Flint, Johnston, and Class Discussion

This week I was able to apply the readings to my reading partners at the Normal Public Library. I have 3 partners and they are all the same age, but each is at a different reading level. One is at grade level, one is above, and one is below. So the readings directly applied to these students. I was able to use them to help me understand and apply the readings. In Johnston, he talked about how students that read below level tend to choose books that are too difficult for them. I have noticed this with my student who is a struggling reader. The books chosen are always above the appropriate level and I end up reading most of the story. I have also noticed that when the students choose a book that pertains to an interest of theirs, they are much more interested in the story and will often interrupt the reading to inform me of more facts about the subject of the story. This is exciting to me because they are so involved in their reading. One thing we discussed in class today was about students who struggle with reading are often immediately asked to "sound out the word". I have found myself doing this all the time with one of my students. This is the go-to response, but in this particular case, I have found that my student is unable to sound out the words, so I become stuck and just fill in the word. This is something that I will have to work on for when I become a teacher. I will need to find strategies that I will be able to use to help students who face a similar situation to this.

Flint Ch 12

I would like to focus my post this week on the Flint reading. (Ch 12)
I noticed initially the statement the "if students are unable to read and write proficiently, their acedemic performance begins to spiral downward quickly." I believe this is true and is why so many students are not identified as having learning disabilities until later grades. Our current system of education depends so much on a student's ability to read and understand as well as to be able to articulate their thoughts and knowledge using the written word.

"motivation can make the differance between learning that is temporary and superficial and learning that is permanent and internalized."
I can see the truth in this in my own academic life.  The learning that occurred in most of my Gen Ed classes where I was not highly motivated was "temporary and superficial" where as much of what I am learning now...I am highly motivated because the material interests me and I know I will need to have all of the things I am learning now in order to teach students...is "permanent and internalized."

A question I intend to pose in class is about all of the intervention programs...I would assume the school that we are teaching out chooses a program that we must follow, I wonder how that will affect us it the program is against our ideas and beliefs about how to help struggling readers develop literacy?

Article on Process Drama

I found the article this week and just the topic of process drama in general to be very interesting. It was interesting in the article that the teacher was using these activities during the literacy block time and how many of the other school authorities did not approve because they did not think that process drama fit within the realm of literacy. I agree with the article and what it points out about how such process drama activities can accomplish many of the same objectives as traditional reading and writing processes but in a more creative and interactive way that probably had even more of a possibility of engaging the student. Process drama can even go beyond what traditional practices can because many of them ask the student to consider plot lines or background stories not explicitly told in the text. I especially liked the ideas that asked students to put themselves in the place of certain characters and think or act as they might. This not only gives student more insight to the character and their role in the story, but also gives students a chance to look at multiple viewpoints and how culture and background intertwine with a character and his/her behavior.

Process Drama

I thought the drama article was very interesting. It is a new strategy that would be a great option to present to students, especially the younger elementary students. They love getting up in front of their classmates and they will have fun in their learning. This may also be a "safer" way for some students to express their real opinions of the reading-they can be a different character so it will be easier for them to express themselves. Also, it is a great assessment tool for teachers. The students will put a lot of effort into a project like this so the teacher will get a real feel for what was comprehended.

I found it helpful to try some of these techniques and connecting them with Esperanza Rising. It not only helped define what Process Drama is, but how it can be effectively used in a classroom setting. This exercise was also helpful because every group had a different idea, so we come away with multiple strategies.

Ray Ch. 6

I am glad to see that Ray is finally explaining how to go about teaching students about writing craft and "reading like a writer". The first thing that I noticed about this was that she says she reads a book over and over with her class to get to know the reading. At first I thought that this was strange, and that the students would probably get bored of hearing the same book, but then I got to thinking about reading with my parents and how we would always read the same books together (Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Tacky the Penguin) and they never got old. I think you would have to pick a really great book to pull off reading the book so many times without the students getting bored.

The next thing I wondered when I was reading was what age the students are that she is teaching. It later said that the students were 4th graders. I thought this was interesting because 4th graders do not often read picture books in class (to my knowledge anyway). I'm sure 4th graders would still like being read picture books, but I wonder if they would prefer looking at novels to learn about writing craft. I also started thinking, how could you really do something like this with younger students? Would they be capable of picking out the things that writers do? I think it would be interesting to see this kind of lesson in action, because even though Ray is describing her process in chapter 6, I still would like to see how it could work. I have never been taught this way, as I'm sure none of us have, but I think that this is actually a really cool way to teach writing and to encourage creativity.

Sorry if it sounds like I'm just thinking out loud... but that's exactly what I'm doing. Let me know what you guys think!

Drama Article

I really liked this article because I think that drama can be so helpful to learning. To say that drama literature activities is not technically literature is crazy in my opinion. By ignoring drama, movement, and hands on activities you are ignoring certain children that may not learn very well when only presented with a text to read and thats it. This article reminded me of a literature/drama activity we did in my eighth grade english class. We were reading Shakespeare's The Taming of The Shrew. My teacher had us split off into groups and assigned us different scenes to rewrite in and theme or way we wanted to. As a class we shared and performed our scenes. Once we did that we voted on which theme or modernization technique we liked the best and then as a class we rewrote all the scenes with our theme of choice (we did western!). Administration read our version, The Wranglin' of the Shrew, and liked it so much they made it our spring play! The whole activity was much more enjoyable and beneficial then just simply reading the play and then moving on. I still remember that play to this day, where other things I've read over the years have fallen by the wayside.