Service Learning Project

When I first heard about the Service Learning project, I was kind of confused as to what we would be doing. I wasn't sure what it meant or how we would be completing it. But, when we went to the YWCA, I felt a lot more comfortable learning about what we would be doing. I felt like the YWCA was a very comforting place and it had a good mission statement. I'm excited to help out as much as I can at the YWCA, because I love kids (even though I'll be teaching high school...), and I know that all of the kids there could benefit from having a college students interacting with them. I think this project will be a good and a fun experience for me, and it doesn't even take that much work/effort. I am a little nervous about creating a lesson or activity for the students, but knowing that this can be a collaborative effort makes me a little less nervous. I know I want to be a teacher, but doing things like this make me nervous (I know it'll go away when I do my student teaching and other field experiences, but for right now, I only have 15 hours of obversation under my belt). Plus, I know that the kids will enjoy whatever activity I (or a group I might work with) come up with. Little kids, especially preschool aged kids, love doing fun activities and I feel like I could come up with a pretty good one that would get the engaged, excited, and have fun all at the same time.
Working one on one with a student confuses me a little bit too. Are we supposed to tutor them? Or is it strictly interaction? I guess depending on the age of the student it would vary, and I would like to work with a school aged child if I can. So, are we just going to talk to them one on one? Tutor them? Play games? The requirements document said something about asking about tests. What are we supposed to ask them and what are we supposed to do about it? If they are not good at taking tests, should we help them try to improve their scores? I don't think any of this would be too hard, but I feel like the project as a whole doesn't focus around this. I would definitely be willing to help a school aged child work on homework and help him or her improve grades and/or test scores, but are they really at the YWCA to be tutored?
I really hope I'll be able to find one or two other people to travel to and from the YWCA with. I always feel awkward going into places I don't really know and doing things with people I don't really know. I suppose I just have to get used to it, and I know I will with time. But, for now, I hope there is a way I can do things with other people.

Chapter 5 Response

I have always been the type of student who doesn't talk in class. I hate it. I'm always afraid of being wrong or sounding stupid, so I just avoid that happening at all costs. I can give a presentation, but that's only because I've already researched a topic and I have a power point (or some other thing) right in front of me to read off of. Growing up, I feel like my teachers would make me feel like I was wrong or that I was saying something stupid, so I think that's why I just don't speak up in class. I always hated when teachers said "There are no wrong answers" because there always was. And I always seemed to be the one who said it.

I know that talking out loud in class is scary for students. I know that I will be able to relate to every single one of those students, and I will be sure to let them know that. I want my classroom to be comfortable for my students, unlike how most of my teachers made their classrooms. (There was one particular teacher I had in high school [an English teacher, go figure], that made me feel the worst. I'm pretty sure she hated me for no reason.) I would like for my students to know that not talking is okay... but it's still not the right way. We're in school for learning and I am not the one who can be learning for them. I suppose having large class discussions would make a lot of students feel uncomfortable, and I think I would definitely utilize the small group discussions. I know I always feel more comfortable speaking to a small group, rather than the class as a whole. Smaller classes made me feel more comfortable talking out loud too, but I know I won't be having very many small classes.

I want my students to feel comfortable sharing their thoughts or asking their questions in my classroom, but I know that is almost virtually impossible. I don't think there is a way for every single student in a classroom to feel comfortable talking out loud. I know I would implement strategies to get them to talk, and so I could see what their thoughts were if they don't say anything out loud. I would also probably require a one-on-one a few times a year, just to talk to each individual student's thoughts. My AP English teacher I had for my junior year and senior year of high school did something like this. He would require us to have a journal conference with him twice a semester (aka once a quarter). There he could assess everyone's progress and hear what kinds of things they are thinking about the books and poems we were reading in an extremely laid-back (yet extremely stressful) setting. I would hope my one-on-ones would not be as stressful as those journal conferences, but I do think they would be very helpful for getting my students to talk.

Delpit Response

I feel like teaching children from another race (like a white teacher teaching and African American student) isn't as hard as these chapters made it out to be. Maybe way back when all of the Civil Rights things were happening it was hard for white people to teach African Americans, but it shouldn't be like that now.

