Final Presentation

I forgot one! Here's my rubric for my wiki project

Whoops! Here is one of the rubrics that I used for my most recent wiki project and there are a few things I would change. First of all, I would not include the rough draft in my grading of the entire project. I would make that a separate grade. As it was, I was not able to thoroughly help each and every student on their rough draft, and therefore I had to make my judgement about that part of the rubric based upon their final draft (which is fairly easy to do with 7th graders, but still not the most transparent). Anyhow, feel free to steal anything you like.

Wiki Project
7th Grade Language Arts
Walk Two Moons

Assignment: To create a wiki page that informs the public about the book Walk Two Moons

STEPS TO COMPLETE

1. CREATE A BOOK REVIEW: A book review is a piece of writing that describes what happens in the book, parts that you liked, and parts that you didn’t like. This book review should be about 2-3 paragraphs long.
2. INSPIRATION CHARACTER WEB: You must create a character web that shows the names and descriptions of all the characters using the computer program Inspiration. This web should include 20-30 bubbles.
3. POST ALL OF THE ABOVE ON THE WIKI PAGE

THINGS TO REMEMBER:
1. You must have all parts approved by Ms. Ward before you put them on the wiki
2. All grammar and spelling must be perfect BEFORE it is posted on the wiki
3. Follow the checklist below in order to make sure you complete each of the steps













CHECKLIST:

1.______ Book Review (30 points)

____ Rough Draft
____ describes what happens in the book
____ describes parts you liked, says why
____ describes parts you did not like, says why
____ all grammar and spelling is correct
_____ 2-3 paragraphs long
____ Final/Wiki Draft
____ all grammar and spelling is correct
____ all necessary information is included
2. ______ Inspiration Character Web (30 points)
_____ Rough Draft
____ All major characters are included
____ All major characters are described
____ Web is easy to understand
_____ Final/ Wiki Draft
____ All major characters are included
____ All major characters are described
____ Web is easy to understand
____ Web is colorful and organized
____ All spelling and grammar is correct

3. ______ Wiki Page (15 points)
____ Wiki page is neat and organized, uses heading and subheadings
____ Wiki page includes all of the necessary components
____ Wiki page has correct grammar and spelling
____ Wiki page has a link in the sidebar on the Front Page

E-Portfolios

Between illness and the demands of being a 1st year teacher, I'm afraid my attendance to this class has been less than stellar. As such, I missed our discussion on E-portfolios, so I will have to simply share my experience with them. In the post bac program at the U, everyone is required to create an E-portfolio. I realize that there must be circles where this would be a valuable way to communicate information about oneself as a teacher, but in education (at least in Minnesota), districts are still a little behind the times. Each district application has a number of documents that must be attached, and therefore all things that one might put on an efolio are made redundant.
Further, I found that even though I did give out the address for my efolio and encouraged people to go and look at it, the paper copy that I had in my hand was much more useful. I carried a binder with pictures of former students, examples of unit and daily lesson plans, my teaching philosophy, letters of rec, and other projects that I had done during student teaching and in my time teaching in Ecuador. Unfortunately, this is one area where the gap between what academia thinks is going on in schools and what is actually going on in schools (in my experience) is quite wide. Many principals (and teachers for that matter) have just learned how to use email. They are unable to fathom the idea of an online C.V. Still, I know that eventually this will be the way of the future, so I am glad that I know how to do it.
As far as using this technology with students, I think it is excellent. Right now, even though my kids don't know it, they are creating a portfolio of work that will exist for them for a very long time (hopefully forever). They will not only be able to look back over their work from the beginning of the year, but also for their work during 7th grade. It is very empowering for the kids to be able to see what a difference their hard work and effort makes to their learning. I can tell now that kids are excited about the improvement they've made just from one wiki project to the next. We've even used the revision tool on the wiki to show the progress they've made from when they first began the wiki page to when they "turned it in" for credit. Meta-awareness of the learning process is a valuable tool in building motivation and engagement, and it serves as the truest example of natural positive reinforcement.
In all, I believe that like most other things, efolios have their place and their value. This depends largely on audience. One has to ensure that the audience is able to access and appreciate the effort and the progression of the efolio in order for it to be truly valuable.

Blog Reflection

As I look back over my posts, I realize that my attitude towards using technology has evolved a bit. First, when I began this class I was fresh from teaching in St. Paul (both student teaching and summer school), where access to computers both in and out of school is limited for the student population. This, understandably, gave me an attitude of weary optimism when it came to techology. I wanted to reach my students where they were, but I kept finding that my students were not where all the research said they were. It frustrated me deeply to hear scholars and academics or people from affluent schools talk about how the digital divide is a myth, that it is really just a broadband divide. I still invite these people to spend time in poorer schools and then revisit this notion.

Now, after spending the last four months in a more affluent district (albeit one that is certainly not "rich"), I understand how people can have this misconception. I now understand what it is like to teach in a school where the majority of the kids have computers at home, even if they don't have much else. Also, if the kids don't have a computer at home, there are hundreds of computers for them to use at school. We have things like podcasting microphones and a tech department that can fix problems. We have teaching tools like Vision and other capabilities that allow us to really incorporate technology into our lessons without it being a major production that ends up detracting from learning instead of enhancing it.

