Literacy Moves on Ch 6-10

I really thought that bringing in toys sounded a little strange at first, but after our activity last week with the McDonald's happy meal toys and reading through these chapters I think it could be used well in a classroom if it is done correctly. I think it is a really good idea to focus learning around what kids are interested in, one of those things being toys. Because students are involved in popular culture why not bring it in to class? Having students interested in popular culture is not a bad thing, teachers can use it to their advantage and create lessons based around it. If lessons are based around students' interests they are much more likely to be excited to learn. I also really liked the idea of the curiosity kit. I have never heard of them before, but I think they could be a very useful and fun tool.

Literacy Moves on Ch 1-5

I LOVE the idea of multimodal texts. Using writing, listening, art, and images is so important in a classroom. Students do not learn the same way, some are visual, some are audio, and some need movement. By teaching with multimodal texts there is a better chance of everyone learning easier. Not only will it make learning more universal, but it is more fun and interesting. Students do not like to do the same things everyday. By switching it up students will be more interested and stay better focused.

MGRP

The MGRP helped me understand more about parents in the classrooms, but it also made me realize how I can use genres in my classroom. Making the genres really helped me to understand my topic, so they would be great to have students do. Thinking of the genre ideas really gave me ideas that I want to use in my own classroom, like having a teacher blog where I can let the parents know what is going on in the class and let them know what they should see coming home. It is a great way to communicate with all of the parents at the same time.

Through writing my paper and doing research I learned that parents want to come into the classroom, but sometimes they are scared to. They do not want to step on toes or make more work for the teacher. So it is our job to bring them in and make them feel wanted and welcome.

Seedfolks/Van Sluys

Seedfolks:

I really enjoyed reading the seedfolks book and the way it was written. I thought it was really creative that all of that characters ended up being connected in some way. I think it can represent a classroom, not everyone in the class is going to be best friends, yet some how everyone is connected. I think this is something that students should read to learn that something you do can affect so many people without you even realizing it.

Van Sluys:

I really liked the Van Sluys article. It taught me more about how to plan for an invitation, how to be prepared and to expect the students to go deep in an invitation not just hit the surface ideas.

Literary Invitations

I really enjoyed reading the book and the article on literary invitations. Although I am still not sure of the difference between centers and invitations I like the idea. I think invitations are more of a choice, where centers you have specific things students have to do. I liked all of the different ideas that the book gave us for invitations, and I will definitely be using them in my own classroom. I like that students have the option of what they want to do. I think if students are able to have more of a say in what they do they will be more motivated in school.

Crafting Writers Chapters 10-12 Response

I have always been curious about assessment and how it should be done in a classroom, so I was glad to see that Chapter 12 was all about assessment. When I first saw the chapter was going to discuss rubrics I was a little discouraged. I remembered my teachers giving me rubrics in elementary school and I had no idea what they were or how to read them. My teacher never really discussed them further than explaining that it was how they were going to give us grades. However after reading the chapter I was a little relieved to see how Hale wanted to use rubrics was different than how my teachers had use them.

If you use a rubric with young students it is imporant to make it with them. Explain what each of the sections means and what each box is for. That may sound silly, but as a young student a rubric just looks like a lot of boxes with words in them. Also its important to use language and words that the students can understand. If you use too big of words they will not know what you expect of them. I loved the idea of making the rubrics with your class so they know what exactly they mean, and what it takes to write a good paper, or whatever the assignment is.

I still have some reservations about rubrics, but I can also see how they can be helpful. If rubrics are used correctly I think they could be a great tool in the classroom because then the students know exactly what the teacher expects of them and exactly what they need to do to get a good grade.

Crafting Writers Chapters 7-9 Response

I really loved chapter seven "Teaching Craft Lessons." I think the minilessons section is so important. I had so many teachers give me writing assignments, or any assignments, back with red ink circles and corrections all over them. None of my teachers ever talked to me about them, or why I had gotten something wrong. As a student I did not go back over my papers, I saw all the red and the grade and then that was that, I was done looking at it. The teacher had wasted their time correcting all of my mistakes, because I never looked at them again, or tried to figure out why I had gotten them wrong.

I love the idea that instead of marking all over students' papers, teachers focus on one or two things that need to be improved and then do "mini-lessons" and "try-its." Giving students individual attention and helping them through a specific problem in their writing could be very encouraging and very helpful for the student. By doing mini-lessons with individual or small groups of students you do not have to teach the whole class something some of them have already mastered, yet the students who need help get it.

My only reservation is that teachers can have so many students in class and if they all need individual mini-lessons how do you have time in the day and get anything else done?