Learning Letter

I feel that the blog postings in this class were of a good length and regularity that I had time to think about each of our readings or assignments before we covered them in class, while leaving plenty of room to explore the readings in class and on our own. I also liked the open-ended nature of them, where the only requirements were a certain word count and completion, because it allowed us to bring our unique thoughts to our readings, similar to the discussion method of instruction discussed in this class. This is something that I would really like to incorporate into my own classrooms. Allowing the students to post to a blog allows them to use technology, which the middle school students I have seen really enjoy, and it also allows them to do so in the comfort of their own home, which many students are more comfortable with. I also like that it allows them to say what they want to say, which I can see for many students as something which is necessary to get them engaged in the class.

I was glad I was able to use the same book, The Outsiders, for most of this quarter. It made it easier for me to learn new concepts and see how they related to each other, and to see multiple ways of using the same text. I got to see the text used in my classroom, and this was very helpful when I structured my unit plan around the text and how it was being used to teach other concepts. The book talk was a useful assignment as it allowed me some time to think about how I would use this book before I did use it to help me construct my unit plan. I was able to develop my ideas for how to use it across the quarter. It was also a good way to hear useful information about the use and application of other young adult texts as teaching materials from my fellow students.

The mini lesson is the assignment that immediately felt the most useful to me as a future teacher, although the unit plan probably had more overall usefulness. I have enjoyed teaching the mini-lesson in this class and in my composition process class because I got to actually practice teaching a lesson, and then immediately receive feedback from my fellow teacher candidates about their experience of the lesson, and their range of ideas on how to improve and what worked well. It was also useful to teach a lesson which was shorter than the ones I am used to observing in an actual classroom, both to practice time management skills, and because there will be days in an actual classroom that are not the usual length, and I will need to learn to adjust as I attempted to do for the mini-lesson. I enjoyed working with the text that I worked with, and felt that I will have something I can base future lesson ideas on.

My unit plan was closely tied to my field experience this quarter, because it was either directly based on lessons which I taught, or adapted from lessons I had observed in the case of most of the lesson plans. I think this assignment was valuable because it is the only time that we have turned in lesson plans that we have gotten practice tying them in with other lesson plans in the context of a unit. While the lessons we teach in our practicum are usually isolated like the single lesson plans, this unit plan assignment was valuable to us as we get closer to student teaching. The most difficult aspect for me was being able to tie my lessons into specific research and theory. In our education classes, we have received a lot of textbooks and other examples of educational theory, but usually not in the form of specific academic papers. Our textbooks refer to these academic papers, but usually break down the research into information that is easier for us to absorb. I think for future teacher candidates, it would be useful to have practice connecting lesson plans to specific research in smaller assignments before we get to the unit plan, both in other classes and in this class.

The main educational idea that I take away from this class is the idea of changing the focus of teaching literature from giving students answers, or the "banking" method, into one in which students become involved in a discussion. I like that discussion allows students to provide their own answers, since they are so very unique. I like this idea for several reasons simultaneously. Many students like to talk about themselves, and using this approach is a great way to get otherwise off-task students like that engaged. This approach could be engaging to all the students because they are thinking and providing answers that have personal meaning to them, instead of just memorizing someone else's answers. I like that we were able to practice this approach in class, to get a preview of how it might look in our own classrooms and how we would use it.

I also appreciated how we were read to in this class, as it gave us time to relax but still learn at the start of class. As evidenced by my unit plan, this is something I plan to incorporate heavily into my future lessons in the classroom. This practice was used differently in my English placement classroom this quarter. There were some days when he would read to them for most or all of a lesson. I feel that having reading at the start, and at most the first half of the lesson, would be the most effective, because it still leaves half of the lesson for students to show their comprehension and complete other learning tasks, and it makes it easier to use the literature as a learning tool. I also think it will be good to read to the students at the start of the lesson, because as my English mentor teacher explained to me, leaving middle school students to read on their own at home results in all of the students being at different places in the book, and it is very hard to plan lessons around that. It is also useful to read to the students because it gets their attention and holds it very effectively, and can help students who have trouble with reading to comprehend the text and keep up with the rest of the class. The discussion method has been incorporated into reading to them in my English placement classroom, as the teacher will stop to ask students questions about what is happening in the text, and this is something I tried to include in my unit plan, and will try to do in my own classroom in the future.

My participation in the class has influenced how I think of myself as a teacher in three main ways. First, it has made me more conscious of how I prepare for and respond to my students. I had not realized at all during my mini-lessons that I had made their answers sound obvious or easy, but that was the impression that I created. I think I am usually careful to praise student answers in actual middle school classrooms, but since I was not aware of the impression I created in this class, this will be something I pay more attention to in the future.

The second way in influenced how I think of myself as a teacher is that it has made me aware that it has been a while since I was regularly reading young adult literature, especially since I have been so occupied the past couple of years reading history books for my social studies major. I will need to expand my library of young adult literature so that I have more that I can use in a classroom, and this class has helped me to do that. The book I would be most excited to use, as a middle school teacher, is American Born Chinese, since the comic book format is a great way to lead into more complex, and purely text-based literature. I also felt the presentation of the material would be the most accessible to middle school students while still challenging them with important and complex issues, and being a quality piece of literature. I would also use the Old Man and the Sea text, but there were other examples of text used in the class provided by both the teacher and my fellow students that I am not sure I would use as a middle school teacher, at least not without consulting carefully with parents and administrators first.