Further, as I look back over my writing, I can tell that my attitude has changed regarding the possibility of using technology in the classroom as well. In my later posts, I examine the viability of the technology in classroom assuming that the basic technological capabilities are there to begin with. I'm not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing; I want to be a voice for those who go unheard in academic circles, but I also want to be a good teacher to the students I have before me. These students still have hurdles to overcome. For instance, they are not allowed to have web-based email addresses or access youtube or flickr or picasa, ,etc, because of the security filters. Still, when we want to access the computers, with a little planning, we can do that at South St. Paul, whereas I was unable to at Como Park H.S. in St. Paul.

In all, I am happy that I have deepened my knowledge of using web 2.0 in the classroom, and I intend to continue to find ways of incorporating it. I do notice that it seems to reach kids on a level that I (being relatively young) can somewhat understand, but not fathom completely. I do proceed with caveats, however; web 2.0 does not solve all problems of engagement and motivation. For further evidence of this, I recommend checking out my class's latest wiki efforts. Their pages are full of spelling and grammar mistakes, lazy formatting, and missing requirements. Overall, though, the benefits outweigh the detractions.

Powerpoint Reflection

I am not a huge fan of powerpoint, but I do notice that in districts that are less savvy about technology (I'm not naming any names here), powerpoint seems to be an easy way for teachers to say they are "reaching" children of the digital age. I agree that interactive powerpoints would certainly constitute web 2.0 material, but in my limited experience, I see so few teachers actually using powerpoint that way. What I normally see is teachers using Powerpoints as replacements for the whiteboard; that is, teachers usually just type their notes ahead of time and slap them on some slides. This technology also allows teachers to 'cover their butts' for students with IEP's and 504's who are legally required to receive a written copy of the notes.
In my opinion, you can make Powerpoints as game-like as possible, but it still means that you have 20-40 kids sitting in the dark looking at a huge screen. For me, I like to model the note-taking process as creative. When I write on the board, I erase between classes so that each class gets to see what it looks like when you have an idea and then transfer that idea to paper. Further, the act of writing is an act of learning for me, as I suspect it is for many students. When I have kids take notes off of the overhead, even when I have had some interactive element to it, it ends up being a rote copying situation, where the kids do not hear the words coming out of my mouth because they are too busy copying.

Anyhow, I do like the idea of sliderocket for posting notes to my website. This does make it easier to have a record of what went on for the kids who were absent that day, and since I can add audio, it almost makes my earlier podcasting idea irrelevant! I can just put a presentation up and the kids will be able to access it. Further, if they were having trouble understanding, they would be able to seek help from another adult. Lastly, it would help me to be more reflective as a teacher. I would be able to go back between years, figure out how I taught the lesson the year before, and then find ways to make it better.

Reflection on Video

As I have fallen deeply behind on most things in my life, so have I fallen behind on my blogging for this class. I will therefore seek to catch up on what I might have missed out on telling you.

I enjoyed learning the video tools. While I have used imovie quite a bit, and I've even had my kids make videos in class, it was nice to actually learn how to use the different buttons/functions from an actual human being. I dislike tutorials, so I have never taken the time to actually go through the entire imovie or moviemaker one because I find it boring, confusing, and usually unhelpful. I would love to teach a film class where students were able to make their own films and analyze others. I took one in college, and it was a blast. Also, it goes a long way towards teaching those analytical skills we are always trying so hard to achieve in literacy education. Based upon this desire, my goal is to create a unit for the end of the year that focuses on critique, and thereby have the kids analyze, critique, and create their own films and other alternative texts. We'll see how that goes.

In all, I intend to continue to use imovie and moviemaker in my classroom. I think that it is an excellent way for kids to understand the procedural nature of academic creativity; that kids actually learn how to be more organized writers by making films.

My slideshow

Literary Terms

From: emilyward,
9 minutes ago

Literary Terms

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own.

SlideShare Link

video

Also

I couldn't open the movie about getting people to subscribe to my podcasts and publishing my podcasts to media mill. That will be a project for class tomorrow, but for the mean time, you can click on the links and download the files. Happy Listening!

Podcasting

I really enjoy podcasting. Garageband makes it so easy! I'm sure there's tools I don't know how to use, but from what I have been able to do I have been happy with the results. Anyhow, here is a podcast example WITH my reflection. So, if you want to hear how I've used podcasts, what equipment I've used, why I think podcasts are useful, and just in general, EVERYTHING I BELIEVE ABOUT PODCASTING, you have to listen to my podcast all the way to the end. 

Also, please feel free to check out some examples of student podcasts that I have attached as well. 

My podcast/reflection on podcasting

Student podcast 1

Student podcast 2

Online Role Play Reflection

Truth be told, my commitment to the online role play was minimal. First, I had to miss class the day we began it because of parent-teacher conferences, and then I went out of town during MEA weekend. I believe that the time we spent in class on the role play was very valuable though. From a purely organizational/technical aspect, I feel like this activity did not work well with so many people participating in a synchronous way. First of all, my convos were, for some reason, being organized in way that did not allow me to read the responses in the order they were written. Second, I thought that with so many different perspectives, it really became difficult for people to actually have a conversation with one another. Lastly, it felt a bit strange to be sitting in a room full of intelligent people and communicating with each other through typing on a website. Why couldn't we have just spoken to one another? I believe that in order for this to be useful, a few things would have to change. 

