Cardboard Boxes

I read Cajas de Carton by Francisco Jimenez, and really enjoyed it. The narrator was originally the one that did not want to leave because he was comfortable with his home in Mexico. They headed off to find work elsewhere and Roberto was upset that he would no longer go to school while the narrator was able to. As soon as the narrator had become excited about schooling and the progress he was making there, they packed up to leave.

This is a good aspect on how teaching English as a secondary language can be. The teacher has to be very patient and willing to build a relationship with the student. In this story he struggled to catch up on new English grammar due to the fact that he did not hear English very often. His family spoke Spanish to each other as well. As a teacher, you have to understand that students may speak a different language in their home and you need to be able to connect and understand them. (Here's a LINK to a cute website of games for ESL children). 

Teachers need to build a relationship and be familiar with other cultures, respecting their language, and engaging them in different ways. This is mentioned in Reading, Writing, and Rising Up as well. When you scold a student's writing or speech that is practiced within their own home, you can cause a student to be silenced. Once you silence a student in their writing, it is hard to open them back up again. Being aware of different cultures and understanding that everyone comes from different backgrounds helps to bridge this gap.

This short story visited how the narrator and Mr. Lema connected. Mr. Lema took extra time to help the student to be successful because he was not as familiar with English as the other students may have been. His background was much different but Mr. Lema supported him, and even went above and beyond saying that he will teach him to play the trumpet.

Advice learned: be open, be honest, be aware, be prepared

Being the Teacher's Shadow

Today I went to Portage West Middle School and shadowed an English Language Arts teacher. She is primarily sixth grade but also teaches one class of seventh graders. 

When I arrived at the school I signed into the office, found the teacher in the computer lab. She was excited to meet me and ready for questions. She talked a lot about her decision to become a teacher. She was unsure of what to do, went to KVCC for a few years, then came to WMU and started to study business, learning shortly that it was not for her. Then she took a career exploration class which helped her to realize that her good influences were within the school system. She had had a great English teacher that had opened her eyes to really loving English. When she became a teacher, this same woman became her mentor within the school in her first years. She has been teaching now for fifteen years! I asked her a few more questions, but I want to save them for my paper :)

The first class was called six plus, which was basically the regular English class. She has this same class first and third hour, which I found very interesting, so that they can have a break from the class. (To keep them engaged!) They were working on grammar such as the use of commas and were typing a novel. This was a biography of someone over the age of thirty that they had decided to interview and write about. The finished product will have six chapters and is a project that takes quite a long time in sixth grade. I got to engage with the students, helping with formatting and spelling. This definitely was exciting for me, although I wanted to take over the class!

One huge difference from the middle school I attended was the diversity. There were many different races, languages, and types of children. They all got along, respected each other, spoke in different languages to each other, and I was intrigued because this was not normal in my school years. 

I also sat in on a class called FLEX, which is a reading program for kids that need extra time to work on their reading skills. There were only seven students because after you meet certain credentials, you graduate out of the class. The teacher set up three stations: one with her, one with a teacher aid, and one for an online reading program. The students spent about thirteen minutes in each station to work on fluency, speed, and comprehension. I really enjoyed working with these struggling students because it was rewarding to see them improve even within the hour.

Lastly I sat in on a class with a teacher that was new to middle school, but had taught at an alternative high school for eighteen years. We did not get any time to chat, which I would've loved to. In this class sixth graders were starting to read Esperanza Rising. They had learned a little background on Mexico and talked about a painting. Then she handed out a paper that had personal questions that would later come up as they read the book.

Overall my day was a great experience. I would love to do it again, and I am so excited that this will be my future career. I cannot wait to see how much of an impact I can make in students' lives, no matter how big or small. :)

Curriculum

After reading the chapter "Curriculum" in Early Career English Teachers in Action, it raised a few concerns. First of all, in the introduction Lindsay Ellis talked about how she did not have many teachers that shared their curriculum due to a small school size. She spent a lot of time writing the curriculum on her own, which scares me. There was a teacher Nancie Attwell that had a great curriculum and was very confident, yet it did not work for all of the students. I do not feel that I would be prepared to do that coming in as a first year teacher and would definitely need some direction. 

I learned in David Jagusch's story that curriculum is something that you learn to develop over time. You have to be open and willing to change it according to where you are, who your students are, and what works the most successfully. Every group of students you have has to be treated in a new way, and none are the same. You have to care to get to know your students for who they are, observe other teachers, and learn from your own experiences. This is also worrisome because it is a lot of trial and error which takes time. Check out this article, it talks about the importance of curriculum in all aspects of the teaching realm.

Sierra Holmes was lucky to find a school system that valued what she did- whatever works best for the students. I loved that she was more concerned about improving the students' writing and gave them back their paper with comments instead of a grade. She was able to take away grading and gave the students credit for improving and working hard on their writing. I think that the flexibility she had and the allowance that the school had lead to better results. The students actually wanted to work on their writing and ended up improving much more than they would if a grade was associated. This also worries me, though, because not all schools systems are allowing of this. I need to remember to ask about the goals of the school staff when interviewing for a job.

I am excited for this part of teaching, but it may be the scariest part for me because I am not formally trained for it yet... :)

What will make school better?

