote, which is currently my proudest academic achievement.

During this month off, I also plan to take a few little fun vacations.  Tomorrow Eric and I are going to Cannon Beach for a few days, and then toward the end of the week we will mosey over toward Rockaway Beach for Burk and Lydia’s wedding, which is going to be wonderful.   Also, next Wednesday is Eric’s 24th birthday!  I will post on that after the fact, in case he reads this and discovers all my secret plans.

(A picture of us at Cannon Beach this Spring.)

A Defense, or Why I Don’t Want to Teach ESL.

Why do I feel guilty for not wanting to teach ESOL classes?  My passion is 20th century American literature.  I love learning difficult words, making up new words, and studying the breakdown of words.   I love writing really, really long papers with multiple scholarly sources.  I even like citing those sources.   I love seeing words used where they don’t belong and analyzing their new perfect context.  I love abstract poetry.

I paid a lot for this passion.  I have worked very hard, and my education cost a great deal of money.  I’m not saying I’m unwilling to ever teach ESOL if it is the only job I can find – but if I can find a job doing what I love, and many of those jobs are available, why do I feel like such a crone for saying that I would much rather teach students who already have a grasp on the English language??

I am not saying that the students I want to teach are more intelligent than ELLs (English Language Learners), only that they have already mastered English and understand its ins and outs.  The ins and outs are the fun part for me.

I am also not refusing to ever work with students who need help with English.

Still, I can feel the eyes staring and the mouths opening at me.  Racist!  Politically Incorrect!  Snobbish!

I do not want to teach ESOL because it isn’t my passion.  Somehow if I say I don’t want to teach ESOL, it is translated into “I don’t like ESOL kids,” or “I just want to teach the smart kids.”  I love ESOL kids, and I know that many are just as intelligent as native English speakers, but have trouble communicating their complex thoughts.  I respect them and sympathize with them.  I just do not have a desire to teach them English — and there are plenty of people who do have that desire.

Please, please just leave me alone and let me teach my Shakespeare to students who can appreciate its language.  Let me teach my e.e. cummings poetry to students who will not (well, might not) run away when they see the jumbled up words and sentences.  Let me teach what I love.

Lesson planning…

In my Structures for Teaching and Learning and Language and Literacy classes, we are discussing lesson planning.

This comes as a relief to me, because we have been studying education in very broad terms for a few weeks now and I’m itching for something a bit more concrete.  I love abstraction, but I need a framework to organize it with.  My knowledge about lesson planning thus far is extremely basic.  Here is what I know:

1. Start at the end goal and work backwards.

This prevents purposeless activities and contrived/artificial ultimate understanding.

2. Identify what you want students to know

Come up with goals: questions students should be able to answer after the lesson, things they should be able to do and think about.

3. Figure out how to test this

I use the word “test” loosely here – this can be anything from a formal assessment to a group discussion where everyone participates.  The point is to gauge learning and determine if students learned what you wanted them to.

Dr. F gave a great example of working backwards on a lesson plan about grammar:

1. End goal:  Eliminate run-ons and fragments.

2. Necessary skills and content knowledge:  Students have to be able to recognize what causes run-ons and fragments.  Punctuation and conjunctions are run-on problems, especially in main clauses.  No verbs and nouns are fragment problems in dependent clauses.  But….

3. What are clauses?  etc.

By starting with the big picture and working backwards, we are able to identify what students may know already and what they don’t.  We can keep working backwards until we arrive at the students’ current base of knowledge; this way we don’t assume they have learned what they haven’t.

This brings me to my own lesson planning.  Currently, I am brainstorming ideas for a Unit Plan I am going to come up with in the next week, hopefully for use in my summer practicum with Portland Public Schools.  The three main ideas I’m rolling around in my head are:

1.  A unit on The Great Gatsby

2.  A poetry unit

3.  A creative writing unit

I know a lot about The Great Gatsby, and I love it – but I almost feel like it’s a cop-out because it is so commonly taught.  I know I could do some interesting things with it, though, and maybe this is one of those situations where I shouldn’t start out with the most epic, challenging, and fascinating subject I can possibly think of.  After all, I am learning new things here.

A poetry unit would be a lot of fun.  I haven’t thought too deeply yet about what I might include, but there are many, many poems that I love that would be fun to teach.

It’s too bad no one reads this blog (yet!) or I could do a poll.  Until then, I will do a bit of research and hopefully come to some conclusions.

The Professional Educator and Learning Theory

The first two courses for my MAT program were The Professional Educator and Learning Theory. Both classes were with my cohort and cohort leader, and it was a fantastic experience to learn more about myself and the theories of learning with the same group while building a surprisingly strong community of colleagues who have become friends in a very short amount of time.

The Professional Educator was centered around Parker Palmer’s idea that “we teach who we are.”  In this short course, we spent time reflecting on and critically thinking about our past experiences with education and educators, our history, culture, and other influences that will affect who we bring to a classroom.  It is important to be able to recognize biases to be a good teacher.  We all have them, but when we must be aware of them.