First, we would have to make sure that the technology was set up to synch the convos in order so that people could actually follow them as a conversation. Second, I would break the students into smaller groups so that they could actually have a conversation that would move forward. The idea is for the students to learn things by researching and taking on and listening to various positions in an argument, but I felt like last week's debate was a bit hard to follow, let alone to analyze and respond to. Part of my confusion could be due to the fact that I missed the first class on this topic, but I think these things just seemed built into the activity (as this is the second time I have learned about this; I saw Rick's presentation at the MCTE spring convention last year). 

Anyhow, I would try this in my classroom with the various adjustments I have mentioned. 

Wiki Update

Now that we have completely finished one wiki project, I am happy to reflect on the experience. I thought that the wiki medium was a very interesting way to teach writing; however, because this was my first time teaching with it and using the technology, I felt that we spent most of the time just trying to get comfortable with using the wiki itself. I believe that the technology can help the kids get engaged in writing, but first they have to learn how to use the technology at all. I know that the kind ladies who came in to talk to us about how easy it is for kids to blog and write on wikis meant well, but with 7th graders in a lower income area (it's not tough to find a lower income area THAN EDINA), there really does exist a digital divide, not just a broadband divide. If seventh graders do have a computer, they are heavily regulated as to their use, and they are 12, so regulation still works. So, they aren't as active on facebook as we adults might believe, and as a result, part of teaching digital writing means teaching the "digital" part. 

That said, now that the kids know how to use the technology, I am going to attempt another wiki writing project. For my low track class, we will be focusing only on writing content and adding pictures to individual pages. For my regular track class, we will be writing and using inspiration on the wiki pages. And, last but not least, for my honors class, we will be writing and creating podcasts using audacity and posting them on the wiki pages. I like the idea of a wiki as something that the kids can use so that they can write for a larger audience, as opposed to writing just for me. I still don't know quite how to hammer it home that audience should affect writing, but we are also going to work on that this time. We are going to look at examples of good and bad websites, and hopefully the kids will get that mistakes in grammar and spelling and boring design lower the credibility of websites. 

All in all, I am enjoying the wiki technology, and I look forward to using it more in the future. 

I should be good at posting these by now...

Here is another example of my prowess with imovie. I truly love imovie, and my love for it has only increased in the past few weeks as I have been forced to teach using movie maker, which is just clearly inferior to imovie for many reasons. Anyhow, I used a poem by Leslie Adrienne MILLER, not RICH, as I say in the audio, but I was too tired to re-record, re-mix, etc. So, I left it. Forgive me Ms. Miller, if you see this, I am very sorry! 

Other than that, for a more detailed version of this type of thing, please again refer to my digital literacy projects from last February. They are the same type of thing. I think I am going to have students do something like this during our poetry unit in December, just in time for Christmas. The wiki has been a big hit; but I do think that people are "underwhelmed" by the quality of the videos and wiki pages, a charge to which I offer the following defense: we had seven days from start to finish, which includes not only writing, but learning all of the technology as well. I believe that next time we use the wiki (hopefully in a couple of weeks) we will work more on the writing aspect as opposed to the digital aspect, which kind of consumed us this last time. Anyhow, I hope you enjoy the post, and please check out my class's wiki at www.7thgradenorthcore.pbwiki.com. 

Wacky Wiki

I am not going to post about wikis until I am done with the wiki project I am currently doing with my kids. This will be after next week Tuesday. Currently, the project is going well, but tomorrow I am going to give the kids video cameras and tell them to film commercials they have written. We'll see how that goes! After they film them, they will post them to the wiki. The other side of the 7th grade core did their videos/wiki posts last week, so you can take a look at those. 

www.7thgradenorthcore.pbwiki.com

my slideshow

How I do my slideshows

I use imovie for slideshows, though I might actually have to use moviemaker and flickr, and voicethread in the future because my school is on PC's. Usually, I do the narration in garageband, another Mac program, because you can put music to it, which you can fade in and out. I have used podcasting, but not slideshows, in my classroom. I do use powerpoint slide shows when we read stories in class. I try to find pictures of things that relate to the stories so that the students are stimulated both visually and aurally. I would probably use Flickr to do the same things; perhaps I would use Picasa, as I am a google person. Right now, I am so excited about my podcasting for disabilities idea, I don't know what to do with myself! Slideshows do help with those kids though; they are more engaged when they know what we're talking about.

I KNOW WHAT I AM GOING TO DO FOR MY FINAL PROJECT

Ok, scratch everything I've talked about already. I am going to make podcasts for my kids with reading disabilities. I will either post the podcasts online, or I will make cd's that the kids can check out and take home to listen to (or of course, come to my room to listen to). This way, not only can the kids have the stories we read in audio, but they can also have my notes, and things I say! This might be more difficult than I think, but I have so many kids who have processing or reading disabilities, and they need a way to study for tests that doesn't involve writing or reading. I'm so excited about this!
Also, I will post my non-narrated collage in a little bit. I need a wi-fi signal. For a better example, refer to my digital writing project, which is already posted.

Right now, I don't like Macs

Hello loyal readers!

I am currently trying to post a new little collage that I have made with narration and music, but unfortunately, my garage band is having a little problem. First my podcast mic wouldn't work, then when I recorded it using the built-in, it won't export to itunes. I have done this a lot, even with students, so it's frustrating. For proof that I do actually know how to do this, please see the post entitled "Digital Literacy", which should be from last February or  March. That was for a different class, but I spent more time on it, so it should be better. Until then, I will try to get some movies and podcasts up here, if my stupid computer will behave. Thanks for patience.