Maybe I'm just biased. I went to a high school where the white students were the minority of the school. There were about twice as many Hispanic students as white students, and maybe about the same African American students. I feel like I already know how to interact with these students at a student level, so I think it will be easier for me to interact/teach students from other races while they are in my classroom. I was able to see how my own teachers handled the huge diversity in their classrooms, and I feel like I'll be just as able to handle it as them. Of course, I know that there are other circumstances behind all of the different techniques, but I honestly feel like some authors make it seem like teaching students from other races is a huge challenge. But as a teacher, that just has to be a challenge you are willing to accept. As a teacher, we have to do what is right for our classrooms as a whole, and then break it down to individuals. If an African American student is having trouble reading or writing, the teacher would just have to meet with him or her individually and in private.

I really feel like it wont be as hard to teach in a diverse classroom as some people seem to think it is. Sure, it may be a challenge to some, but I dont think it will be as hard in the society we live in currently. There are better ways to help students now than there were in previous years, and I think a lot of teachers take advantage of these tools. I know I will.

Chapter 14 Response

I'm in Instructional Technology (EDUC 295), and one of our first assignments was to post a forum about what we thought about using blogs in the classroom. At first, I was completely against it. I mean, how could you possibly use a blog in a classroom? Especially an English classroom? At first I thought they really had no educational value whatsoever. But now, after reading about how an actual English teacher used blogs in her classroom while reading a certain book, made me rethink me previous accusation. I think that blogs actually might be useful in the classroom. I think they actually might be a very cool thing to use while reading a novel. Students feel more comfortable when they can say what they want from the protection of their own home and behind a screen. No one can really "attack" them there, if they say something wrong or stupid. I also think it's awesome the even people from other places can access the blog and post their own comments, even though they're not in the class. I think it would be really cool if my class had a blog and some writer began commenting on it. I think it would add a whole new dynamic to the classroom and to the discussion. It would probably even be possible to get that person to come and talk to my class.

I also think that the wikibooks and the book trailer ideas are cool. Both things make students think and have a safety net behind a screen. I think that students feel more comfortable when they can see/hear other student's ideas before they share their own. I know I felt that way in high school, and even sometimes in college, but in high school we never used online technology to do things. See what I've posted here? I would never actually say this out loud in a class. I can write a paper about anything, I can write on a forum post about anything, but talking about anything in class? I just can't do it. That's why I like being able to do things like this, because I know I feel more comfortable with it. I think the book trailer idea would be better as more of a project when students have finished reading a book. I had to do something similar in my creative writing 1 class in high school, where we had to make a book jacket for the "book" we had created during the class. It was fun to see how everyone had created theirs, so I think seeing how students would make a book trailer would be cool.

I was not a huge fun of the podcast idea. I think it might be good for a teacher to have students record book discussions, because I think everyone knows that when the teacher isn't actually around, the book really isn't being discussed. I think it would probably be good for the teacher to hear what went down in the actual discussion, but then when the students post it to the website, then they could edit out those parts so the other members of the group can listen to it again if the need were to arise. Other than that, though, I don't really like the podcast idea. I would probably never use it, and if I did it would be for the reason I explained.

Chapter 8 Response

I think that people (not so much teachers, but everyone else) need to be more considerate to English Language Learners. English is probably one of the hardest languages to learn because of all of the stupid rules we have (rules that don't seem stupid to native speakers). Take for instance, silent letters. How do you expect someone who's native language is Chinese to understand that the p in phone is silent and the "ph" makes an "f" sound? I think that people who are not ESL teachers or who are not bilingual need to understand that learning a new language is hard. Most everyone in the United States has had to take at least one course in another language to graduate from high school or college, or both. The native English speakers need to remember how hard it was trying to learn Spanish (or French or German or whatever other language might have been offered) and think of how hard it must be for someone from one of those countries to learn English. I know from my experience, I always had to hear things in English and learn the concepts in English before I could even remotely understand what I was learning in my Spanish classes. It's the same thing that happens to the people trying to learn English. These students to be put with patient teacher who is willing to go through the English language just as painstakingly as a Spanish teacher goes through the Spanish.

