Learning Letter

Dear Dr. Agriss,

            This class was a lot of work, but the amount I learned equaled out the work load, so I didn’t mind having to work hard, because I was rewarded with a lot of knowledge about each subject we learned about

The book talks were a great way to show different texts that we can use within our classrooms. I loved learning about each of the books that my classmates presented on. It is very interesting to see what each of my classmates chose to present on. It was helpful to learn more about what texts our students can read. There are so many great texts that can be a great tool to teach the classroom content, but many of them teachers don’t know about. I am going to keep all the handouts with the book talk information on them so in the future if I need to recommend a text to a student or If I have the opportunity to have a text implemented into a classroom the books my classmates presented will be in my repertoire of choices.  

            One of the most helpful assignments I did in this class was the mini-lesson. I was so nervous to teach my mini-lesson, I was super prepared, but I was still shaking in my extremely squeaky shoes. I think it was because of the topic that I was teaching. I had just gone to the Holocaust class and I wanted to teach my lesson well and do it justice. When I got started all those nerves went away and I had a great time teaching my classmates about Night, even though it is a heavy subject to talk about let alone teach.

            Even though most of the pedagogy texts were extremely dense to read I learned a ton from each of them. Probably the most helpful piece was discussing each text after reading them before class. It was helpful to hear different classmate’s opinions on what I had taken a totally different way than they had. The text that I enjoyed the most and learned the most from was Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed. I still think about his analogy of how students shouldn’t just be trash receptacles for their teachers to throw their opinions and expect them to regurgitate when the time comes to test them on it. The students learning experience should allow them to explore the material they are learning about and they should be able to form their own opinions and not be told they are wrong on something that doesn’t necessarily have a right or wrong answer. I think Freire’s opinions will stick with me the most because my opinions are a lot like his. I also agree that students should be equals with the teacher. It creates a more comfortable and open learning environment that the students don’t have to be afraid to be wrong in. When students are expected to be right the first time they won’t grow as much as they could because they will be afraid to be wrong. By creating a learning environment where the students know that being wrong is ok, that will make the students less nervous to voice their opinions, which will in turn make the learning environment better for all the students.

            The unit plan opened my eyes up to a multitude of things. First, that lesson plans take an extremely long time to thoroughly create. Times that by 15 and they take forever. The unit plan was the biggest project I have done in my college career and it taught me that when a huge obstacle is set in front of me I won’t give up until that obstacle is completely torn down. Also, from the unit plan I learned that there are still so many pieces to teaching that I don’t evej have a grasp on. Hopefully I can learn more about those pieces before I start student teaching and working in my own classroom.

            I was really proud of myself this quarter and in this class especially. Usually I’m a student who sits and pays attention to everyone who talks, but I don’t really voice my opinion/ Throughout this class I have gained confidence to talk about my opinions, which I am proud of. As a teacher I think this helped me grow as well. Having confidence when you speak is important to gain students trust, if you sound unsure of yourself in front of people then the students will doubt your knowledge as well. As I am learning more and more about what I am talking about I am gaining confidence in my own opinions as a teacher and as a student.

Sincerely,

Kirsten French

Gene Yang: American Born Chinese

          American Born Chinese is the first full graphic novel I have read. Reading this book is sort of like reading a book and watching the movie at the same time because of the pictures that go along with the words.
         The first step to teaching this book in a class would be to teach about graphic novels. This would include things like what students will find within the text and within the pictures. It may be hard for the students to not just look at the pictures, but he content of the text is a really important aspect to graphic novels. Starting out this unit could be a lesson how to read and examine the pictures to see what is going on within the pictures and the text. This is a good way to start the unit before the students begin to read American Born Chinese. This way the students will begin the book knowing how to read and really analyze the content within the graphic novel.
         This is a great book to go over stereotypes and finding a persons identity. To really drive home the stereotypes with the students they could keep a journal about stereotypes they see in the media as they are out side of school. This is a good way to help the students recognize that stereotypes are all over the world. An example a journal entry that they students could do about a stereotype they found is with The Big Bang Theory. The students could explain how Howards mom is portrayed as a loud Jewish mother who is always pushing food onto her Howard. Going over that this is a stereotype of Jewish mothers and that not all Jewish mothers are like this is a good way to integrate pop culture into the lesson with the students.
          Another activity that could be done is to have the students create a comic of the main events within the book for each part within the book. This could be a really fun way to interact with the plot line of this book, because it does have the potential to be confusing with the different stories that are all being told at once.

Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet

          Romeo and Juliet is an extremely well known text that is written by Shakespeare. That is done in many freshman classes across the United States. Romeo and Juliet is a classic tragic love story, that of course ends with the death of both the main characters.
          I think it is important for the students to read any piece of work that is by Shakespeare, because the complex language that isn't spoken anymore. This type of language gives the students a whole new insight to what writing was like hundreds and hundreds of years ago. Shakespeare can give the students a good grasp on how to decipher a text for the true meaning, because his writing is similar to a word problem. It has to be solved before you can understand the true meaning of what he was trying to say.
          The characters in Romeo and Juliet are complex and hard to pin down to one characteristic. This is why a character activity would work really well for this story. Also, because Shakespeare is written in a complex way it would be a good learning experience for the students to do a discussion on some higher level thinking questions. One of the higher level questions that the students like the most could possibly turn into a paper assignment. This would make a good paper, because there are lots of opinions on most of Shakespeare's stories and especially Romeo and Juliet, because it is so well known.
          How could someone read Romeo and Juliet and not want to watch Leonardo DiCaprio play Romeo, in the 1996 version of Romeo and Juliet. This is a good opportunity for the students to watch the ending of the 1996 version and then to compare the ending of the movie to the ending within the text. This will give the students an opportunity to grow their ability to analyze multimedia and text at a higher level.

Edgar Allen Poe: The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Phall

          Poe has never really hooked me into his writing, and I went into reading The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Phall not having high hopes in regards to me liking the story. After I finished reading the story I ended up liking the plot more than I thought I would, which was nice. I might be a late blooming Poe fan.

            I really think this would be a good story to teach plot with, but because the story is pretty long and a little bit wordy, the upper high school grades could use this story to deepen their knowledge of plot. By deepening their knowledge of plot they will have a better knowledge of how to find the plot line.

A comparison that could be made between is between “The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Phall” and “From the Earth to the Moon,” by Jules Vernes. The students could read pieces that are selected by the teacher, so there are some good opportunities to compare and contrast certain aspects of both stories. The students could read through both pieces of the selected text and find characteristics that both stories have, no matter is they compare or contrast the two stories. Then the students could compare and contrast the characteristics they found in each story.

This is a good piece of text to read to really get a grasp on what science fiction writing is like. Edgar Allen Poe does a nice job of using this genre to write a story that grabs the reader attention. The students could analyze what pieces of this story in general are science fiction and what makes this story specifically a science fiction story. This would be a good chance for the students to explore a genre that they don’t usually get read, it’s usually the science book, or the history book, or the math book, switching to this genre might engage the students, because it isn’t the retelling of a historical event, it’s a made up story that is obviously not a narrative of someone’s real life event.

Sherman Alexie: The Diary of a Part-Time Indian

I had never read any writing of Sherman Alexie’s writing before, after reading The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, I want to read more of his books. This book is accessible to high school students. It isn’t a very hard book to read, especially because of the comics that Arnold draws to break up the text.

This book is especially inspirational to use in a high school classroom, because of the theme of the book. Throughout the book, Arnold is striving to work past the stereotypes that have been set by his relatives and by the expectations that have been set by the tribe that he is a part of. This is a good theme for the students to read. Especially if students don’t have family members that have gone to college, this book might help the students decide to take the steps to go to college and get a higher education. Arnold decides he doesn’t want to be exactly like most of the other Indians on the reservation, as a result of this he ends up going to Rearden High School. This could motivate students to really take the steps to achieve what they want in life.

Another reason why I would use The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is to teach the students about diaries. This could be a good opportunity for the students to write their own diary or journal. The students could add pictures or magazine clippings to personalize their writing within their journals to themselves.

As I was reading this I really liked the theme within it, which made me think that this would be a good book to teach theme with. Teaching theme with a complex book won’t really grab the student’s attention. Using The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, would engage the students, because the theme is something most of them can probably relate to.