Here is a lesson plan teaser!

Preparing a Lesson Plan

I am working on preparing my "Japanese Particles" and "Poe" lesson plans.  I found some good online resources to outline the lesson plans so I have a better idea of the order of instruction and such.  Having never taught a lesson, I am afraid I will not include enough material or information, and the lesson plan will be confusing to the students.  That is why I downloaded a lesson plan outline from a teaching resource to aide in my lesson planning. 

Here is a sample of the lesson plan that I am using.  Do you think this outline is comprehensive enough to provide an educational lesson?

Lesson Plan

Relinquishing Your Classroom

I never understood the problem my classmates discussed in class about their teachers not wanting to let them teach in their classrooms.  I never understood that is until I had to turn the classroom back over to my cooperating teacher.

I began teaching after fall break in October.  I was so excited to teach a subject I was very comfortable with--Shakespeare.  The requirement was for me to teach all the classes for two weeks straight.  I had the two weeks planned out from the beginning.  There would be background information available about Shakespeare and the England he lived in.  There would be a reading of A Midsummer Night's Dream, and we would also incorporate poetry.  I would have the students read a variety of poetry and experiment with writing some.  They would also have to memorize at least five lines from a poem to recite in front of the class.

After the two weeks, the lesson seemed unfinished.  There was still two more weeks in there before Thanksgiving break with several days off for various activities.  My cooperating teacher allowed me to continue my lessons with analyzing poetry and more reading and writing.  We all had a blast!!

The problem came after Thanksgiving break when I had to relinquish the classes to my teacher because I only had about two weeks left of school.  It took one day for me to realize how much I loved to be up there teaching the kids.  All it did was fuel my fire for teaching and gave me strength to finish out this semester strong.

Writing WITH Them

This post finds me immersed in writing three papers WITH my students.  Yes, three.  As an literacy teacher, I should be continually engaged in the field of my expertise.  Otherwise, how I am a role model for my students?

Today, as I was teaching infinitives, I shared this quote with my students:

"To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society."
(President Theodore Roosevelt

Granted, practicing my curricular field is not a moral, but maybe reading and writing with my students is an ethical responsibility?

To imitate President Roosevelt's sentence, I would state:  To teach literacy is to model writing and reading, to make mistakes, to proof, to imitate, to...yes, the list is seemingly endless.  To do...that is the directive!

This week, as we continue reading The Crucible and Macbeth, we are writing thematic responses for each act.  I model a thematic response; then, I guide, scaffold, encourage, write another thematic response with my students.  To see my models (thus far), please visit these sites:

• English 11 - The Crucible
• English 12 - Macbeth

Yes, as we write, we also incorporate other skills being discussed, learned in class:  embedding quotes, writing phrases (so far, appositive, participials, and infinitives).  Yes, writing/reading workshop activated!

Ultimately, the students will choose two themes and trace their development throughout a text.  Check out this Common Core Standard:  

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.11-12.2 Determine two or more themes or central ideas of a text and analyze their development over the course of the text, including how they interact and build on one another to produce a complex account; provide an objective summary of the text. (Source)

Yes, that is the goal.  Honestly, in twenty-two years of teaching (which include obtaining a masters and National Board Certification), I have never written such a paper.  I am now, though!  I have chosen to use two themes in Edgar Allan Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death."  We'll see...learning right along with my students!  Shhhhh!

Credit for the above ideas must go to Penny Kittle's book Write Beside Them that I read several years.  I credit this book with one of the best changes in my teaching career. (Prior to this one, Step up to Writing...another huge positive change in my teaching methods.)  In other words, teachers need to always be learning and using the best practices that work best with your teaching style (that is another soap-box topic!).

The negative to this style of teaching?  I barely stay a step ahead of my students.  Or maybe that is a positive?  Students need to see that other writers struggle through the various writing steps.

Tell me:  To teach is to.....?  

The Empowerment of Multiple Reads

Today, I sat reading our assignment for this afternoon's class, and I saw myself and my students on these pages as author Penny Kittle discussed the power of rereading texts in her new book Book Love:  Developing Depth, Stamina, and Passion in Adolescent Readers in chapter seven "Responding to Reading."  "We know that rereading a text is central to deepening understanding.  Rereading is when we begin to think differently and see differently."

Yes!  This we are doing in my English 12 class (teaching this level for the first time in many years), as the other teacher and I deliberately chose to have our students view (and some read along) before analyzing the text.  For 'tis true, their lack of comprehension of the text would have been a dire detriment to their understanding of even the the plot, much less the lessons that either Shakespeare wanted us to learn or the lessons we learn based on our own background experiences.