Inspiration

Zero Inspiration

I can't figure out how to get my Inspiration document up here yet, so I will probably post it during class. Sorry to all my loyal readers. Thanks.

Blog on Blogs

When I need to search for something, I typically use Google. I teach research methods to students, and when I teach it, I am forbidden from telling them to use Google. I don't know why this is, but I suspect it is because most people don't know how to use Google properly. They don't know that when you search in Google, you are given a variety of different types of material related to that search, including academic articles. As an aside, I also use Google to fight plagiarism, as I can just type in the words I believe were plagiarized and they come right up. Of course, a student could plagiarize from a book, but the chances of them actually using a real book for research are low (why would they when they could use the internet?).

I usually use ERIC when I have to search for academic articles, or Google Scholar, an extension of the wondrous search engine mentioned above. I find that most databases are unwieldy and just not as easy to use as Google. Why do I always have to limit my search terms? Can't the database figure out that I want articles about baseball when I type that word in the search field? Google can.

If I am forced to use a database, it usually takes me many trys to find what I am looking for. I will start by just typing the most important part of what I am looking for in the search field, for instance, an unusual word in the title. Then, when that returns nothing, I try putting that in quotes. When that returns many un-useful, unrelated articles, I usually try the author and the unusual word. Sometimes that works, but for the most part, I just type the entire title into the search field on our old, good friend, Google.

I determine the validity of information on a website first by the appearance of the website and the last time it was updated. A good website should be updated almost every day, if not several times per day. Further, I look for the level/style of writing on the website; many grammatical errors or usage errors means I won't be using this information. Lastly, I cross-reference the information with other websites, usually found by using Google Scholar.

Thus far, I have taught students to use the clunky databases. They generally hate it because the databases are so hard to search compared to what they are used to. I also teach them to look for sites from newspapers or other news outlets, to check the date the site was last updated, and to look for neatness and grammatical mistakes. Also, I teach the students to look for funding information on the website, and then research the group that funds it. This becomes extremely important, especially when students are researching controversial issues.

Digital Writing

This is my second blog. When I traveled to Ecuador, I used a blog to relate stories to my friends and family scattered throughout the world. I found that it was a great way to communicate with a large number of people at once, and I avoided the impersonality of a mass email. I like blogging because I like writing, and I think that blogging is a practical way to have a written conversation.

I've just started teaching at South St. Paul Secondary School (7th grade), and I am looking forward to using blogging in my next unit. I plan to have the students do a blog role play for various novels that we will be reading. I tried to do this during my student teaching, but I met resistance. I found that students did not have the necessary technology skills to complete a blog project and that the school did not have the resources. I would have had to monopolize one of the school's two computer labs for 4 periods per day for about 2-3 weeks. Anyone who knows the reality of some schools' technology resources knows what I am talking about.

I was, however, able to complete a creative writing podcast with one of my classes. I found this to be very rewarding, motivating, and helpful. Though I haven't heard much student feedback after the project, I can report that the students were very engaged and focused when creating the podcast itself. I also used this medium during my practicum last year at Crosswinds, and I found the same results: kids get very excited by the thought of recording their own voice reading their own work. Unfortunately, I have typically used Mac computers to complete this project and I have handled most of the technical side of things (I use my computer and my podcast microphone). If I continue to teach here at SSPPS, I would like to apply for a grant to purchase these things for my classroom.

I think that digital writing can enhance communication, but I am skeptical of the notion that digital always improves communication. I think that sometimes speaking and old-fashioned pen-and-paper writing is sometimes useful in that it's familiar, and also necessary for "the real world". I am a little taken aback by how infrequently issues of access are mentioned amidst the zeal in English Education for all things digital. There are students who don't know how to use a computer, who don't have a computer at home. Also, digital writing is still a bit controversial in actual school settings because it challenges knowledge that older teachers might not have. I am interested and willing to try a variety of digitally-based projects, but I am careful to consider the caveats along the way.

In all, I look forward to this class and what it will teach me so that I can pass that knowledge on to my students and perhaps even my colleagues.

My reflection video

Here is the link for my reflection video. This is my last attempt!

My Final Presentation (Hope this works)

This is my presentation







Here is my actual unit:

Walk Two Moons Digital Literacy Unit

Overview: This unit will be for a 7th grade English class reading the book Walk Two Moons. This unit will be taught to all levels during a 4-week period. The students will read the book and they will participate in an online forum. They will blog both individually (as themselves) and in a group (as characters from the book).

Enduring Understandings: Empathy is important in human relationships. Storytelling helps us to know our identity within our families and also within our cultures.

Essential Questions: How does empathy help humans to understand one another? Why is empathy important to human relationships? Why do humans tell stories? What purposes do stories serve in our lives?

