Blog Post #2- Stepping back from literature and addressing different types of literacy.

Hello everyone!

I hope that the past few weeks in your placements have gone smoothly.

I have been having an interesting time in my placement. I honestly have not had many chances to be an English teacher-like figure in my classroom because we have been focused on getting the career skills portion of English 4 out of the way.

There is a section in our Bomer text that is related to the next issue that I have been pondering; “It would help us serve students better if we kept in mind the realities of people’s lives. Everyone is not an English major. Everyone is not even a college student. . . They are entitled to an education that is useful and significant in those lives, that improves not just their work performance but the wide range of purposes for which people use literacy” (51). My CT addresses this idea of teaching students real world skills and how they will use literacy after they graduate effectively in her classes. I know that career related writing is extremely important, but I have been wondering if it should be a part of an English class. Granted, I know that there is really no other class that focuses on writing as much as an English class, but I have been wondering if a class that focuses only on career planning would be helpful for seniors to take for part of a semester. I am not opposed to what my CT is doing in class right now, but I do think that it is unfair for English teacher to have to step back from literature in order to make sure that students have the necessary skills for after they graduate.

I also have been wondering whether or not it is a good thing to assign a series of writing assignments without a break in between them. Do you think that students will get burnt out from all the writing? Or will they just be really relieved when we finally get around to reading literature in a few weeks?

I found out that I will be teaching my lessons on the Kite Runner sometime in October and I was wondering if anyone had any ideas about how to introduce Afghan culture in a more interesting way than a PowerPoint presentation. I was thinking of maybe creating some sort of internet scavenger hunt, but I would probably have to choose a few credible websites for them to look for the answers instead of them just browsing Google. I do plan on using different reading environments like Bomer suggests; I will definitely have students read the text in different “social structures”; we will read as a whole class, in partners and individually. I want all of them to be able to strong readers in every type of reading domain. I did not like reading in partners when I was in high school, but I know that it is necessary to be able to read every situation that I am placed in, and reading in partners is one that is common in daily life.

I am excited for the literature portion of my placement class to start soon, so I can start to feel like I am contributing to the class as more of a teaching figure than a spell-checker.

I hope that all of you have a great week in your placements.

Miss Schmidt

Pondering class structure and homework

Hello everyone.

Last week in the classroom, the seniors started their unit on business letters. They will be required to write two business letters during this unit; one will be written with a group and one will be an individual assignment. I think that writing a business letter as a group is an odd assignment; I do not know if group writing assignments are beneficial, but I guess I will see when they get to their individual letters. My teacher is using two different social arrangements for this assignment, which is said to be good according to our Bomer text, so maybe group work will help students who need to interact with classmates in order to fully understand an assignment.

I have not seen how my teacher lectures very much so far; she seems to favor projects mostly. I am interested to see how she presents lessons later on when we actually start getting into the literature section of the course. I wonder if focusing on projects more than lessons is what students prefer because the students have not complained during class about her assignments yet, and everyone has turned in each assignment so far.

I have a question that has been floating through my brain for the past year. I have observed, during my past placements and co-op placement last year, that students are not being given homework on a regular basis anymore. I realize that students have busy lives after school, but that has always been the case, so I do not understand why they are not receiving homework anymore. It might be for the fact that students do not turn in homework when it is assigned, but not giving out homework for that reason only is not good for students because they will never learn to be responsible for doing their homework if they are not given any. I am worried that students will get to college and not know how to manage the homework load that they receive each semester. I am not saying that students should be given a colossal amount of homework each week, but they should be able to handle a few assignments a week.

The class that I am a part of somewhat reminds me of the IB class that I was in two semesters ago. Both teachers give a short introduction lesson before they are given an assignment and then they work on the assignment for a few days and then it happens all over again with the next assignment. When I look at the way the class is structure from this perspective, it is a good thing because the students do not rely on their teacher to walk them though each little step of each assignment. Maybe making the students be productive on their own in class compensates for not assigning them homework because they are responsible for getting their work done in class, using their time wisely, and making sure that they speak up and ask questions during class if they have them.

These are just a few of the things that have been running through my mind when I have been watching students work in class this past week. I am sure that many more questions and thoughts will arise this week while I am in the classroom.