Yuk! That is not my nose!!

Wednesday I taped the first lesson I taught at my dyad placement.  It was a math lesson comparing linear and nonlinear relationships.  I didn’t want to jump to the obvious, but I am afraid I’m going to if I were brave enough to show you my video you would see how the camera added like 3 inches to my nose.  I clearly had a fake nose glued on ;)  I mean there is no way that the nose I saw in the video is the same nose I look at every day!  Come to think of it, my voice didn’t sound like my voice either; well, at least not the voice I hear in the shower or car when I am singing.  The voice on the video sounded an awful lot like my mother’s voice.  I’m starting to think that maybe my mother was teaching the lesson or some evil Halloween spirit took over my body.

All the laughs aside, this is my reflection after watching my video the first time and I now understand why my professor said not to write a reflection until after watching the video multiple times.  I took my professors advice to wait to write a true reflection of my video. 

Stay tuned for a Halloween treat!

Why won’t my words magically appear? Need words Now, Please!

Lamott has been a great read so far.  There is so much I can connect with on a personal level.  Although I have never been a writer nor have I wanted to write for a living, all her struggles in writing I have seemed to experience while trying to write college papers.  As I was reading, I found myself shaking my head consistently in agreement with Lamott.  Everything from tapping fingers on the computer for words to magically appear and then still waiting for something magical to happen, yet nothing does…well for me anyways!  I can’t count the number of times I started “listing of things that must be done right at this moment: foods that must come out of the freezer, appointments that must be canceled or made, hairs that must be tweezed” (pg. 7)  I found every possible thing I could do that didn’t involve starting my papers. 

The need to be a perfectionist right from the beginning also really resonated with me.  I have always been stuck with my writing because I have always tried to a perfectionist.  I have always felt that it would be a waste of time if I had to review and edit my paper multiple times, but in the end I am sure I spent more time trying to get it right the first time around.  After reading Lamott, I definitely appreciate the writing process a bit more than before.  I especially found it interesting that a writing prompt of Lamotts, school lunches, could bring back so many school memories.  I think it is a great idea to get kids exciting about writing and while Routman thinks teachers should not focus to much on prompts, I do think a fun and creative prompt will help get the kids get the creative thought flowing.  Routman mentions that children need to enjoy writing and I think creative writing prompts will help with that.  That doesn't mean I support writing prompts fully; some are tedious and unnecessary.

ps. Unfortunately my words did not magically appear while staring at the screen...maybe next time!

Literacy Blog 2- sizes, shapes and so much more!

Last Tuesday was great!   I absolutely love my Kindergarten buddy.  For the sake of confidentiality I am going to refer to my K-buddy as G-man. 

When I was working with G-man I got a sense that, according to Fox’s five word learning stages, he is past the pre-alphabetic stage and somewhere in the partial alphabetic stage.  I am hoping that after tomorrow I will have a better sense of exactly where G-man is.  Before my partner and I started working with G-man, his teacher informed us that the students in her class are currently “stretching” out words to better hear the letter sounds.  That was the first time I had heard of such a technique; so when I came upon the technique in Fox I was rather happy.  It was nice to see actual techniques from text material being used in the classroom.  For the last few quarters I feel as though I have been reading a lot of material, mostly theory, but not getting to see it actually happen in a classroom.  Putting the text to practice allows for better comprehension as to what works and what may not work.  I look forward to seeing more of Fox’s techniques each time I work with G-man.

I have always known that learning how to read is a big process, but I never realized exactly how many steps children go through.  I especially had no idea children see words as shapes.  It is amazing how children see words differently based on shape and length.  I found Fox to be rather informative with the details of each aspect of learning how to read.  I also found it extremely useful that chapter 2 has so many useful activities; I plan on using them in my classroom and with my 4-year-old niece who is currently at the pre-alphabetic stage and is eager to learn how to read.

Literacy Blog 1- to read aloud or not to read aloud

I found the Sulzby and Teale article to be interesting.  It had really good ideas about how to incorporate literacy into the classroom in ways which may not initially standout as ideal methods in teaching literacy.  I particularly enjoyed reading the section on morning messages.  I first read of the idea of creating morning messages in Faber and Mazlish (1995) and have already spoke with my MT and incorporating it into our morning routine. I originally thought it would be good for children who already knew how to read, but after reading about it from the Sulzby and Teale article I see that it is still a great idea for those who do not know how to read as well.  It is amazing how so many daily activities can help children with literacy…shopping list, etc.

Before reading the Albright article I didn’t see how it would be possible and/or effective to do a read aloud to students in middle school or high school.  I do now agree that read alouds are beneficial at every grade level, but I am still not sold on every subject.  Albright references a study of a social studies unit.  Within the social studies unit a read aloud fits perfectly.  I do not however, think a read aloud would be beneficial for an upper level math class.  I am open for someone to convince me other wise!