Learning Letter

This quarter was particularly difficult, as the work load seemed to be significantly higher than it has been in previous quarters. I was still pleased with the work that I was able to put forth, including the book talk, the mini-lesson, and the unit plan. I really loved listening to everyone's book talks and feel like I'm walking away with many more tools up my sleeve. However, I do wish that I had picked a different book. I took a chance on the book that I read, having never read it before, and it didn't bring me the benefit that I was hoping from it. While it was good, it was really geared towards only creative writing students. So, I wish I would have found something to offer the class that had a wider audience. I am still disappointed about the mini-lesson. We should have tried talking through the whole thing before doing it in class to see just how long each activity would take. I have a horrible habit of overplanning my lessons, leaving me cutting chunks out during the lesson or having to scramble to fit everything in. That is my goal for next quarter -- to work on my time management. The unit plan was insanely stressful. I say insane because there were definitely moments where I was definitely pushing the crazy side of the sanity spectrum. However, I am extremely proud of the work that I put in and I think it came out to a very cohesive, well-scaffolded lesson that I actually get to teach in the fall -- YAY. The one piece that really stick out to me that we read were Readicide. I knew that there was somewhat of a reading epidemic going on, but I suppose I had no idea how bad it was. Readicide made that very clear by quantifying it and giving some suggestions regarding how we can fix it. I definitely want to make sure that I start gathering my classroom library and surrounding my students with books so they learn to love reading. I will definitely be incorporating SSR into my daily lessons, and sharing with them the love that I have for reading to be a strong model for them. I think this course definitely made me a better teacher. I liked that it forced us to think not only about what we were teaching, but why we were teaching it. I had never realized the important of rationale before. I appreciate the readings that we were given in this course as well, as many of them are resources that I will use forever. I feel like I have a more broadened understanding of methodology and concepts that are important to teaching, and I think that's truly essential to being a good teacher. I certainly feel better prepared to be a teacher than I did ten weeks ago, and I'm thankful for that.

Shakespeare

While I do very much enjoy Shakespeare, I don't love Romeo and Juliet. In my experience as a student, it was only approached in a very dramatic, serious manner. If I am ever in the position of teaching this play, I will definitely use a more humorous approach, as a large majority of the plot is pretty ridiculous, especially to modern standards. The play I would most like to teach of Shakespeare's is The Taming of the Shrew. That play is funny, witty, and it makes a comment about the role women play in marriage, which is certainly not entirely irrelevant today (wait--what do you mean teenage suicide for love struck reasons isn't relevant?! Sorry Romeo). As a teacher, too, I've found the language to be quite daunting for lower level readers. In my experience with Macbeth, I had many students who wouldn't even look it because they were already convinced they couldn't understand it before we had even started reading. However, I had a lot of success when using the graphic novel version of the text along with the Shakespearean language, as the graphics seemed to give them the visual that they were unable to form in their mind. I also had the students try acting out the play as they read it to give it a visual, though the graphic novel was more successful. I do think that it is important that students read Shakespeare, of course. However, I just wish there was more flexibility with the texts that we could teach. Ideally, I'd like to focus more on his poetry and sonnets in 9th and 10th grade, and use 11th and 12th to tackle his most important plays, perhaps more than one each year. He works are very important, but I think they are better suited for a higher level audience.

Maus

I am slightly ashamed to admit that I have only been introduced to graphic novels within the past year. Okay, month. I had no idea how versatile, widely encompassing, and supplementary they can be. Just last week, I used a graphic novel in my English 10 classroom. The students were really struggling to understand the plot and events in Macbeth by simply reading the text aloud. When I brought the graphic novel in, however, the visual aspect engaged the students and brought them to a whole new level of comprehension. Never again will I doubt the graphic novel! I really enjoyed reading Art Spiegelman's Maus. Beyond just the beneficial visual aspect of the novel, I love the characters that he incorporated as well as the dialogue. A class using this book could look simply at the animal choices that he uses in his book and discuss why they think he chose the ones he did to represent the different people. I love that Spiegelman also incorporated his father's accent into the dialogue. It makes his character much more realistic. I also really like that the reader can see the aftermath of the war and the concentration camps in the relationships in the book, such as art's father with his new wife, art with his father, art with his late mother, and so on. The students could look at the various relationship dynamics that take place throughout the book. I think this book would be extremely effective in the classroom. Not only would the students be engaged and interested in reading it, there are also almost endless possibilities for teaching, all of which incorporate both history and literature. This book would be awesome to use in a history course -- a subject where students are often used to reading only out of the textbooks. I would love to use this novel in my future English courses, as well.

