As Christenbury talked about the difference between usage and grammar and the difficulties of teaching it in the classroom I grew somewhat frustrated. I began to wonder if the education I am receiving in college is actually preparing me to become a teacher of Communication Arts. As a middle school education major we are required to split our time of content in two different areas as well as take a few more education classes. To be completely honest several of the classes I have had to take for my English requirements have been good classes for "higher education" but I'm not sure if they are going to help me teach middle school students. The education classes I have taken have been a pretty big waste of time. What I'm trying to say is I do not feel my education is setting me up to succeed. I knew going into this that middle school students spend a lot of time developing the grammar skills that Christenbury was talking about. I have taken one class that dealt with grammar. It would be nice to paying for an education that is going to better equip the future teacher, but as Christenbury said we can always learn those things and how to teach them. It would be nice if classes were geared towards the future profession we were going to be going into instead of just putting us in classes that are related to our subject.
As the chapter titled The Craft of Questioning is something that is often talked about in education. Last week in my Social Studies Methods class we talked about this as well. I believe this is one teaching technique that is difficult to master but one of the best qualities a teacher can learn. I find it hard to find the right questions to ask a class to get them talking and when I do find that question it is sometimes hard to think of good follow-up questions. One thing my professor in my SS methods said was that the teacher should never answer their own question. If we do this it makes the students believe that they do not really have to pay attention to what is going on in class. Thought it was interesting.
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4 comments:
I understand your frustration. In all of my lit classes, I have never read a book that I will probably end up teaching, which would have been hugely helpful. But I also know that not everyone in those classes is an education major. I almost wish there was a class or two geared towards JUST the books that we are most likely to teach in a high school (or middle school in your case) setting.
How great would that be?! (If they would give us those classes Kendra suggested) You would think that the university would understand that we have not experienced many of the books that we will one day be teaching, and correct this problem somehow...
I understand as well, but I'll play devil's advocate. All of you are getting a liberal arts degree. What if you went to college and only read books you were going to teach or "use." As an English teacher, you are supposed to be experts in the content area--and there is much more content than what is listed on the curriculum lists for schools. Those haven't changed much in 100 years. In terms of middle school, I think you do get the short end of the stick in some regard.
So, when you get a chance to read, are you picking up books on the curriculum list? Do you pick up a young adult novel? I know you are busy, but if there are books that you need to read and you haven't, are you trying to read those books? Just some questions. I would like to discuss this next week, too. Great questions!!
I agree, most of the Education courses are worthless. I've gotten all A's in them, but learned nothing from them. I would rather have taken two more sections of English, geared in the "You're going to be teaching this" fashion, than waste anymore time on the education courses that are thoughtless, busy-work with instructors that are the worst of the lot. Seriously, aside from my IMT instructor, none of my education courses have been led by instructors that actually demonstrated the techniques they tell us to use. The University has severely been ineffective in this area.
~Stan
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