I am not sure what happened that my orginal post didn't go up but I am retrying. Cross your fingers.
I found as I read the chapters on Sameness and Fairness, Permission to Fail, Issues of Literacy and Power and Building Success with Underachieving Adolescents, I found myself drawn to parts of the readings and just irritated by others. Though when I really thought about my irritation it wasn't what they were saying it was the fact that I have been witness to some of it and here is some pointing it out in a much grander scale.
What really stuck out to me was the video by Gladwell. I LOVED IT! I loved it because it said exactly what we as educators already know, but maybe we need to keep hearing it. There is no perfect.....(lesson/student/teacher/etc.) What Howard Moskowitz released and then passed on to the food industry is that different kinds people like different kinds of food. The data that was collected from the Pepsi research showed no bell curve but was scattered, extremely scattered. The data didn't make sense, until Moskowitz looked at it a different way. They were asking different people what they prefered, and by doing that they got different responses.
So take that into the education field. Why do we have such extreme scores on standardized testing? Because, there is no standardized student. Different backgrounds, different cultures, different family structures, different everything and anything and you get scattered results. Our students don't learn the same way, some need more time, some need less, some need to figure it out on their own and still others need it broken down to the bare bones to understand what it is that we are teaching. As each teacher has a different style so do our students. When do we stop doing the "universal search" and start on the "understanding of variables"?
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Code Switching
I'm still getting used to blogging on here.
After this week's readings I find myself drawn back again and again to Lisa Delpit's chapter about her daughter Maya. I agree with her view on why it is so easy for kids to pick up additional dialects. When you can identify with a group because you are comfortable with them you relax and are open. You find them to be inviting and fun (Delpit, pg.39).
She also points out why this isn't the atmosphere in the classroom for so many. "Students rarely get to talk in classrooms. The percentage of talk by the teacher far outweighs that by all the students put together."(Delpit, pg. 40) Sadly it is the truth. Add that to teachers knowing little about their students and their background and you have a sorry combination. A mentor of mine used to have a sign in her classroom that said "No one cares how much you know, until they know how much you care."
Teachers need to help students find motivation in the classroom and students aren't motivated if they don't feel that teachers care or understand them.
Delipt writes that once teachers internalize an understanding of certain facts about students particularly students of cultural backgrounds different from theirs "then it is much more difficult for them to judge their students' abilities solely on the basis of their language form." (Delpit, pg. 42)
And this isn't an easy task to undertake, but teachers need to do it and they need to believe in why they are doing it. Delpit points out that only once we are connected to our students and they are willing to connect with us do we hold a chance at getting them "to adopt our language form as one to be added to their own."(Delpit, pg. 48)
After this week's readings I find myself drawn back again and again to Lisa Delpit's chapter about her daughter Maya. I agree with her view on why it is so easy for kids to pick up additional dialects. When you can identify with a group because you are comfortable with them you relax and are open. You find them to be inviting and fun (Delpit, pg.39).
She also points out why this isn't the atmosphere in the classroom for so many. "Students rarely get to talk in classrooms. The percentage of talk by the teacher far outweighs that by all the students put together."(Delpit, pg. 40) Sadly it is the truth. Add that to teachers knowing little about their students and their background and you have a sorry combination. A mentor of mine used to have a sign in her classroom that said "No one cares how much you know, until they know how much you care."
Teachers need to help students find motivation in the classroom and students aren't motivated if they don't feel that teachers care or understand them.
Delipt writes that once teachers internalize an understanding of certain facts about students particularly students of cultural backgrounds different from theirs "then it is much more difficult for them to judge their students' abilities solely on the basis of their language form." (Delpit, pg. 42)
And this isn't an easy task to undertake, but teachers need to do it and they need to believe in why they are doing it. Delpit points out that only once we are connected to our students and they are willing to connect with us do we hold a chance at getting them "to adopt our language form as one to be added to their own."(Delpit, pg. 48)
Monday, June 6, 2011
Language Diversity
In a nation where literacy seems to be a dominant focus in our schools it seems that we easily forget where we came from. "Multilingualism was always highly valued in Indigenous societies and, indeed, was essential for trade and survival in one of the most culturally, linguistically, and ecologically diverse regions of the world."(Lomawaima, McCarty 2006) But as our nation developed indigenous societies were not looked at in this sense. I find it surprising that, "In fact, first-language literacy among the Cherokees in the early 1800s was higher than that of the local White population"(Lomawaima, McCarty 2006). It was easy for white missionaries to decide they were going to make it better for Navajo, Cherokee and other indigenous groups, they didn't understand and there for didn't trust these groups.