This teaching method also illustrates the growth in my own learning process and teaching style, for once upon a time in a land not so far down the road, I would have assigned Act 1, administered a quiz, and then attempted to lead a discussion on primarily the plot and maybe a connection or two, but, no, nothing like the class I had today.

For a look into that class, please visit this lesson plan.  Then, if interested, you might visit here for a brief look into the next few day's thematic topics that I am confident will develop as we continue to "reread" this text.

This time, as we analyze Macbeth, my students and I are attempting to gain access to Shakespeare's brain instead, as compared to how I used to teach this drama, of my attempting to just pull out what little a few of my students had comprehended in their reading of the play.

Try this out sometime.  Read for pleasure or, in the case of complex texts, even for understanding.  Then, read on an analytic level.  The result?  You will have read two completely different texts.

"What if I don't like it?  What if I don't understand it?"

I was caught off guard by this question today in class.  I honestly had no good answer for her.  I tried to think of a time when I had to write on something I didn't like.  I could not think of something I didn't like.  

That is not to say that I did not understand it.  I have had many occasions where I had to write on a text I did not understand.  I still did not give her a good answer.  I am not sure I even gave her an answer.  I am sure this frustrated her.

I know when I run into having to write on a text I don't understand, I research it.  I find essays on the text and analysis written by other people on that text.  Sometimes I have to get a different translation of the text to understand it.  I have often had to listen to the text to understand it.  

With Shakespeare, I watch a theatrical production of the play I'm reading because I can interpret the subtle facial expressions and gestures by the characters to understand the text.  I allowed the students to watch a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream.  I thought this would help, but it obviously did not help her.  I have a feeling she may be one of those readers who only understands texts if it tells her exactly what it is about.  It would have to be a text where she would have to infer nothing!

God, help her!

A Japanese Model

As I pondered on our reading of Carol Jago's chapter six "Lesson Design for Classical Literature" from her professional development book entitled Classics in the Classroom, I just had to pause and comment on a few of her points.

First, what the coincidence that she uses Japan as an example of teacher professional development.  Right, Trent?

So very interesting how they provide professional development, pd based on the premise that "successful teachers are the best teachers of teachers."  True.  The teachers themselves identify a problem and then plan a lesson that addresses this concern.  One teacher demonstrates the lesson for the other teachers, who critique. Then revisions are made.  As Jago notes, "One of the most powerful outcomes of this lesson study process is that teachers develop a shared language for describing and analyzing classroom practices."

Just have to note here, that this, too, is the premise of Lyon College and this class.  When asked if would teach Methods for Secondary English, I had to acknowledge that my masters degree is not in English.  Quickly, the reply came, "You are in the classroom teaching English, aren't you?"

Yes, as a matter of fact, I am.

In my situation in my current school, I would love for this to happen, for I spend hours creating lesson plans for my classes.  Yes, hours.  "Americans ascribe virtue to individual effort and originality, but the longer I am in this profession, the more I am convinced that we need to spend more time working together toward a common goal."  Those are Jago's words, but they might as well be mine, for I wholeheartedly support this also.

Another echo I hear of Jago's is "I still can't write lesson plans for more than a week in advance."  Map out the skills to be taught?  Yes.  Create the big picture of a grading period?  Yes.  Begin with the end in mind?  Yes. But detailed, down-to-the-minute lesson plans?  No?  If I have learned anything in twenty-one-plus years of teaching, it's that every class is different, and interruptions are just the norm.

Our department is working closer than it ever has.  That I appreciate, yet I want more.  More for myself as a teacher and more for my students.  More.

Use of technology to understand Shakespeare

I find it difficult at times to understand the language of Shakespeare.  I know this is a shocking confession considering how much I love Shakespeare's work.  So, I usually watch a production of the play I am reading.  To be able to see the gestures and facial expression make the words come alive for me.  For this reason, I decided to allow the student to watch a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream.  I found an app on the iPod that is pg rated.  It does have the words "ass" and "hell," but does not give in to the sexual suggestions.  Plus, it is in cartoon form.  They seem mesmerized by the "B" rated program.  I will do all I can to allow them to experience many things.