I've had many friends go through an ELL class and they have all loved them. My friend Talitha, who is originally from the Philippines, went through an ELL class when she moved to Illinois when we were in eighth grade. She has said to me before that she probably did not need to go through this class because she had been instructed in English as well as in Tagalog while in the Philippines. Even when we had first met, I couldn't even tell that she came from another country. She speaks English just as well as anyone else I know, and she can speak Tagalog just as fluently. It's fun to watch her at home because her parents do not speak as much English (even though they are fluent enough to get by), so Talitha will switch from talking in English to me to talking in Tagalog with her parents in an instant. Both of her parents and her other older family members (aunts, uncles, etc) have heavy Filippino accents, but Talitha does not have an accent at all. It is interesting to me that the book states most ELL students are afraid to speak outloud in English because of their accents, yet my friend (who is not afraid of anything, really) does not even have an accent when talking in English. (I can sometimes hear it when she is talking with her parents, though.)

Chapter 7 Response

I think vocabulary is a very important thing to learn, no matter how old you are. I love learning new words every day and I always have. I guess that's why I wanted to become an English teacher. The different techniques described in the chapter seemed very well thought out to me and I would definitely try to implement them in my classroom. I'm not entirely sure how I would make learning new vocabulary fun for my students, but I would defintely try my hardest. Something my sophomore English teacher had us do was write the word in one corner of a piece of paper, write the definition you thought it was in another, the actual definition in another, and then use it in a sentence in the last corner. Then, in the middle, we had to draw a picture of the sentence we wrote. I know that really helped me in learning how to use the words in context, and I now actually do use some of the words in my everyday speech. (I wouldn't be able to tell you which ones I actually learned then, since I've been using them for so long, but I do know that that is what helped me to learn new words.)

Chapter 4 Response

I definitely agree with what the author of this chapter wrote about. Teachers need to teach students in a way that they will understand the material for life, not just long enough for the test. The story the author wrote about how she visited a classroom and had the student sit on the floor for the discussion really got me thinking. This is where a lot of students feel more comfortable. If the teacher and all of the students are more physically comfortable on the floor, then they will more than likely be more mentally comfortable to actually listen to the teacher and engage in the learning. That is where the learning takes place.
I also think that the author of this chapter was trying to get at the point of "learning is okay." I think it would be good for a teacher to show the students that he/she is learning the same stuff the students are, just differently. As an English teacher, I think it would be important for the teacher to be reading the books or passages or poems at the same time as the students and talk about the troublesome spots he/she had. That would make for a better discussion with the students, because then they could see that even the teacher had trouble with certain spots, and maybe a few students did too. Then those students can speak up and ask their questions, and the students who felt like they did understand that same section can speak up and give their ideas. These are the things that students will remember for life.
I think that lessons have to be interesting, especially when the topic isn't. I can honestly say that I don't remember much from my US History class in high school because the only thing my teacher ever did was make us fill out enormous packets, take notes (with highlighting! If there wasn't highlighting in your notes, you got points off), and watch movies. Of course I remember HISTORY... I just don't remember all the fine details that I know my teacher gave us. If he would have had us doing more things that were interesting, I would have remembered a lot more.
I think that as a teacher, I will definitely try to implement more of the comprehension ideas the author of this chapter talked about. All are important, but some may not be necessary. For teachers, these things are usually just trial and error. If it works for all, or most, students, then it's something they should keep using. If it doesn't work, well, then you just try another.

Chapter 6 and Strategies Response

Chapter 6:
This chapter is all about books and how to use them in the classroom. Mostly, obviously, for the older students because Lesesne discusses all Young Adult (YA) literature. Being an English major, I have read a lot of books, mostly consisting of YA novels. Lesesne discusses using graphic novels in the classroom, but I don't think those are particularly enjoyable. Sure, you can get a whole story in a graphic novel and there are some cool drawings, but how do you really get inside the characters' heads in just a few panels per page? Actual, 200 page, novels is where a student could get a lot more in-depth with discussions and other ideas. I understand that graphic novels would be an interesting approach for most students, but I can honestly say that I would probably not use one while I am teaching. I feel like they are more childish, no matter what the subject matter may be. I would want my students to think critically about the characters and the setting and all of the other literary elements, rather than look at the pictures on the page and not really read or see the words. Half the fun of reading is seeing it in your head anyways, or at least that's what I think. Having what the author wants you to see already there on the page seems pointless. Plus, how could you make a movie out of a graphic novel? I happen to like being able to read a book, knowing that there will be a movie coming out for it that I can go see to determine if what I pictured in my head is the same as the casting director's. (As a side-note, I was very angry that the author of this chapter mentioned Twilight in one of the sections. Twilight should never be used for teaching in a classroom because it is NOT literature. It's not even good writing. The plot of the story is lacking in a lot of places, and the whole thing should have just stopped after the first book. As you can tell, I am very much not a fan of these books/movies and I really hope that the phenomenon dies out very soon. [And yes, I did read these books and enjoyed them as light reading when I was younger. But people have taken it way too far and I hope beyond hope that "teaching" Twilight wont be something I see as a teacher.])