Lomawaima and McCarty write that "Native societies were assumed to entirely lack or possess only rudimentary forms of the building blocks of a civilized society, such as governing bodies, codes of law, or organized religion. US educators assumed that Native societies also lacked educational systems." (2006) But that was far from the truth. Native societies had all of these in place, it just didn't fit the mold of the standard educators felt worked best.
Currently there aren't many educators out there who would say that every student learns at the same rate, or in the same way. But what has changed over the years to make us see that? And why are we still holding on to the need for language learning the same way we always have?
After reading about triligualism and the use of multi-languages it makes sense that students who have the literacy skills for a native language and English would do well. I think it should be embraced and expected more, that students who are English first learners about have their second language courses at younger ages instead of waiting to a point where it is harder to grasp.
Lomawaima and McCarty write that "Native societies were assumed to entirely lack or possess only rudimentary forms of the building blocks of a civilized society, such as governing bodies, codes of law, or organized religion. US educators assumed that Native societies also lacked educational systems." (2006) But that was far from the truth. Native societies had all of these in place, it just didn't fit the mold of the standard educators felt worked best.
Currently there aren't many educators out there who would say that every student learns at the same rate, or in the same way. But what has changed over the years to make us see that? And why are we still holding on to the need for language learning the same way we always have?
After reading about triligualism and the use of multi-languages it makes sense that students who have the literacy skills for a native language and English would do well. I think it should be embraced and expected more, that students who are English first learners about have their second language courses at younger ages instead of waiting to a point where it is harder to grasp.
Sunday, May 22, 2011
"What Literate Americans Know"
Over the last week I have been reading and hearing a great deal about the issue of literacy and what educators need to do to help improve it. I participated in a workshop with Mike Mattos, veteran teacher and administrator who now gives talks on RtI and Professional Learning Communities. It was eye opening to see the statistics he had, as well as some of the work that he and others have done to show how well RtI can work. The ideas from Mike Mattos then were joined by the readings from E.D. Hirsch Jr., Lisa Delpit, Laurie Olsen and Stuart Greene.
E.D. Hirsch Jr. created an extensive list in his book Cultural Literacy:What Every American needs to Know. His point being that understanding of these thousands of things allows for Americans to communicate with each other in a fundamental way. Hirsch points out that "the standard of literacy required by modern society has been rising throughout the developing world"(Hirsch, 1988). He explains that we as a society are stuck doing things as the system of education had standard for in the 1950's. However that standard no longer applies and if we continue to maintain the status qua we will not be able to compete in the economic world.
We live in a time where information is essential and advanced technology pushes this information faster and further than when Hirsch first made his statements regarding literacy. His points are still relevant though. To understand the words on the page, there needs to be a foundation of understanding that many adolescents, children and even adults don't have. Hirsch also states that nationwide communication allows for a national language, which is sustained by national literacy (Hirsch, 1988).
As I looked over Hirsch's list of What Literate Americans Know, I found myself thinking of it as "What Educated Americans Know". If I were to ask a hand full of my 9th graders what a tenth of the items on the list were they would not have an answer, that sadder part is that I could also ask adults that are in my work place and have them hesitate to respond as well.