Paper Topics

Sometimes I have problems figuring out paper topics.  A professor confronted me about a paper I still owe him and asked to have a meeting to go over possible paper topics.  I do not currently have any possible paper topics. 
What are some ways to spark ideas about paper topics and is it wrong for a teacher to assist a student to spark creativity on a certain subject?

Warning Signs Of Depression

So I will come right out and say that I have been battling with depression lately.  This is very unlike me, and took me by surprise when I could not get out of bed for over two weeks.  I got behind in classes, papers, tests, quizzes, etc.  I contemplated withdrawing because the feelings of being overwhelmed crippled me, and getting behind only magnified the situation. 
I went to class one day in the middle of this and had a break down moment in front of a fellow classmate who took the initiative to type a line on a blank word document and told me to WRITE!  So I did.  In 45 minutes I had written the issues paper that I was 4 days late turning in.  Small accomplishment.  Then I went to class to turn in the paper and my professor confronted me about my odd behavior lately.  He insisted that I go see the school nurse to be screened for depression.  I did just that and started a web of understanding and support.  The nurse set me up an appointment with a doctor to get on an anti depressant and to begin the process of helping myself out of my anxiety. 
This is not a story about depression as much as it is a story about kind and understanding friends, faculty and staff that helped me see what was wrong.  I did not want to talk to anyone about anything and all it took was opening up to the right people to show me the path to help. 
I am still battling the urge to go to bed but every day someone shows me some kind gesture that helps me get through it and keep persevering. 
How would you handle a student who is suddenly showing warning signs of something being wrong without any self awareness on their part?

"You can handle them all!"

My teacher introduced me to a great app.  It gives you a list of different students, the clown, the last word, the drama queen.  It also gives you symptoms by which to diagnose them.  It tells you what behavoirs to look for.  It tells you how this behavior affects teachers, classmates, and parents.  It will also give you primary needs being revealed, secondary needs being revealed, and primary causes of such behavior.  Then it gives you several ways to work with the student.  It will aslo give you a list of thing NOT to do with these types of behaviors.  It will also give related behaviors.  It is fantastic!!!  I think the app may be $3.99.

The Internet version is www.disciplinehelp.com.  You do have to register for it.  This is a great weapon to have in any teacher's discipline arsenal.  

Frustration Abounds

How To Handle A Discouraging Professor?

Today I went to my Japanese professor to ask her about my application for the JET program.  When I walked in I said the standard greeting  which is  respectful way to say excuse the interruption when entering some one's office.  Without looking up from her desk she had a smile on her face and replied for me to come in and sit down.  Once she looked up at me her face turned into a frown and she said "Oh it's you.  I was expecting someone else." 
I continued anyway informing her that I was beginning my application to the JET program and I asked if she had any of the past participant's statements of purpose that I could review to get an idea of formatting and content.  She told me she did not understand my question and I had to explain again that if these former student had been accepted then obviously they had an understanding of what was expected.  She told me that she would not let me copy some one's work.  That is not what I wanted to do.  Obviously I would not cheat or copy anyone else's statement of purpose because it would not be MY statement of purpose.  She began to berate me about how I was not equipped for the position, and that she thought that I would probably "offend MANY Japanese people" because I did not understand Japanese culture.  I politely asked her if she would at least review my application and tell me what needed to be done.  She told me she would, but that she would not recommend me.  I then asked her if she was going to go out of her way to give me a bad recommendation.  She said "I want nothing to do with your application."  This interaction was very disheartening.  Am I really equipped to go through with this dream, or is it just that a dream that I am not qualified to fulfill?  How do I go about proving myself to someone who is so pivotal in the application process for this program?

How do you help the student who doesn't want help?

In one of my classes is a student who lost his mother in a car accident.  It seems the father has shut everyone out of his life after the accident so much so that he won't seek help for his son who may have dyslexia.  All attempts by the school to offer to diagnose the boy and give him help has been met with animosity.  Even offering help without his parent knowledge is rejected.  I am not sure if the father has brainwashed the boy so much that he thinks he doesn't need help.  Perhaps, the boy was told he could never play football is he had to get help in school.

How can I help him without him realizing he is receiving help?  He is very smart, but with his trouble of mixing up letters, I'm afraid he won't reach his full potential.