Assessment: Students will participate in an online role play in which they will take on the persona of a character in the book and then post writing on a blog as that character. Their posts will be evaluated for creativity, textual accuracy, depth, and structure (students will be forced to use appropriate language, punctuation, etc., so that this is not an exercise in IM language, see rubric)

Materials Needed:
Computers with access to Internet
Copies of Walk Two Moons
Parent Letter
Character Gmail I.D.’s
Student Gmail I.D’s
Assessment Rubric

Procedure:

Day One:
1. Discussion of Essential Questions
2. Listen to Story Corp
3. Evaluate the importance of storytelling
4. Read Walk Two Moons through Chapter 4
Day Two: Prep for Blog groups
1. Blog group assigned (groups of 3)
2. Groups come up with character profiles of 2 main characters
- Profile must include: Name, Age, Three most important character traits, names of family members, 3 important events
3. Create class character profile
4. Introduce Blog Role-Play assignment
Day Three: Computer Lab
1. Each group is assigned a character Gmail i.d.
2. Each group signs into the class Walk Two Moons Blog
3. Break out of groups, into individual bloggers; each individual student creates a gmail account
4. Each student posts a comment on the question, “What is empathy? Can you think of a time in your life when someone has empathized with you or when you have empathized with someone else?”
5. Homework: Read through chapter 8

Day Four: Computer Lab
1. Individual Post: Have you ever known a truth that you have ignored? Write about a time when you did not want to believe something even though you knew it was true.
2. Group Post: What does the lunatic want? ? Each character must say what they think the lunatic wants and why.
3. Read through chapter 15

Day Five: Computer Lab
1. Individual Post: Have you ever been given a piece of good advice? What was the advice and whom did it come from? Why was it good?
2. Group Character Blog: Who is leaving the notes for Phoebe’s family? What does the first note mean? If you think you are the note-leaver, you had better not let everyone know!
3. Weekly Wrap-up: What’s happening with the characters? What do Phoebe and Sal have in common? What are their differences?
4. Homework: Read through Chapter 20

Global Conflicts Palestine Walk Through

Overview: This post will show the reader how to play the game "Global Conflicts Palestine" based on my experience playing the game. 

Getting Started: When the game open

s, it will give you an overview of various images from Jerusalem, where the game is set. As the game will inform you, your mission will be as a journalist to write a story for a newspaper about what you see there. You will have to gather newsworthy quotes that illuminate 

the situation in Israel-Palestine for readers around the world. You will then come to a menu where you have the option to start a new game (if you've purchased the game) or to choose a single mission (if you are simply playing the free demo, as I did). After you choose a single mission, you will have to choose a player. There are back-stories on the two possible players, and I chose Hannah, the American Jewish journalist. I chose the only mission available to me at the next menu, called "Checkpoint". You choose these things by clicking on them with the mouse. After you click start, you wait for the game to load. 

Playing the Game:  After the game loads, you will find your avatar (Hannah) in a square talking to Henry Fulbright, her editor, wh

o will give her the assignment. 

You can continue the conversation with Henry by choosing the answers. In the top right hand corner of your screen, there will be a meter that shows the amount of favor the person you talking to has for you. Therefore, if you want people to like you, you should pick answers that will make them like you. Still, one has to be careful that they get the information they need (you are a journalist after all) while not alienating your sources. 

In your conversation with Henry, you will have to choose a newspaper to write for. Pay special attention to the editorial focus of your newspaper because it will dictate what type of information you will gather, what types of sources you will use, and what story you will ultimately tell. You will write the story by gathering quotes, so you need to know exactly what your goal is before you go about doing that. 

When you leave Henry, you will want to find Omri,

 who is a guard at the checkpoint. Use the map to direct you to him. Also, you move your avatar just by holding down the mouse button and mo

ving it where you want to go. 

<-- OMRI

When you find Omri, you will engage in a conversation with him. Again, the way you speak to him will dictate what he tells you and also how your relationship is with him later. You will need to have a good relationship with him, so be nice. After you finish talking to Omri, a pregnant Palestinian woman waiting in line at the check point will faint. You will then have the option to speak to her or someone named Baz. I talked to Baz first by clicking on his name. I collect some quotes from him and his son, Shakil, who will be an ally I need later. I collect quotes from everyone I talk to. If you collect more than 15, you can click on notebook at the top left of the screen to delete the ones you don't

 think you will use. After I finish talking to Baz, I talk to Fatima, the pregnant woman who fainted. She needs to get through the checkpoint. You must decide whether or not to help her. I do, and I go between her and Omri and broker a situation where she will be able to go through the checkpoint even though it is closed. Also, everything you do affects your bias, which is shown at the lower left hand portion of the screen. Depending on the editorial focus of the paper you are writing for, you will want to make sure your bias reflects that focus. So, if you were writing for the Israeli paper, your bias should be to the Israelis; if you are writing for the Palestinian newspaper, your bias should be towards the Palestinians, etc. 

After Fatima goes across the checkpoint, you can talk to Roi. Roi gives some good quotes and then asks you to do a favor. Since it is beneficial to have the favor of the checkpoint administrator, I did the favor. He tells me to see Mordechai. I check the map to find where he is and then I pick up the papers Roi needs once I find him. When I return to the checkpoint, there is an attack on the checkpoint in which 3 people end up injured. After the attack, I talk to Roi. After the ambulance comes to pick up the victims, Roi tells me to leave. Now what do I do? 