Strategies:
1) I loved SSR in school! It was probably always my favorite time of any English class. As I got older and more advanced, thought, the SSR time dwindled into nothing. I will definitely give my students SSR time when I'm teaching!!
2) Reading aloud can sometimes get boring. I know every once in a while it can be fun, but as an English class it might be hard to read certain things out loud. Of course, as an English class, it is necessary to do so, but I know I wont be doing that ALL of the time.
3) I think that reading autobiographies seem more like an activity for younger students. I probably would not do something like this in my high school class. Maybe a middle school class, but I don't think high schoolers would take it seriously.
5) Of course a safe and welcoming enviornment in necessary in all classrooms. I already have plans on how I am going to make my classroom warm and welcoming, a safe place, and a place where good discussions can happen.
6) I am definitely planning on doing my own reading while I am a teacher. Not doing so would make my students thing I don't enjoy what I teach and they wouldn't want to be there. I am excited to be able to read good books while I teach, so I can tell them all about it.
8) Talking about reading is essential in an English classroom! That would be something I do every single day in my classroom. Whether it be about their SSR books or about the book we would currently be studying, talking about what they read would be the first thing we did every class.
9) I'm not entirely sure what more of an essential conversation an English class could have other than discussing the books and other literary things. I'm sure once I would be in that position, I would be able to find other things to discuss, like the history of the time period or something.

Chapters 3 & 16 Response

Chapter 3:
First of all, I really didn't like this chapter. It wasn't written very well, in my opinion, and I really don't think the author of the chapter knew what she was talking about. She used quotes left and right and didn't really connect them in a way that made sense to me. Aside from that, though, I thought the parts of the chapter I actually understood (usually just the very long quote she used) was pretty interesting. The part that really got to me was when she had the quote from Johnson about the parallel universe. What if video games had come before books? Where would society be right now? Would we have people who were completely against books and refused to read? (Not like we don't have that now....) Or would we have people who chose to read over playing video games, even though they had grown up on video games? Personally, I think video games have their time and place, but I do not think they should be taking the place of books and instruction in school. Is using the Internet and other technologies good for teaching? Of course they are. But they shouldn't completely replace actual teaching. Playing educational video games as children is probably good. The bright colors and the movements stimulate the brain and then they do things like math or spelling in a fun way that actually helps them. Playing video games like Black Ops or Nazi Zombies or anything like that isn't educational. How can it be? The person playing the game is sitting there killing zombies or whatever else might be in the game. That's not educational. And anyone who says otherwise would be in for a huge arguement with someone like me.

Chapter 16:
In this chapter, the poem that the girl wrote about what teachers need to know to motivate students is what really got to me. The underachieving students know how teachers feel about them and it's not fair to them. Students from low-income families or any of the other sterotypical things have just as much of a shot at making it as a student who doesn't come from one of those places. Additionally, a student who isn't from a sterotype is just as likely to drop out of school. So why do teachers focus so much more and trying to teach the "underachieving"? I think that teachers and schools should treat all of the students in the same way. No one group of students should have some kind of special treatment. The more equally you treat the students, the more likely they will compete for the better grade, which, as a teacher, isn't that what you want? Students should want to get better grades than their classmates, without the pressure. Sure, some students do come from a poor family or have a bad home life, so they sometimes need a little special attention. But that should come before or after school. Not in a whole separate class where teachers basically treat you like you're stupid and don't know anything. I think schools should really look at how they are handling students from low income places and they should treat them with just as much respect and dignity as they would a student from a different kind of family. That's what is going to motivate them to do better. Not being placed in a separte class, away from their friends and away from a challenge.