Facilitating Conversation in the Classroom

I was in class on Tuesday and came across a situation that was a little frustrating.
During a class discussion in my American Literature 1 class, a hush fell over the entire classroom, save myself.  I had read the literature and truly enjoyed it, so I was ready, willing, and able to discuss it.  There were about two other people who randomly had comments, but as a majority no one had anything to say in analysing the work. 
The professor obviously got perturbed by this lack of interest and conversation.  He commented, "You all look asleep or uninterested in this reading." 
As a student who read the material and was genuinely interested, I felt bad for dominating the conversation, and likewise felt bad for the professor for putting together a class room discussion that did not actually happen.   
How do teachers deal with facilitating conversation in the classroom when it is obvious that the students have either not read the material, or are not willing to openly discuss the topic during class. 

Who Am I and Why Am I Here

My name is Trent Baker and I am a senior at Lyon College majoring in English with a minor in Philosophy.  I have an interest in teaching English as a foreign language in Japan. 

Foreign language is an important part of any student’s college experience, but choosing Japanese was more of a personal decision for me.  Before attending Lyon I met a Japanese language student that attended Lyon who made a huge impression on me.  That student’s name was Josh Looney.  He was an English major but took Japanese as his foreign language while studying at Lyon.  I would talk with him at the coffee shop where I worked while he did his Japanese homework and I was thoroughly impressed with his retention of a language that looked so foreign to me.  After talking with him on and off throughout the school year he shared with me his future plans to teach English in Japan as a foreign language.  The idea of education, travel, adventure, and exploration intrigued me.  After meeting Josh, I decided to follow in his footsteps, not only by going to Lyon, but also in attempting to learn the language and culture of Japan in hopes of teaching there after graduation. 

Since being at Lyon, I took Japanese 101 and flippantly applied myself, not fully grasping an understanding of  language nor culture.  Then after a devastating house fire I had to drop Japanese 102 because the course load was too much for me to handle; I was bound for failure.  It was only after a Nichol’s trip to Japan this summer that my interest in previous goals was once again solidified.  I want a genuine understanding of the religion, culture, and language and am determined to apply myself in hopes of success in not only the language classes but also in my endeavors to teach in a country whose people I am extremely interested in. 

Why Tonya is who she is

I have always wanted to be a teacher.  I remember teaching my teddy bears and stuffed animals when I was in elementary school.  I also set up a horse riding class in high school.

My passion was science.  I wanted to be a biology teacher right up until Dr. Thomas showed me all the math involved in being a science major.  Not knowing what to do my concentration in, I chose the discipline that would only take me four years to complete.  So, here I am, an English major. 

During my past three years, Dr. Tebbetts and Dr. Boling has influenced me the most.  I learned I could write professionally through Dr. Tebbetts.  I learned I had a love for Shakespeare through Dr. Boling.  If I decide to specialize in an English subject, it would be Shakespeare.  I am excited the Common Core has a section on Shakespeare.  My current co-teacher has already told me she wants me to teach that section.

I plan to get my masters in something, but I haven't decided if it will be in English or teaching.  Maybe I will master both.  I eventually want to teach English in a 2-year college or community college or become a principal of a school.

I look forward to learning everything I can from Mrs. Gillmore.  She is so knowledgeable and has so much to teach us.

Why I Am Who I Am

First, welcome Jon-Micael, Tonya, and Wesley to the class and to this blog!
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Many people should be thanked for their assistance in my becoming who I am right now in my career, for as Hillary Clinton's book persuades...just as it takes a village to raise a child, so it takes a conglomerate of individuals to build a twenty-one year career.

First, to my high school English teacher Mrs. Smith, my heroine, absolutely without a doubt, I would not be an English teacher had it not been for the example she sat every day of every week.  She worked us, holding us to higher expectations than most of us wanted, yet she loved us, and we knew it.  

Second, to my college instructors Dr. Tebbetts and Dr. Wray...one being the extreme, energized, definitely a sage on the stage of my life, the other, solid, direct, forcing our writing styles to become what they were not. Because of them, I inherited a much more solid literary background, one recognized when I later attended grad school and was told that I must have graduated from Lyon (or some high quality program) because of the caliber of my work.  Yes, I stood a little taller!  Thank you, Dr. Tebbetts, Dr. Wray...and the late Dr. Oliver.

Third, to my peer Lisa Huff who shared her love of technology as a tool, which then began the big change in my presentation methods.  This blog (and several others) and multiple wikis are a testament to her. Professionally, I have grown and now freely assist my peers as they take baby steps, steps that, to them, feel like giant leaps at times, all in an endeavor to better prepare all our students for the "real" world or, as the latest jargon encourages, to be "college and career ready."

Many more names should be mentioned here, for I have many to thank for the gift of my career, for without them all, I would not be who I am today.