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?

Crafting Writers Chapters 4-5 Response

In Chapter 4 Hale talks about teaching students specific crafts for writing. I loved the idea of teaching kids to write with their senses, especially stories. By asking the students to incorporate what they saw, heard, tasted, smelled, and felt it will add a lot of detail to their writing, and giving them a deeper connection to the writing.

When I was young I was not a good writer, but I think if someone had asked me to write a story and simply describe what I heard, smelled, tasted, felt, or saw it would be a lot easier. It seems to me it would be a lot easier for students to write something based on their own experiences and senses.

I liked the different specific crafts for writing because I think it breaks down how students should be writing and makes it easier to understand, especially if you only go over one craft at a time. After awhile the students should be able to put all of the craft lessons together and write a very well done story.

Reaction to Wilde's article

Spelling came very hard for me in elementary school. I did really well in every subject except for spelling. I think part of the reason I had such a hard time with spelling as that no one took the time to help me come up with strategies or gave me anyways to improve my spelling. We had a pre-test Monday, our spelling books throughout the week, and then a final spelling test on Friday. There was no other help or strategies. I remember if students asked the teacher how to spell a word she would say, "Look it up in the dictionary." The problem with looking a word up in the dictionary is that you have to know how to spell the word.

I liked Wilde's article because it was full of ways to teach and help students who have problems learning how to spell words. I thought the "placeholder" spelling was a really cool idea, and something that can help students become better spellers, and feel better about themselves. I also liked the idea of having a very print/text rich classroom environment. If there are words, phrases, names, and other types of text all over the classroom the students have a lot of resources to look at. I think part of a rich text environment could be having the students have "trouble word" lists at their desks. These lists would be taped on their desks and would include the words that they have trouble spelling on multiple occasions, that way they see it everyday and eventually learn how to spell it on their own.

It was eventually discovered that I have a low form of dyslexia, which explains why spelling and writing was so difficult for me in elementary school. It would have been nice to have someone attempt to help me with my spelling at a younger age. It probably would have saved me from feeling like such a spelling failure. As a teacher I want to make sure not to just give my students a spelling book and tell them to memorize the words, I want to make sure I know how well each student is doing with spelling and writing. I do not want any of my students to feel like failures, so I want to make sure I find strategies and ways to help all of my students. I felt like the Wilde article was a good place to start.

Coffee Shop Thoughts

Part of my job when we went to the coffee shop was to write down words or phrases that someone would need to know and understand in order to feel comfortable ordering coffee. At first I was really confused by this, I didn't know anyone didn't know how to order coffee. I was not used to thinking about ordering coffee because I have been drinking coffee with my mom since I was young, REALLY young, my mom put a small amount of coffee in my bottle when I was 18 months old. Because of my history with coffee I have never had any problems ordering coffee. Then I got to thinking and if I brought a friend to a coffee shop who had never had coffee and just told them to look at the menu and order it would almost be impossible. The menu would look like a different language. There is definitely coffee house lingo that people would have to know to make it possible for them to order a drink. While we were there I did not witness anyone having problems ordering coffee, so I am assuming they were all either regulars, or just experienced coffee drinkers like myself. The feel of the coffee shop was very chill, offering a good environment to study, read a paper, or catch up with friends. This project really made me realize just how much literature is in everyday life that we aren't even aware we use.

Crafting Writers Chapters 1-3,6 Response

I really thought these chapters were interesting. I remember in elementary school most of my teachers were more worried about my grammar, spelling, and punctuation than they were about how well I was writing. It wasn't until high school that I remember any of my teachers talking about having a "voice" in my writing. I think is really good that elementary schools are looking more in depth about writing. Of course students still need to be able to write with correct grammar and spelling, but I think the most important part of writing is how well students write and what is actually in their writing. I thought a lot of the concepts that the book introduced were useful and things that I will definitely be looking for in students' writing and also in my own. Overall I really liked these chapters and the ideas that were introduced!

Response to "'That's online writing, not boring school writing':Writing with blogs and the Talkback Project"

From elementary school through high school, my schools never used blogging, or writing online as a tool in the classroom. I did however have to write journals for almost every class. I had the same experience as the teacher's student Cassandra. I hated writing in my journal, but I loved coming home and writing emails, xanga, and on facebook.

I really liked the Talkback project that the teacher started. Students today have so much more technology to work with and will have to have mastered it to be successful in life. Because students are going to need to have mastered technology to be successful, it only makes sense that we incorporate it into the classrooms. Having your students blog about a book and then allowing them to respond to others is a great way to use technology while creating a way for students to think critically about a book.