When you are left without an obvious option, you should talk to one of three people: Miriam, Leah, or Shakil. I decide to see Leah first because I know (from previous playing) that she will have some good quotes. I see her, get her quotes, and then decide to see Shakil because I have been gathering a lot of quotes from Israelis and I want to be balanced (I am writing for the European Newspaper, which has a general, balanced perspective). I take a taxi (check the map to find one) to Northern Abu Dis, which is where Shaktil told me to find him. When you do things for Shakil or Miriam, you affect your bias. When I find Shaktil, I decide which task to do for him. I decide to help him deliver papers to an Imam but not to help him deliver packages because they are from Hamas. I run to Rayhan, collect the papers, and then run to the Imam, and then return to Shakil. As always, I am collecting quotes. 

At this point, I had enough quotes to write my article. While I have yet to write a successful article, I know how to get to the point of doing it. When I want to write, I go to see Henry Fulbright again. If he sees that I have enough information, he tells me to call the office. I do this on the pay phone across the square from Henry. When I get to the writing screen, it will allow me to choose which quotes to use. 

I hope that this is a detailed walk-through and that it helps someone to play this game. Overall, I found the game to be a little tedious, much like being a reporter in Israel-Palestine must be. It took me a long time to figure out how to end the game, but when I did, I was glad. I played the game for about 3 hours; hopefully, whoever reads this won't have to play as long. 

Work Vs. Play Analysis

Results from Experiment: 

Sample Size: 3 people, aged 25-45, 2 males, one female

Work Section:

 100% Symetrical, 100% non-animated, 100% stiff, 66.7% monotone, 100% consistent volume, 66.7% less emphasis, 66.7% terse

Play Section: 

100% symetrical, 100% animated, 100% stiff posture, 100% varied tone, 100%varied volume, 100% more emphasis, 100% complex discourse

I thought that this experiment was fun and interesting. As we can see from my video, each participant clearly changed their posture once the sock puppet was introduced. As the results show, each participant became more animated, varied in their tone and volume of their speech, and more emphasizing and complex in their discourse. Suddenly the participants felt comfortable making a joke while they were wearing the sock puppet. Also, I noticed that each participant, at some point while wearing the sock puppet, sat forward towards the camera. I have no idea why they did this, but perhaps it had something to do with the performance aspect of wearing a puppet. 

While this is my first experiment using sock puppets, this is not my first experience using them in an educational capacity. I taught English in South America and I had each student make their own sock puppet which spoke only English. I had the students use these puppets to speak to each other in English. It was their favorite activity of the entire year that I taught there. The students would use their sock puppets at recess! Their parents came and told me that their kids were constantly playing with these puppets, and that these puppets only spoke English at home too. Honestly, it really worked. I think the aspect of play that it adds frees people to take risks that they wouldn't otherwise want to take. All of my subjects in this experiment changed their answers to the questions once they were wearing the sock puppet; their answers became "let's pretend", imaginative, creative, and funny. I suppose that ideally students in classrooms would always embody those characteristics in their learning. 

Rats!

It didn't work. I posted it on youtube.

emily's video

Sorry for the lax presentation. More to come, I promise. 

Work VS. Play

For some reason, I have been having trouble getting my video up on this blog. I hope it works this time. Analysis to follow. 

Play and Literacy

I thought the readings for this class were interesting in that they both get to the heart of what makes a good reader, or a good decoder of information. As educators, it seems we have defined what qualities good readers possess, but we are still up in arms as to how to instill those activities. Personally, I struggle with motivating reluctant readers/students and that is one of the reasons I am interested in this class. I was happy to read in Brock's articles about situations where students were very engaged in their activities. Both of the situations were highly reliant upon the learning community and the social dynamics of those communities. I have noticed this phenomenon in different learning tracks in middle and high school. Though I have not yet had the opportunity to teach students in the "high track" classes, I have had the opportunity to observe and speak with many high achieving students about their work. From what I have observed, the material in the high track classes is never exponentially more challenging than the material in the "regular" track classes. In fact, during my student teaching experience, the material was the same, only with tighter deadlines and heavier writing loads for the higher track kids. I was struck, though, by the types of learning communities that existed in each track. In the higher track, the kids joking generally tended to be centered upon the material being discussed and in general there was a great social importance placed upon being able to speak intelligently about the material being studied. I found this to be different from the regular track classes I taught in which I was constantly trying to get the kids to stay engaged, to stay focused on the material we were working with. I would constantly try to make the text relevant for them by having them discuss the human side (big questions) that the text was posing. In higher track classes, the students did that on their own; in fact, the difficult part was getting them to come back from their extrapolations and relate it back to the material at hand.
Obviously, community expectations are very important. In a community where "appearing intelligent" is valued, where achievement within the parameters set forth by the teacher means social acceptance, learning and teaching is easy. I suspect that this is why so many teachers want to teach "the smart kids". But if, as in my experience with "the regulars", the exact opposite of intelligence is socially valued by the community , then learning and teaching becomes infinitely more difficult. We find ourselves trying to make our activities "more engaging", which is to say, to make them something that the students can not only succeed in doing but also feel motivated to continue to do so by the response of their community or affinity group. Ideally, we would be able to create communities like the "high track" communities at all levels, and I wonder why we haven't been able to do so thus far. Perhaps games and play are the answer.

Wohlwend Article

Karen Wohlwend’s “More than a Child’s Work: Framing Teacher Discourse about Play”


I found Wohlwend’s conclusions about teacher discourse surrounding play interesting in that I often find myself wondering whether I would be “in trouble” if an administrator walked into my classroom. I identify with her findings that teachers feel the need to strike a balance between what they think administrators want to see and what they know would enhance student learning and engagement. I have a few games that I play with students that inevitable lead to loud, raucous interactions, but that also engage every student in the room. I have often wondered whether an administrator would approve of these games. That said, I know that I would also fight for the right to use these games because the students enjoy them and thus learn well from them.