Edgar Allan Poe

In my experience, I have found Edgar Allan Poe's works to be an irreplaceable tool in the classroom. Not only does he use and demonstrate countless literary techniques, he also manages to captivate his readers. Even in classrooms where there may be a higher rate of resistant readers, Poe still manages to capture everyone's attention. He creates an element of surprise, suspense, and mystery in all of his works. The suspense keeps readers hanging on until the very last word. Poe's works are also easy to combine with popular culture, especially with example, such as the episode of the Simpsons that reenacts "The Fall of the House of Usher." His biographical information in itself is a mystery, as well, drawing the students in once more. While "The Raven" isn't my favorite work of his, I do love "The Fall of the House of Usher." I think it's an outstanding example of what someone can do in just the limited space of a short story. I would love to use this in a creative writing classroom -- reading it before asking my students to craft their own short story while trying to employ the technique of suspense. I would also love to use it when discussing characters and character development in order to show the students how a character in a story can signify more than just the people. In FHU, the house really becomes its own character with all of its personifying qualities. I love bringing Poe into the classroom just as I can hear the students start groaning about "yet another classic," as students always seem to be surprised about how much they enjoy reading his works. He is one writer that I don't think will ever be replaced by a more modern piece, as his techniques, tone, and literary elements are irreplaceable in the world of literature.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

With the amount of academic reading that I am asked to complete for school, I haven't had the opportunity to sit down and read a light, enjoyable book in a while. However, I found that much-needed fun, easy read in Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. I sat down to start this book, only expecting to read a few chapters. Two hours later, I found myself on the last few pages. I was hooked! His narrator is so genuine and relatable, I didn't want to stop reading. I would love to teach this book in a classroom setting. Not only would it engage readers through humor and relatable characters, it discusses many social and cultural experiences that our students have likely seen or experienced, such as racism, alcoholism, poverty, ostracism, bullying, etc. Better yet, these events are told through a narrator who is would be so relatable to the students. I'm sure that all students at one time or another could connect to the feelings of loss, of being different, of not belonging that the narrator describes. I also love the use of drawings throughout the book. With the pictures, the book appeals to a wider range of students -- both auditory and visual learners. Like the writing, the pictures are often humorous and very well represent what Alexie describes in the chapters. I love the inclusion of the awkward, often hormonal love story, and the narrators rise to fame and popularity. Between the pictures and the humor, Alexie manages to include many useful and timeless lessons that could benefit students of all ages. He displays the importance of friendship, tolerance, and understanding, as well as perseverance, encouragement, and the power of expectations. He shows his readers that it is okay to create one's own path, even if it's one that nobody has been down before. If taught in the classroom, this book would captivate the students while teaching them important lessons that would last a lifetime. If not taught, in the very least, it's an essential book to keep as part of a classroom library.

Readicide

While reading Kelly Gallagher's book Readicide, the only thought running through my mind was this: how did we get here? Why are there so many people pretending like our current education system is working? Why are we stooping to their level? It seems that it all boils down to one thing -- money. How sad that we've prioritized money before the wellbeing of our students. I became a teacher so that I could help students experience the same joy that I found in reading. How did we lose sight of that? I am pleased to know that the answer is simple. Our students need to read more. They don't need to be reading more academic texts, informative texts, novels, or anything in particular -- simply, more. We need to encourage them to find a place where reading is enjoyable again. In my classroom, it's very important to me that my students see how much I enjoy reading. We need to be reading alongside them, being the model of a good reader. More importantly, we need to provide them with opportunities to read not just academic texts, but recreational ones, too. I didn't realize the impact that SSR can have on students engagement and success. The school where I am placed requires that all English teachers require ten minutes of silent, sustained reading at the beginning of class every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. However, I don't think it's being effectively implemented. Students who have forgotten to bring an SSR book are allowed to work on homework quietly. This has greatly increased the number of students who do not participate in the reading every day. There are a handful -- probably two handfuls -- of students who conveniently forget their SSR books every single class period. While the teacher will occasionally require those students to go retrieve their book from their locker, the students will simply spend enough time in the process of getting the book to once again miss the ten minutes. SSR needs to be taken much more seriously, and it certainly will be in my classroom. I really want to start my library of books that will fill my classroom so that students may just grab a book when they have conveniently forgotten theirs. Many of the books in Gallagher's selections were ones that I grew up reading and loving. I just want my students to experience that feeling, too. I am looking forward to implementing Gallagher's 50/50 approach with my students. They seem to have forgotten that they can read books without a 50 page study guide and a packet full of response questions. We need to remind them once again why we read. It is certainly not only about their scores on a multiple choice test.

I Read It, But I Don't Get It

Our reading selection of Cris Tovani's I Read It, But I Don't Get It could not have come at a more opportune time. Last Friday, I was teaching a lesson on the first act of Macbeth to a sophomore English class. While we read the first act aloud, with each part assigned to a different student, I could sense that the students were only reading the words on the page, not interacting with the text, forming any inferences, or following the plot. While I had guessed that this gap in student comprehension was due to the students' inability to form connections with the text, I wasn't at all aware of how to remedy the situation and get the students to a place of understanding. I kept finding myself simply feeding the students the information that they needed to know, and left at the end of the day feeling defeated and disconnected from my students. After reading Tovani's book, I realized that my class consisted of mostly Word Callers, who "have altered decoding and, as a bonus, also choose to read. However, they don't understand that reading involves thinking" (15). The students weren't thinking about what they were reading. I think the students are overwhelmed by the language in Shakespeare's works, not bothering to read closely and interactively, so they go on autopilot and wait for the explanation. I really enjoyed all of Tovani's strategies to not only monitor one's own reading, but also remedy the issue independently if possible. I certainly plan to use many of the worksheets included in the appendix in order to show the students how they can start making connections to the text. Rather than bombarding them with a whole act at a time, I also plan to break up the text so as to not overwhelm them with vocabulary. I will give them a few quotations at a time and prompt them to identify a connection they share with that text. Tovani's book allowed me to think methodically about how to best help a class of word callers who have grown up in a generation often uninterested in reading.