Throughout the school year, students have asked me to come to their sports games, and since I've been in class most evenings, this has been impossible. I really wanted to see my kids in action, so I was excited when one of the seniors came in and told me there was going to be a game on a Saturday about a month from the current date. I was actually surprised he was so interested in me attending; before this time my rapport with the seniors wasn't very strong. In many ways I was more of an observer than a teacher in that class. But he definitely cared, and he checked back with me about once a week, reminding me about the game.
Last weekend the day arrived and my husband and I went to see them play. I knew the kids would be excited to see me, but I had no idea how excited I would be to see them. I was surprised by the sheer number of my students on the team. I knew many of my students were on the team, but there were really only one or two students on the team that I didn't know. The kids made the word "teamwork" sound like an understatement. Knowing, as I do, that they have grown up together since they were very young, I shouldn't be surprised, but it was almost as it they read each other's minds. I was proud to see them so passionate about something, and so successful, but the experience left me with one question-- how can I make them feel that way about English?
Monday, November 14, 2011
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Keeping Current and Fresh
I have been working so hard to fit in my internship, that I think I have forgotten there are options aside from the techniques that my mentor teacher uses. I was once again reminded of alternative teaching methods when I came across the article Transforming English with Graphic Novels: Moving toward Our "Optimus Prime"', by James Bucky Carter, while working on an assigment for an education class. This article backs up a theory my husband posited to me years ago-- that of using the graphic novel to get students interested in reading.
When he first suggested this idea, I feared that the graphic novel would be similar to the young adult fiction phenomena. When I was in high school, I fell in love with Christopher Pike books. I loved his storytelling and became absorbed by his characters, but the books were far below my reading level and I finished them in mere hours, so my literacy skills weren't challenged at all by this reading. In a similar way, many high school students today fall in love with the characters in Twilight and Harry Potter novels and read nothing but these stories. While reading something is better than reading nothing, when Lit Lab teachers allow students to read only what they like, which often happens to be books that do not challenge the student, it is difficult for the student to grow as a reader.
That said, I was surprised when I visited KIPP Delta a few weeks ago and saw students reading a graphic novel in a tenth grade English class, and I was even more surprised by the complexity of the material and the depth of the themes the students were studying. This concept was in the back of my mind when I began to work on an assignment summarizing an article about my discipline and I found Carter's article.
Not only does the article give examples of how Carter, an avid comic book fan for most of his life, used Captain America and Spiderman to help teach his students-- high school and students studying to be teachers-- to study complex themes, but he spells out several ways to use the graphic novel to teach complex books that students find less appealing. He even shows the reader how to teach difficult, controversial subjects to a younger group of students and explains how graphic novels can be used in this process.
Needless to say, I am looking at the process of teaching literature a little differently now. I ordered several graphic novels off of an internet bookstore and have begun looking for an appropriate graphic novel to contrast with "The Color Purple" in my thematic unit. I am again looking at more controversial, interesting topics to grab students' attention. Carter's article has helped me to remember why I wanted to teach in the first place. The field of literature is ever-changing, and as a teacher I need to respect that, and my curriculum needs to be ever-changing as well in order to impact students in a positive way and help them to feel as passionate as I do about what we are reading.
When he first suggested this idea, I feared that the graphic novel would be similar to the young adult fiction phenomena. When I was in high school, I fell in love with Christopher Pike books. I loved his storytelling and became absorbed by his characters, but the books were far below my reading level and I finished them in mere hours, so my literacy skills weren't challenged at all by this reading. In a similar way, many high school students today fall in love with the characters in Twilight and Harry Potter novels and read nothing but these stories. While reading something is better than reading nothing, when Lit Lab teachers allow students to read only what they like, which often happens to be books that do not challenge the student, it is difficult for the student to grow as a reader.
That said, I was surprised when I visited KIPP Delta a few weeks ago and saw students reading a graphic novel in a tenth grade English class, and I was even more surprised by the complexity of the material and the depth of the themes the students were studying. This concept was in the back of my mind when I began to work on an assignment summarizing an article about my discipline and I found Carter's article.
Not only does the article give examples of how Carter, an avid comic book fan for most of his life, used Captain America and Spiderman to help teach his students-- high school and students studying to be teachers-- to study complex themes, but he spells out several ways to use the graphic novel to teach complex books that students find less appealing. He even shows the reader how to teach difficult, controversial subjects to a younger group of students and explains how graphic novels can be used in this process.
Needless to say, I am looking at the process of teaching literature a little differently now. I ordered several graphic novels off of an internet bookstore and have begun looking for an appropriate graphic novel to contrast with "The Color Purple" in my thematic unit. I am again looking at more controversial, interesting topics to grab students' attention. Carter's article has helped me to remember why I wanted to teach in the first place. The field of literature is ever-changing, and as a teacher I need to respect that, and my curriculum needs to be ever-changing as well in order to impact students in a positive way and help them to feel as passionate as I do about what we are reading.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Oh, to Be a Blogger
I truly treasure my personal blog Treasure Chest of Thoughts...please, check it out to preview my topics of the day.
I am attempting to post more often, but "real" life tends to get in the way! My topics, though, tend to develop out of whatever is on my mind at the time. I do usually attempt to link to various noted sites and to include a photo, usually found in Google Images, to which I hyperlink. That's right: must give credit where credit is due!
You might consider inputting topics in the tag box below. This more ensures that other readers will find your posts, for as they type in topics (or your tags), they will be directed to your blog post. You are, then, a truly published author!
Now, type, type, type! Put your thoughts in black and white!
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