The final way the class has influence the way I think about myself as a teacher is that I will need to do more research into the scholarly literature regarding teaching. I think I can use the references in my textbooks as a great place to start, but I will need to do more exploration from there. Up until now I have relied on my classroom experience and what I have been taught in my classes in the education program, as well as my experiences as a student, but I will need to be more familiar with educational research so that I can really understand and therefore better plan for and execute my lesson plans and instructional strategies. I will also need greater familiarity with the research so that I can bring my own approach to teaching and lessons that will work best for me as an individual.

Night

This was easily the hardest book to read of any we have read in this class. It is a painful and terrifying thing to imagine. There are many descriptions in the book of children dying, and each description was as or more horrifying than the last. The one that was most disturbing to me was the hanging, when the small child who had the angel-like face, was killed.

A major theme in the book was the lost of this particular child's innocence. He frequently became angry with God when he wondered where he was and why he did not put a stop to any of what was happening. The clearest image of this for me was when he saw the smoke and fire where children were being burned, and how this first started to drain away his faith on the first night.

In the English classroom I have been placed in, they are reading the Diary of Anne Frank, and most recently they have been watching the movie as well. So lately I have gotten a double-dose of this event in history as described in literature. The loss of hope and faith in this book contrasts with the majority of Anne Frank's story, in that she spent most of her story telling others to continue having hope. She was a strong, optimistic child, while the child in Night frequently had thoughts of despair and suicide. Eventually though, Anne Frank also became overwhelmed with despair when she believed that her parents were already dead, when in fact her father survived to make sure her diary was published. This story also took place at a different camp, so the exact conditions experienced in each was different. Anne Frank's came experienced a much more slow suffering and death through the spread of disease, while death in this story happened more quickly, usually at the hands of those who held them captive.

I can tell from reading this story and even from watching the Anne Frank movie that this will be a very difficult subject for me to teach the kids about, as it remains something very difficult for me to process. I personally would not use this book in a middle school, and I would even feel hesitant about using it in a high school setting.

Romeo and Juliet

The last time (and the first time) that I read Romeo and Juliet all the way through was last quarter during my Shakespeare class. Like many of Shakespeare's plays, it seems to me like a lot of problems would be avoided if the characters reacted in less extreme ways to things. There never seems to be much of a passage of time between when something bad happens, and when a character in a Shakespeare play decides to resort to suicide or murder. The only time when there was a lot of hesitation in carrying out one of these acts that I can remember is in Hamlet, and that was the focus of the entire play.

Like with the other stories that I read last quarter, I came to appreciate Shakespeare more than I had in the past. The difference in the way language was used then compared to how it is used now creates a barrier for many younger readers, or at least it did for me, but I was able to appreciate it much more here in college. When I had attempted to read this and other Shakespeare stories in secondary school, it had seemed over-dramatic, and confusing, but this time I was able to see that Shakespeare was really a genius with language, and was extremely witty. I was also able to pick up on how he would play against the norms of the time, and propose challenging ideas. For example, introducing humor in tragedies.

With this play, there is usually the question of whether Romeo and Juliet were really in true love, or just puppy love that they reacted to too strongly because they were just kids. Based on modern sensibilities, I would say they were just infatuated kids, but taking into account how other Shakespeare characters reacted to similar tragedies, and how people would get married much younger in Shakespeare's time, I think it is very likely that Shakespeare intended for the characters to be seen as in true love.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

This book reminded me of the Outsiders in that it did an extremely good job of telling a story from the perspective of the protagonist. It did so while creating a very realistic portrayal of the kinds of thoughts a young man would have. Even though the story was told from only one character's point of view, it was easy to relate to other characters in the story because their own faults and vulnerabilities were made plain even though a young perspective. It was also easy to root for the main character, because even though he was pretty hard on himself, he did legitimately face a great deal of challenges that many people in life to do not overcome. He also showed great bravery in the book, such as when he stopped, afraid to go to into the new school, and when he could have turned around and returned to his old school, he moved into the new school. Even though he thought he was just obeying the rules of behavior, it was also brave to stand up to a kid much tougher than him when he was getting bullied, although there were probably wiser courses of actions he could have taken.

I do not think I would use this book in my own classroom because there is some material in the book that could be considered problematic by administrators and even more by some parents, such as sexual content and language. I say this largely because I am in a middle school classroom. In a high school classroom, the students might be considered old enough that such material would be more of a non-issue, but I would still be wary of it because of parental concerns. I felt that it did a good job of addressing important issues such as race, socioeconomic status, and bullying, but there is other literature that addresses these subjects that do not bring with them such potential problems.

The Unparalleled Adventures of One Hans Pfaall

This story was unlike anything I've ever read from Poe before. I would not have been able to guess the story was by him if his name was not on it. Usually, his stories are written with an eerie, mysterious tone. This story was written in a lighthearted and even humorous tone. The way the people of the town acted seemed like it was designed to cause people to smile or laugh. The man from the moon had more of a funny appearance than a scary one. My previous awareness of Poe was that he wrote horror stories, but this story did not have that kind of feeling at all. As it says in the title, it was an adventure story, so it contained mystery, but not of the terrifying kind in his usual stories. This story seemed to rather be a kind of humorous science-fiction story. I do not know if that kind of story existed before this one, but it seems to me like it would have been one of the first of its kind.

It was not the easiest story to read. The sentences were very long and wordy. Sometimes it seemed the story went into more detail than necessary. I think Poe improved as a writer in his later works, since from what I looked up about his story, it was written when he was young and before he became popular. There was a part of the story that was humorous for me that Poe probably did not intend to be funny, which is his description of the science and technology involved in reaching the moon in a balloon, and what space and the moon would look like. I do not know how much of this was intended to be seen as clearly fiction, and how much would have been considered plausible at the time the story was published.