After reading the article "How to Make Schools Better For Kids" by Alexandra Sifferlin, I have a few questions. What will make school better? (beyond the levels you see on WikiHow) This article gives many options but how do we know which things to change, or if they will actually work. Are they reasonable? It raised many thoughts and questions...
"Ditch Traditional Homework"- I think this is an excellent and reasonable idea. When you give choice, students are more interested, therefore will succeed at a higher rate.
"Make Recess Mandatory"- I always had to go out for recess and think that it is sad that schools are shortening this time. If they shorten recess, they will only go home to sit on the couch or play on their computers. I think recess is very important!!!
"Screen Kids for Mental Illness"- This is a very touchy subject with parents because they do not always want to know if their kids have a mental illness. I really have no opinion on this, but it should be up to the parents and not the school system. Also the school system would need to have programs to accommodate these mental illnesses.
"Design Cafeterias that Encourage Healthy Eating"- This is very important because it is hard to make healthy choices when there are mostly unhealthy choices. Obesity is rising so promoting healthy eating is only helping. But how would you do this cheaply? And what options would they give for variety?
"Promote Diversity"- I can see how you could attract students from different backgrounds, but how do you promote diversity in a community full of 80% white people? 
"Turn Discipline into Dialogue"- This is an interesting way to handle your students and disruption in the classroom. I think that it might almost be more distracting to have students stand up during class than if they were not able to sit still. Would this encourage students to behave better or would they feel like they could get away with more?
"Let Students Customize Their Curriculums"- This would work well for students that learn decently on computers. Many students though, would much rather learn on paper. This can be challenging to use this concept with- would it actually help?
"Start Classes After 8:30am"- I do not agree with this at all. You start cutting time from after school activities and make it harder for the family to be together. Those things all help the student to be well-rounded while if classes started later, they would not have as many opportunities for that.

I really enjoyed this article but it raised more questions than it answered. They were good proposed ideas but no thorough explanations... I would love to learn more about customizing curriculums and turning discipline into dialogue. 

How to be a cool teacher...:)

We were asked to make an "ideal teacher." Here are some of our important things! (his mustache says "funny") Anything we missed? Sarah and I are proud of our creation :)

Teacher Identity

While reading the section "Teacher Identity" in Early Career English Teachers in Action, I began to realize what my future was coming to. The intro explains that an identity is both how others view you and how you see yourself. Developing a teacher identity is extremely important and only comes through experiences that shape you as a person. I really enjoyed how Lindsay Ellis broke down the identities as a teacher in all aspects of the job; not what you would think about as a first year teacher.

The stories were all very interesting but two stood out to me the most. "Integrity" by Amanda Brown was the first one that resonated with me. We share common characteristics such as being women of faith and being true to ourselves and what we believe in. Her situation is definitely something that I may come across my first years of teaching. I just need to remember that no matter what happens, do the right thing. If I do something that will leave me feeling guilty, I need to fix it. She could have easily not told anyone about the use of calculators on the test, saving money, time, and probably better results on the test. Instead she knew that she would feel guilty and reported it, staying true to herself. In the end she had better relationships with the staff and was more confident in herself. I strive to hold myself accountable like this as well. 1 Kings 9:4-5 shows us that God will deliver when we are people of integrity. Alike how God holds to his promises to David when he is a man of integrity and does not hide, Amanda was shown this delivery by the love of her boss and security of her job when she remained true to herself

The other story I loved was the very last one by Tracy Meinzer. When she said that she was a crier, she won my attention over. I am a total crier as well which made this story very relatable. I think that she saw how important relationships with students is, realizing that we do not know what they are going through at a fragile time in their life. We were all there once, and we don't always look back and notice how they are just in that stage. I need to keep this in mind especially teaching in a middle school... It's an awkward, self-exploring, self-finding age where they need a lot of support. The exercise she did with the class would be an awesome idea with a class that does not relate to each other well. The class opened up and saw that others were going through things alike or even worse than themselves.

Overall, this book is going to be super helpful and I will definitely be taking down ideas and advice for the future... :)

Nothing but the Truth...

I just finished reading Avi's Nothing but the Truth. I enjoyed reading this quite a bit. I had previously never read a multi-genre book and I did not know much about them. This style is something that I would definitely read again. It catches your attention, lets you see into the head of many different characters, and is an easier read. I think that if I had been introduced to this style of writing earlier in high school, I would have written more like this or taken the time to read multi-genre books.

Enough about the style, let's talk about Phillip. I am not fond of this kid... He basically stacked the deck to be on his side. Miss Narwin was clearly not out to get Phillip, but truly only wanted to help him exceed. Once he realized that he needed to do well in her class or get moved into another class, he started to get people on his side. Starting with his parents, then the neighbor, the newspaper, and then the rest of the world followed. He realized that he was guilty but didn't want to give in as everyone was already on his side. UGH. He should have just confessed. 

I did not like how he got away with this, basically forcing Miss Narwin to retire. She deserves better. Yes she may have overreacted a little about the singing and could have talked to him... But Phillip was definitely out to get her. Also his parents, don't you think as a parent you would want to know the teacher's side as well? This book was frustrating and I feel for the teachers... Kind of scares me for what could happen in my teaching career :O Maybe start with building positive relationships with students as said here. Miss Darwin should have reached out to build a better relationship with Phillip...


Overall I really enjoyed the book and couldn't put it down :)