4/22

I can’t believe the semester is this close to ending, it seems like it all went by in a flash. I am really going to miss the students at Reagan. I appreciate all of the laughter that resulted in my experience with them this semester. They made me feel at home in this very different world, and I wish there was time to continue and develop those little relationships. I hope they got something out of my time there because they gave me a lot to work with (good and difficult), and I don’t think I would have had that experience somewhere else. I also liked working with Ms. Derbyshire. She is very open and honest about her experience and that allowed us to learn from each other and collaborate in ways I wasn’t able to experience last semester.

I think I now I have pretty good idea of what I’d want the school year to look like, and I’m enjoying putting the pieces together. My ideas are completely influenced by my work and interactions with the students at Reagan and I have been putting a lot of thought in trying to figure out what would work for them.

            One of my main concerns, and something I regret not talking to them about is that a lot of the Spanish-speaking students are not comfortable reading ad writing in English. I think a lot of them are ashamed of this so I definitely want to do a unit where there is an exploration of language and talk about how power influences how we see language.

I also think they need to be allowed to write in Spanish, whether it’s 100% Spanish or code switching because their confidence as writers in English starts from there. Alex and I read this great book by Dangling Fu (Writing Between Languages) and it gave me a lot of needed insight on helping students who speak other languages develop their writing skills. I learned that the fact that they are more comfortable speaking and writing in another language is not something I should be “concerned” about, but something we should celebrate as promising and helpful not a hindrance or limiting.

            I taught 4 lessons last week where I got the chance to see for myself how teacher led and student led discussions feel and I’m very glad I did it. Although, they weren’t perfect, it was great practice, and I’m grateful for the experience. My video probably will not do a good job demonstrating what took place, but I learned quite a bit from those lessons. I asked one of the classes how they felt about “Socratic seminars” and student led discussions and initially most said they preferred teacher led discussions. They expressed that they were very shy and not comfortable doing it all on their own. After a while, they began to reveal that teacher led discussions prevent them from expressing themselves, but they need more practice before being able to participate in a discussion that is student led. One of their suggestions is that the teacher gives them a specific side to argue for or against. They feel like this is something they are comfortable with and can be used as a starting point.

            I really enjoyed this conversation, and I completely agree with them. A student led discussion is something you have to build up to. By 9^th and 10^th grade the students are so accustomed to teachers leading every aspect of the classroom, that giving them a little bit of freedom can make them feel uncomfortable and unprepared.

            Initially, I wanted to start the year off with a unit that relied a lot on student led discussions, but now I don’t think that is the best idea, and I’m thankful that they were able to show me that.

4/15

This will be a very short blog because I don’t have too many experiences to reflect on…

This week I will be teaching a lot of lessons and I have a great deal of freedom so I’m excited about what I’ll be able to do with the kids. It has been a little while since I have seen them due to testing, so I am a little nervous because it feels a little new again. Nonetheless, I am very excited to work with them again because they are great kids and I’m so glad I got the chance to meet them.

I have been trying to figure out some things for the year plan, but I’m still a bit unsure about the project, so I hope we get some time in class to talk about it again. I think I’d just like to hear what other people are working on because it helps me confirm whether I’m thinking in the right direction or not.  I think I’d like to see some examples of different plans to get more ideas.

I’m sure next week I’ll have more to ponder over because by then I’d have taught 3 lessons and be at least halfway through planning the year. 

4/8

I had such a hard time creating this unit plan and it was has been a very frustrating experience. This whole time I have based my decision to teach on wanting to empower students and challenge the ways in which they think and the moment I get the chance to do that, I am completely LOST!

            I was comforted by Bomer’s statement that “what produces an education is the minutes students spend engaged in meaningful activity with their teacher and other students, not some technically correct sequence of lessons”. However, I was confused about what those meaningful activities should be and how to make activities meaningful. I think this is also a little different because the unit is being constructed for a grade and I know it will be judged. I’m less open to risk taking because I have to consider my audience, and I’m afraid to create something that will seem ridiculous or does not reflect what we have learned thus far.

             Nonetheless, planning this unit made me think about the curriculum my friend and I created for the summer program a couple of years ago. That was much easier because there was somewhat of an agenda and the students were not very diverse. Now, I have to consider diversity and not simply throwing my ideas on the students and presenting them as absolute truths, because that’s essentially what we did.

            At first, without being completely sure, I focused the unit on social inequality in Austin. That ended up being very difficult because I couldn’t find enough resources or literature that addressed the issue in a manner that I thought would work for the classroom I had in mind. Then, I thought about making the unit more broad and just focus on social inequality. That was still a bit overwhelming because that topic is too broad and I struggled with how to plan for that in six weeks. I didn’t want to overlook anything and I felt like I needed more time to select the best books, articles and documentaries to support the topic.

            That whole process was very frustrating and I ended up completely letting the idea go. Now my unit is focused on identity. I found that focusing the unit on identity allows me to introduce social inequality to the students in a different way, a way that I can handle and support as a new teacher. Thinking about identity forces them to look at their social worlds, and what makes them who they are.

Overall, my goal for this unit is to foster a strong sense of communion within the classroom, the school, and the greater community because there is a lot of power in that, especially when challenging power. In my quest for resources to show the students, I stumbled across a documentary where bell hooks talks about promoting “communion” rather than “community”. She explained that in a community there is a great sense of togetherness but not a lot of conversation that focus on the differences within communities, and that often weakens the community; whereas communion has a strong focus on understanding, communication, and empathy. I thought that was very powerful and an idea I wanted my students to explore.

            At this point, I have decided on 3 books, 2 essays, and 3 documentaries:

The House on Mango Street-Sandra Cisneros

“The Negro and the Racial Mountain”-Langston Hughes

Black Boy- Richard Wright

“How it Feels to be Colored Me”- Zora Neale Hurston

Breath, Eyes, Memory- Edwidge Danticat

“Black is Black ain’t”- Marlon Riggs

“Afro-Latin Americans: A rising voice”- Miami Herald series

“When the Drum is Beating”- Whitney Dow