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.