Here's a question for discussion:
In a school where there is a percentage of students on free or reduced lunch, who probably don't have a computer at home, is it fair to have a teacher webpage for students with computers to download assignments they forgot at home IF the teacher doesn't hold students accountable for retriving information from the webpage? Does it just offer an additional resource, or does it give more affluent students an advantage?
Thursday, December 15, 2005
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
Book Club / Literature Cirlces
One more post, then I need to go pack my wife's lunch so she can go to work:
I had this idea a couple weeks ago that maybe if students had to read a required text, they could still use book clubs but analyze the book using different literary theories or different approaches. One group could approach the book from a predominately topical standpoint. Another group from a cultural, another from social.
Questions:
1. Would this work?
2. Does this preserve any of the advantages of book clubs? Students would still have some choice in their study, and they would be working in groups . . . the real question is would this kind of book club benefit the student, or am I just trying to do book clubs for the sake of doing them?
I had this idea a couple weeks ago that maybe if students had to read a required text, they could still use book clubs but analyze the book using different literary theories or different approaches. One group could approach the book from a predominately topical standpoint. Another group from a cultural, another from social.
Questions:
1. Would this work?
2. Does this preserve any of the advantages of book clubs? Students would still have some choice in their study, and they would be working in groups . . . the real question is would this kind of book club benefit the student, or am I just trying to do book clubs for the sake of doing them?
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I was almost done with the last post when I got a reply from my mentor teacher, saying that Night is required reading for all eighth graders - which is totally cool and something I partially expected.
I bombarded her with another three questions in my reply (I hope I'm not coming across as too much of a boat rocker).
In Cindy O'Donnell-Allen's Methods for Teaching Language Arts we discussed a study she did while working on her doctorate (I think?) where they trained educators and then met up with them again after one year. The majority of the teachers implimented traditional pedagogies in their classrooms instead of new strategies they had been taught in college. I don't want to lose what I've been taught.
At the same time, in his book Teaching English through Principled Practice (the main text for the same class), Peter Smagorinsky talks about how many teachers lose their jobs after their first year because they go into schools and alienate themselves from the other teachers by trying to impliment entirely different teaching methods - and are very vocal about it.
I know I have a lot to learn. I know that many of the teachers I'll be working with next semester can teach me a great deal. I also think that because I've just spent four years reading about all the "radical" new pedagogies that maybe I can show them a trick or two as well.
So how fine is the line that I need to walk? Or is it really three lanes wide and I'm just freaking out?
I bombarded her with another three questions in my reply (I hope I'm not coming across as too much of a boat rocker).
In Cindy O'Donnell-Allen's Methods for Teaching Language Arts we discussed a study she did while working on her doctorate (I think?) where they trained educators and then met up with them again after one year. The majority of the teachers implimented traditional pedagogies in their classrooms instead of new strategies they had been taught in college. I don't want to lose what I've been taught.
At the same time, in his book Teaching English through Principled Practice (the main text for the same class), Peter Smagorinsky talks about how many teachers lose their jobs after their first year because they go into schools and alienate themselves from the other teachers by trying to impliment entirely different teaching methods - and are very vocal about it.
I know I have a lot to learn. I know that many of the teachers I'll be working with next semester can teach me a great deal. I also think that because I've just spent four years reading about all the "radical" new pedagogies that maybe I can show them a trick or two as well.
So how fine is the line that I need to walk? Or is it really three lanes wide and I'm just freaking out?
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