I thought about what would be on my list. I doubt it would be as long at Hirsch's. There are specifics that I would have but not limited to the following:
*The Declaration of Independence
*The Constitution
*The Federalist Papers
*The Gettysburg Address
*Abraham Lincoln "A House Divided"
*Martin Luther King Jr. "I Have A Dream"
*Franklin D. Roosevelt "Pearl Harbor Address to the Nation"
*Franklin D. Roosevelt "The Arsenal of Democracy"
*Franklin D. Roosevelt "Fireside Chats"
*John F. Kennedy "Inaugural Address"
*Woodrow Wilson "War Message 1917"
*Woodrow Wilson "The Fourteen Points"
*Elie Wiesel "The Perils of Indifference 1999"
*Robert F. Kennedy "Remarks on Martin Luther King Jr. Assassination"
*George W. Bush "Address to Congress and the Nation on 9/11/2001"
*Rudolph Giuliani "9/11 Speech to the United Nations General Assembly"
*Bill Cosby "Address to NAACP 50th Anniversary of Brown vs. Board of Education"
*Maya Angelou "Remarks at the Funeral for Coretta Scott King"
*Maya Angelou Poems including but not limited to I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings and Phenomenal Woman
* Jane Austen
*Emily Dickinson
*Robert Frost
*William Shakespeare
*Langston Hughes
*Walt Whitman
*Ralph Waldo Emerson
*The Diary of Anne Frank
* Howard Zinn A People's History of the United States
*James Loewen Lies My Teacher Told Me and Teaching What Really Happened.
*Tim O'Brien The Things They Carried
*Randy Pausch The Last Lecture
*John Gatto Dumbing Us Down and Weapons of Mass Instruction
E.D. Hirsch Jr. created an extensive list in his book Cultural Literacy:What Every American needs to Know. His point being that understanding of these thousands of things allows for Americans to communicate with each other in a fundamental way. Hirsch points out that "the standard of literacy required by modern society has been rising throughout the developing world"(Hirsch, 1988). He explains that we as a society are stuck doing things as the system of education had standard for in the 1950's. However that standard no longer applies and if we continue to maintain the status qua we will not be able to compete in the economic world.
We live in a time where information is essential and advanced technology pushes this information faster and further than when Hirsch first made his statements regarding literacy. His points are still relevant though. To understand the words on the page, there needs to be a foundation of understanding that many adolescents, children and even adults don't have. Hirsch also states that nationwide communication allows for a national language, which is sustained by national literacy (Hirsch, 1988).
As I looked over Hirsch's list of What Literate Americans Know, I found myself thinking of it as "What Educated Americans Know". If I were to ask a hand full of my 9th graders what a tenth of the items on the list were they would not have an answer, that sadder part is that I could also ask adults that are in my work place and have them hesitate to respond as well.
I thought about what would be on my list. I doubt it would be as long at Hirsch's. There are specifics that I would have but not limited to the following:
*The Declaration of Independence
*The Constitution
*The Federalist Papers
*The Gettysburg Address
*Abraham Lincoln "A House Divided"
*Martin Luther King Jr. "I Have A Dream"
*Franklin D. Roosevelt "Pearl Harbor Address to the Nation"
*Franklin D. Roosevelt "The Arsenal of Democracy"
*Franklin D. Roosevelt "Fireside Chats"
*John F. Kennedy "Inaugural Address"
*Woodrow Wilson "War Message 1917"
*Woodrow Wilson "The Fourteen Points"
*Elie Wiesel "The Perils of Indifference 1999"
*Robert F. Kennedy "Remarks on Martin Luther King Jr. Assassination"
*George W. Bush "Address to Congress and the Nation on 9/11/2001"
*Rudolph Giuliani "9/11 Speech to the United Nations General Assembly"
*Bill Cosby "Address to NAACP 50th Anniversary of Brown vs. Board of Education"
*Maya Angelou "Remarks at the Funeral for Coretta Scott King"
*Maya Angelou Poems including but not limited to I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings and Phenomenal Woman
* Jane Austen
*Emily Dickinson
*Robert Frost
*William Shakespeare
*Langston Hughes
*Walt Whitman
*Ralph Waldo Emerson
*The Diary of Anne Frank
* Howard Zinn A People's History of the United States
*James Loewen Lies My Teacher Told Me and Teaching What Really Happened.
*Tim O'Brien The Things They Carried
*Randy Pausch The Last Lecture
*John Gatto Dumbing Us Down and Weapons of Mass Instruction
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)