My personal experience with education has been mixed:  Until high school I was a good student, caring deeply about teachers’ opinions of me, doing my best on my school work.  I was in gifted and talented programs and loved them.  I was always among the brightest students in my class.  In ninth grade, something changed.  A lot of changes occurred in my environment, actually, so it’s hard to pinpoint what exactly went wrong.  I changed schools, started attending a large public school, and began on the right track.  Quickly, though, I became disillusioned with the entire concept of school.  This grew to a complete disdain for high school.  I hated my classes, I thought my teachers were despots who wasted my time daily, and I never did my homework.  This attitude quickly faded when I became a college student.  Was it the larger, more competitive environment?  the cruelty of adolescence? the structure of schools?  I do not know, but through this course I realized more fully my mission for becoming an educator:  I want high school to be a place where any kid, even the punks like me, wants to learn.  Unrealistic?  I say visionary.

Learning Theory was a very broad overview of many, many, many theories.  And here is my even briefer summary of the theories I found most interesting:

Behaviorism (Skinner, Pavlov, Thorndike)

• posits that behavior can be controlled (or at least strongly influenced) through the use of “reinforcers.”  This creates a learning theory based on a system of rewards and punishment.  Strong implications for classroom management.

Social learning (Vygotsky, Bandura, Dewey)

• says that learning occurs in social environments, through modeling, trial and error, and help from those who are more experienced (either teacher or other students).  Zone of Proximal Development provides a model for attainable learning goals vs. those a student can’t reach – yet.  Doesn’t place a limit on what can be achieved with time and help.

“Whole child” theory (Kessler, Noddings)

• encourages teaching the entire child, soul, spirit, body, and mind.  A nurturing, safe environment is most conducive to learning.  This means classroom environment (including physical, social, and spiritual environment) is extremely important to a student’s ability to learn effectively.

Brain-based learning (Jensen)

• focuses on environmental and physical effects upon the brain, which influence learning.  Similar to whole child, but focuses more on brain development.  Leaves room for limitations such as learning disabilities and developmental stages.  Offers research-based suggestions for classroom environment, emotional well-being of students as it affects the brain’s ability to process information.  Important to keep in mind when teaching hungry, hot students who have not been recently physically active and who are listening to distracting noises outside.

Constructivism (Piaget and many others)

• so much could be said here.  Essentially, students are in charge of constructing their own knowledge and teachers act as a guide and mentor rather than a fountain of information.  Teachers should provide students with resources and ask great questions, among other things.

Critical pedagogy (Wink, Freire)

• takes constructivism one step further:  out into the community.  Focuses on integrative learning that betters the world.  Offers relevance

“Classical” vs. “Official” theory (Smith)

• states that the way we “used” to learn (Classical theory) was fun, effortless, and came naturally because we learn what we are genuinely interested in.  The “official” theory focuses on transmitting standardized knowledge from teacher to student (the “empty vessel”) and relies heavily on standardized testing.  As a result, educators teach “to the test” instead of teaching for understanding and long-term learning.  Smith says the majority of people today have been educated according to the official theory, and that we should return to the way we used to teach and learn: apprenticeships are a good example.   A basic but helpful distinction is that the official theory teaches for short-term memory, which is quickly and easily forgotten, while the classical theory of learning results in long-term memory.

This class was challenging because it forced me to consider many theories and, considering those theories and my own experiences, develop my own theory of learning.  I fall in the middle of the continuum between the theories many contemporary writers champion and those they want to toss out.  My main belief is that teachers should cultivate an environment of respect in which students view the teacher as a legitimate authority (see this article).  This means teachers need to be clear about expectations and firm with rules, but not unreasonable or abusive with their power. I firmly believe that students will learn from teachers they believe are worth learning from.  I strive to be one of those teachers.

Housekeeping.

Here we are at a NEW address!  Brynnalynea.com was expiring, and I felt the name no longer represented my purposes for blogging.  So without further ado, I give you the brand new Poetagogue.

Here’s a little etymology lesson:  the name is a play off the word “pedagogue,” which basically means teacher (more specifically, leader of children).  This word can have a negative connotation, but let’s ignore that for now.  The “gogue” part means leader.   So my two loves, the English language and teaching are combined into one beautiful (but sort of hard to pronounce) word.  Hopefully I won’t need to say it out loud any time soon.

I have kept the previous posts, but let it be known that my previous promises (ah hem – to finish my ORELA series, for instance) may or may not be seen through to completion.  For this I apologize.  I am simply too busy with my masters program right now to think about a test I took a year ago.    That said, please do not hesitate to direct any specific questions about the ORELA, CBEST, or Praxis II Language Arts tests my way.  Some pictures that were stored on brynnalynea.com were deleted before I could retrieve them.  I will gradually replace them, if possible – until then, sorry for the monochromy.

Poetagogue’s new vision is to focus on the now — what I am learning through training for my career — and will hopefully continue into my career. If I find a job in this economy, that is!

Thanks for following me around.

Love, Brynna