Chapter 10 Response

Technology is always changing. I've learned that many times, in many ways. Through experience, through other education courses, and through my instructional technology class (which I am currently taking). It almost doesn't matter, though, does it? Especially for and English teacher. That's the one teaching job that could never be taken over by a computer. A computer can't teach you how to read, write papers, or even communicate well. Only a person could do that.
Everyone has to learn. Burke even states that "all workers who must continue to learn as their fields evolve and must, consequently, be highly literate" (150). How could anyone without any form of literacy hold a job? There's no way someone who could not read or write could even be a waiter/waitress, let alone something high-paying like a doctor. This is why teachers, especially the English teachers, are so important in today's society.
Without these people, students would never learn how to commincate with one another. That's another huge thing people must be able to do today. According to Burke, there are eight steps that are needed in the world: collaborators and orchestrators, synthesizers, explainers, leveragers, adapters, green people, personalizers, and localizers (152). I think the two most important out of this entire list are leveragers and adapters. I think the two kind of go hand-in-hand, yet they are both completely different. Leveragers are the ones that need to stay calm and almost continue to use existing technology to get the results they want. However, adapters are extremely important. Jobs change rapidly (like the example Burke gives of the firefighter). There needs to be a form of adaptability in everyone, so they can continue to work in their jobs, instead of becoming obsolete.

Chapter 1 Response

I went to a low-income high school. It was also in a bad neighborhood, filled with mostly Hispanic people and African Americans. As a freshman, I really had no idea what the No Child Left Behind Act was and I wasn’t too concerned about test scores for a school as a whole. My sophomore year, though, my high school went through a restructuring process. They took away our half hour lunch break called Flex block (we were on block scheduling) and forced us into a classroom for half an hour directly after first block for a “study hall”. Everyone hated it. Other than that, I honestly have no idea what else my school did to restructure. I was always in the honors and AP classes, so I never had to deal with the test-prep classes some people were put into.

            But why do test scores matter? What is the point of ISATs, or any other state exam? My high school didn’t meet the AYP standards too many times and they have been restructuring ever since my sophomore year. To the point where next year (when my brother is a freshman) they won’t even have block scheduling anymore; so they can fit more classes into one day instead of just four. Why are schools so concerned about the scores students get on those tests? Is it because if they don’t meet the standards, the school gets less money? Is that what education has come down to?

            Education should be about the students. Not the scores they get on stupid state exams. What if you’re a bad test taker like me? What if you just had a bad day and couldn’t remember anything? What if your home life was terrible and you got a bad night’s sleep the night before the test? So many things can go wrong for a student and they might receive a bad test score, even though they might be an excellent student. Shouldn’t educators take that into consideration? The example Beers gave about Collin is perfect for this situation. Just because he didn’t do well on the state exam and he doesn’t always do well on his papers doesn’t mean he’s a bad student. In all actuality, he seemed like a very good student. He just cared about different things instead of grades and test scores.

            That’s what education and literacy should be. Who cares if a student doesn’t do well on the reading portion of a test? It happens sometimes. When Beers wrote about her experience with Derek, she said that his reading score had improved immensely, yet he was still placed in a test prep class. How did his score improve so much? Was he placed into a test prep class the year before too? Educators should see this kind of improvement and treat it with respect. The student is bound to be excited about this improvement, just like Derek. So why take away that excitement? Instead of Derek having been placed into a remedial reading class, he should have been moved up one more level. Obviously, he probably would have had a little trouble with it, but isn’t that the way kids learn? He should have been placed into something slightly harder than what he needed, or what his test scores said he needed, and just asked for help when he needed it. That’s what I hope my students do when I’m a teacher.

            Of course I would want my students to achieve good grades. But why should I care what they get on a state exam? Items on tests like those don’t even matter in the real world. It’s like when Beers talks about how some people had to memorize poems because they “ought to know [them]” (pg. 8). How many of those people actually remember those poems a week after memorizing them? I think it’s safe to assume that about 90% of those students wouldn’t.

            It’s hard to believe that school administrators are only concerned about state tests scores. They really don’t even matter. I don’t understand the point of them. I don’t even understand the point of regular classroom tests. It doesn’t show anything. It’s also hard to believe that some schools, like my high school, actually make some students drive thirty to forty minutes to school because you’re the only town in the district that has a high income and helps make the test scores go up. (Yes, I had to go to high school a half hour away from my house, even though there was a school only ten minutes away, just because the students from my town helped that high school raise the test scores. It’s ridiculous to think about.)