Blog Post #2 Staying Strong!

Hello again everyone! This semester is just flying by! I’m staying as busy as ever and am continuing my pre-student teaching at my school and working closely with my CT on classroom strategies, lesson plans, and other practices. She has been working with me by telling me how she has her classroom set up and her teaching style. Also, I have been able to teach with her, and at times by myself. I must say, I am becoming more and more at ease with my students when I am by myself. I have found that the more I teach, the more it becomes second nature to me.  

My CT has told me something that made me realize what this whole student observations are meant for. My last three semesters were not only to show me different teaching stiles, but to see what kind of classroom I will want have, and what sort of teaching strategies I will want to implement. I was told by CT that every teacher has a different teaching style, and that the observation is for helping me get a better idea of how I want to teach, and how I want my classroom to be laid out, and what sort of technologies and what not I want to use in my lessons.  

Now to help me this semester, I have taken up writing in a journal whenever I get a good idea I think would be a good lesson. Last semester, my CT told me to do this, as it is what he does, and he is a great teacher, and I want to mirror many of his lessons in the future. So far this semester I have been writing a lot in my journal with my new CT’s lessons. Many of the lessons are great, and I have some ideas to expand on them if I teach a class that is longer than the fifty minutes. In our Bomer text, we have been reading about using literacy to manage strategies, and the other day in class we had a debate on how each one of us uses literacy strategies in our own way. Bomer writes “Writers need a way of capturing thoughts, information, and plans, and the writers notebook is a useful tool for those purposes.” (Bomer 64) This passage spoke to me as I have been writing ideas for lessons in a notebook since last semester. My idea is that if I think I have a good idea for a lesson, I will share it with my colleagues and see if they have any ideas that could possibly make it a better lesson.

Also, I have been discussing with my CT plans for my unit plan and lessons. Since the students are on a tight schedule, I am doing my best to read ahead of their lessons, so that I can teach them according to the big picture idea. This semester, my CT and I are teaching the students about different types of character development. Hopefully I will get to do my lesson plan on a secondary character from one of our books that we have been reading. Since the unit plan is a large part of our grade this semester, I have been setting aside an hour a day to help me prepare for this project. Bomer writes “Writing demands a particular kind of energy and sense of time, and that energy and space do not fell equally available at all times in an individual’s daily life.” (Bomer 59) Since Bomer is referring to time here, I have been using this hour for constructing and writing out ideas for my lessons.

Since I don’t have a finalized character or book yet, I have been using my daily hour to think up lessons that can be used across all the books and multiple characters. I have one lesson where I plan on having the students do a before and after of character development of one of the characters that starts off as a villain, but becomes a friend of the protagonist in the end. Hopefully this will allow students the opportunity to see the character from another student’s perspective. For my reflection and idea hour I go to my quiet place away from distractions. This place is also known as my gun room, where there is a desk, and gun cabinets. Bomer states “locations can be extremely important in the construction of reading life.” (Bomer 55) Once again he is referring to writing so I am once again writing my ideas down.

My question to you is, what do you do to lesson plan? Do you need to be with people, or by yourself? Well hope everyone has a fantastic week!

 

Bomer, Randy, Building Adolescent Literacy in Today’s English Classrooms, 2011, Heinemann

Starting This Semester Right!

Hello all!

Well this semester is off to a flying start! I have begun my core III teaching, and am enjoying my class very much. It is a class full of juniors who have IEPs and other learning issues. It is a class of about 18-19, it seems at the beginning of every week, we get a new student that has transferred into the creaky old classroom. The classroom is in an older section of the building, but it has a very warm and welcoming atmosphere.

Our readings so far have shown me what it means to depict a better way for our students to write in their own personal style. In Harry Noden’s book, Image Grammar, he writes “Developing a grammar of style begins with learning to “see,” literally and metaphorically.” (Noden 2) In my classroom, my CT has been teaching student how to identify irony, metaphors, and similes through television shows, and class readings. The students are beginning to pick up on the subjects, and have had to write poems and short stories on their experiences and personal feelings. The way in which they write is based on their creative writing style, and they are encouraged by my CT and their teacher to write what they want and how they want. I have also noticed that when they are done with their writing, they can read to the class if they want. My CT doesn’t feel that the students have to read out loud if they don’t want to; as many may not want to read out loud due to their fear of public speaking.

Since we have just begun the semester, there have not been any big assignments where the students have had to write any big papers or anything that would require advanced grammar. Instead we have been using our time in class reading William Carlos Williams poems and writing poems similar to it using his poems as a model. However, I am looking forward to helping students expand their grammar. In our Pre-Student teaching course, we learned about appositives. I am very anxious to help my students learn more about them when we come to the lessons on expanding our grammar.

Right now my students are in the process of reading a young adult literature novel of their choice. Many of them have chosen the book, The Maze Runner, by James Dashner. When the seven students who chose this book have been reading it in their free time in class, have had a hard time trying to picture the images that the author is trying to produce. I have used the images released from the movie that they are making to show the students a better image of the book’s universe. According to Noden, “The combination of written brush strokes and popular film cuts reinforces the concept of the writer as artist, making image grammar more significant for students, many of whom have been exposed primarily to multi-media imagery.” (Noden 18) Keeping this in mind, I have been asking my students to tell me about what imagery they have seen from the movie pictures and what the book says. Hopefully as time progresses, I will be able to show them how their writings will be able express the pictures in their minds.

Chapter nine in Noden’s text discusses the well-known area of literature known as non-fiction. The way that my class has been reading, seems to be a balance of non-fiction and fiction. I am very excited for the non-fiction section of this semester as I understand that it is supposed to coincide with the students’ social studies class. We have read a story where the book gives a narrative lead. Noden states “A narrative lead lures the reader with a compelling story in one to three paragraphs.” (Noden 207) I have always had a problem with narrative leads, as it does not give the reader other characters’ points of views, and limits your understanding of the situation. What are my fellow teacher and student teachers’ opinion on narrative leads? Our text says “A narrative lead lures the reader with a compelling story in one to three paragraphs.” (Noden, 207) However, I can never really trust the narrator though, what are your thoughts on the subject?

So far I have really enjoyed my time in my placement, and am becoming close to the kids. I hope to be able to teach them how to expand their grammar as we progress through the semester. Until next time!

Noden, Harry Image Grammar, Teaching Grammar as Part of the Writing Process Heinemann, Portsmouth, NH. 2011