I also find it interesting that the way we talk about our activities in the classroom largely defines the level of focus and seriousness we bring to those activities. For instance, as Brock mentioned in class the other day, the tenor of an activity changes when a teacher says “Let’s try to play with this” instead of “Let’s work on this”, though I’m not sure that either approach is completely useful in and of itself. For instance, when children play organized sports, they look at that as “hard work” (especially in high school), though it is ultimately play, And yet, when they come to school to do more “hard work”, the engagement that they have with their sports is often absent. Both are called work, but one seems to motivate and engage more than the other. Conversely, if something is called a “game”, students automatically perceive it as less important than “work”, but those lowered stakes do not automatically ensure the engagement of the students; in fact, the lowered stakes may just cause the students not to participate at all (because the “game” is “stupid” or for “babies”, etc.). I am interested in this line between work and play, and I believe that the language we use around it is important, but I am still not sure just how and why.

Play Observation

For this observation, I studied two young boys playing at their home in Minneapolis. These boys are two and four years old, and their names are Heath and Noel, respectively. They are brothers and they are my boyfriends' nephews. I observed them for about an hour continuously, during which time they engaged in social play and rough and tumble play. When I say that they were engaging in social play, I mean that they were playing together in a seemingly disfunctional manner that ultimately was meant to get attention from their nanny. For instance, Noel has a new toy that he received in exchange for good behavior last week. This toy is a Batman motorcycle that ejects various weapons when one presses certain buttons. Since Noel is obsessed with this toy, Heath wants nothing more than to take it away from Noel. Noel was playing with the toy on the kitchen floor and Heath ran up to Noel, and stole the toy and ran away, which of course caused Noel to chase Heath, catch him, and easily wrestle him to the ground. Predictably, this caused Heath to cry and Noel to get in trouble from his nanny, who told Noel that he needed to share the toy with his brother.
It is difficult to observe the lines between what is play and what are attention-getting strategies. In a way, their little "dance" with stealing the toys from one another and tackling/fighting each other for them seems to be social/rough and tumble play, but on other hand, one of them knows exactly how to end the play by crying out for an adult, who is always nearby.
Noel also engages in imaginative play with his Batman toy, running it around the hard wood kitchen floor while making noises with his mouth and pretending to be both the voice of Batman and the "bad guy". That is, until his brother takes the toy away from him and he gets in trouble for it. Further, Noel often stands on a chair at the kitchen counter and takes the day's junk mail and colors on it with a pen. When asked what he's doing, he says he's "paying bills", which must be a very interesting sort of mimicing "let's pretend".
Heath, because he is only 2, still engages in the attunement style play. He will still play peek-a-boo and respond to tickling, etc, from adults. Though I did notice on this visit that he is more interested in playing with his brother's things than he has been in the past, so perhaps this means he is growing out of the need for attention from adults and is beginning to seek more attention from his peers (or his brother in this case). All in all, the boys are very rough with one another, almost too rough for comfort, but they are often prevented from being so rough with one another by an adult. The boys almost never play unsupervised, as they have a nanny whose sole responsibility is to watch these two guys and parents who are very attentive.

Individualized Learning Plan

Individualized Learning Plan


1. I will work independently on this project
2. I plan to create a curriculum unit around a game, though which game I am not quite sure. I am interested in possibly looking at the curriculum I will be using for next year and seeing if I can create a unit that I will actually use. If not, I will create a unit based on something I have already taught.
3. The project will be completed by next Thursday, August 14, 2008.
4. I will need to know the curriculum for which I will be responsible next year. Also, I will need to know the level to which I intend to teach the material, though I think that I teach the same material to a variety of different levels. In that case, I will need to know what sorts of accommodations/differentiations I need to make for each different level.
5. I will complete the project on my own, so the activities will probably take place in my home and in my school (South St. Paul Middle School).

In short, I want to find a way to use play to illuminate the reading experience for my future 7th grade students. I am considering an online role-play that will allow the students to become and write as characters from one of the novels we are doing, but I’m not sure if that will work. My overall goal is to have something that I can actually use in my classroom instead of just an academic exercise.

