She must know all my insecurities, hopes and dreams for teaching. All I have to do is read the first page and feel a sort of relief and have another one of my doubts about my abilities be soothed by the words of Christenbury. I mean, lets be honest, I wasn't assuming that I was going to know EVERYTHING there is to know about English when I graduated, but it can still be frightening to feel as though you are underprepared. I love her comment, "Teachers, in order to teach, really must continue to learn" (123). It has to be true that in order for us as teachers to be engaged and enjoy teaching we must be learning - even alonside our students.
I also enjoyed reading Christenbury's section on Focus (pg. 140). No doubt we will be teaching novels, short stories and other literary works where we could extrapulate from the work all that can possibly derive from it, but I think that she makes a valid point that "trotting your students through every literary element" can be overwhelming and give students more of a negative feeling towards a piece of work (140). I am hoping to learn how to teach a novel through my conceptual unit and sometimes it is easy to think that I must hit every aspect of the literary elements that can be found in it. I read Christenbury and she changes my mind.
The different ideas that are presented are definitely note worthy. However, I want to make sure that I can provide opportunities for my students to read what they enjoy. In Christenbury's closing story, I was a little taken back by the idea of giving students a reading day once a week. In high school, I don't really remember having classtime to just read so it is hard for me to comprehend setting that much class time to reading alone. I have been thinking about it more, though, and really see that it could be the most beneficial thing to do in a classroom. What I love more is that I met with my practicum teacher on Friday and she mentioned that every Friday in her English 2 class it is "quiet day" or class time devoted to reading. I think I'm hooked on this idea and hopefully I can incorporate into my own classroom.
Saturday, February 16, 2008
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6 comments:
I agree, the reading day, seems a bit of a stretch for me too. I mean, until I see it in action, I;m not convinced it will work. But if we are going to be successful, we have to try things at least once.
~Stan
I also disagreed with the entire reading day per week, but then I thought a little deeper. Some teachers give the first ten minutes of class to the students to read a book of their choice or of the assigned reading. Over a 5 day week, that adds up to 50 minutes, which is an average classroom day. I don't think i agree with it, but if you think of it in these terms, it is a little different.
It would be interesting to try the once a week reading day. My question is--Would the students bring their own copy to class or would the students leave their books in my class to ensure that they had a book?
I love the concept of learning along with your students. We are all constantly learning our entire lives. I think it would be good to give them the feeling that you understand that they are too. This lets them know it's ok that they don't know everything yet.
I remember when I was in English I back in Jersey my teacher everyday had us read for 15-20 minutes everyday. Of course we were on block scheduling so it didn't eat up all our time. It was interesting because she told us that if we read everyday for that amount of time then by the end of the year we would have read apporximately 4 books. Also, when we did this reading, we were not allowed to read our current class book, and we got points for it every week.
Emms
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