Access and the Kaiser Foundation Report

I thought this report was useful, though not surprising. Anyone who works with adolescents and literacy knows that their definition of that word (literacy) extends much further than the definition given by previous generations. Their definition, as the report supports, not only expands the notion of navigating different and emerging types of literacy but also of navigating them simultaneously and continuously. I was also glad to see the report mention the significant access gap that exists between members of low and high SES. I have noticed this in my limited experiences with trying to incorporate media into my lessons. During my middle school practicum, I was given a cart of mac laptops which the students could use to surf the internet and do research on radio programs (which was the topic of the class). Eventually, we were able to create podcasts, which we then compiled into a class "radio show".
During my high-school student teaching, I tried to incorporate an online writing component into my first unit. When I showed this intention to my cooperating teacher, she did not laugh, b she emphatically told me to do my best, but that it would be just about impossible. At a school of 1300 students, there were perhaps 60 usable computers. Further, only 3 students (out of 86) raised their hands when I asked who had access to a computer at home. I tried not to let this lack of computer access mean a total lack of media in my classroom. Predictably, my middle-school practicum was in the suburbs and drew from a higher SES than did the high school I where I student-taught.
I think that all of these issues of access get to the heart of the question of whether or not schools are relevant, and which things they do wrong, which they do wrong. I think that schools are as relevant as they want to be; that is, when schools try to prescribe learning on a population that is resistant, and they don't give that population any incentive to accept the school's prescription, they make their presence irrelevant. However, when schools actively respond to the changing world of their student population, and thus make learning in school more closely resemble learning in life, they will continue to solidify their relevance in our society. This means that administrators and teachers need to be as tech-savvy or more so than their students. We would not allow people who did not know how to read become teachers; not knowing how to use a computer and navigate the internet is like not knowing how to read. Showing students that you know how to use technology and that you are willing to incorporate it into the learning environment not only gains their interest but also their respect. My students have often asked me if I have an ipod or a cell phone (and I hope it's not been because they were thinking about stealing it), and when I respond that I do, they are full of questions about what kind, what version, what sort of music do I listen to, have I heard of this music, or this cell phone program, and do I know how to text, etc. This is their world. I know that schmaltzy policy wonks always say that about children, but in this case I mean that because they are so much more accustomed to our media-driven world, they are more equipped to understand and manipulate it, which means that they can literally control a good deal more of our society than their parents, and sometimes do it without their parents even knowing it's going on. Again, schools (teachers and administrators) are as relevant as they want to be, and in my opinion, it should be clear that irrelevance really isn't an option.
All of this leaves me to wonder what it would take (aside from political will) to increase access not only for students but also for teachers. It seems unfair that the richest students should get the "richest" education, but it seems that old problem remains. Is it simply a question of money? Or is there a "generation gap" or "cultural gap" similar to the divisions that existed at other turbulent times in our history?

Digital Literacy Project

visual essay

the video

My Visual Essay

So, as you might be able to tell, this is my first time using imovie. I just realized that I forgot to put music on it! Ah, I am silly. Anyhow, I found this experience interesting, to say the least. I have to admit that I was somewhat intimidated by imovie, because I don't know how to use it, but really, it's just like a very simple and broader version of powerpoint. Making a movie really does get you to think about the order in which one puts the images, and the effect the images will have on my audience. I wanted to pick things that were familiar to many people of our generation, since I think that, at least in the beginning, my literacy journey seemed pretty typical. During my middle school years, however, I was exposed to some things (such as Il Postino) that many were not. I remember the special feeling that I got from these things, and how part of that came from it being "outside the mainstream". I could have included many more images; perhaps I will in my digital literacy project. I have no idea if this meets the requirements, because this is my first try, but I hope you found it visually coherent, salient, impacting and organized. I hope you like it, again, sorry there's no music, but baby steps here, next time, I promise.

OK IF YOU ARE READING THIS EARLY, PLEASE KNOW THAT I AM TRYING REALLY HARD TO GET MY VIDEO UPLOADED HERE, BUT IT'S NOT WORKING. I AM GOING TO STUDY UP ON THIS, AND HOPEFULLY IT WILL WORK BEFORE 5 PM WEDNESDAY. I REALLY HOPE SO. OK. THANKS.

Digital Writing = Thinking in a group

I really enjoyed the part of the reading that dealt with collective intelligence this week. To me, this is such an important skill, and I feel like it is very resoundingly discouraged by our school systems today. As the Jenkins article points out, schools place a heavy emphasis on each student proving that his or her work is their own and not someone else's. Since this whole idea of collaborative, community-based learning experiences is one heavily perpetuated by the U, it is something that I have thought about a lot. I wonder how we can motivate kids to participate in their groups, how we can prevent social loafing, etc. As the Jenkins article points out, kids seem perfectly able to work in collaborative "knowledge communities" when they are engaging with pop culture (i.e. video games), but they seem very eager to push work onto someone else when that work is for school. It would be interesting to see what would happen if we allowed kids to form their own knowledge communities, and if we then used those communities to teach essential skills such as critical thinking and problem-solving. I think that part of the problem, as a teacher, is knowing just what the kids will get excited about. For me, it seems strange that kids would get completely involved in Japanese culture, so much so that it would motivate these kids to actually learn the language. Not that there is anything wrong with Japanese culture, but it just doesn't jump out as a topic that would be consumingly interesting to teenagers. I'm so curious about how to make my classroom a knowledge community! I am thinking of attempting such a thing in my student teaching. One of the novels I have to teach is very centered around storytelling, and so I am thinking of using a wiki to create our own sort of "story corps".
I am hoping that the students will get really excited about maintaining the wiki and writing the stories. I don't know yet if this is technologically feasible at Como Park, but we shall see.

Also, in case you need some inspiration, here's a little slam poetry: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxsOVK4syxU

How do we assess writing?

I enjoyed the reading for this week as much as a direly sick person can. I am incredibly interested in exactly what writing I should assign for my future students and, further, how to assess that writing. It seems that the balance that one should strike as a writing teacher is the balance between feedback and assessment, which are clearly two different things. I have had writing teachers who assess (as opposed to merely evaluate) every piece of writing they recieve from students. As was predicted in the Dornan text, this encourages students to write for the teacher, and ultimately, for a grade. This can be especially detrimental with rough drafts, which, while it is important for students to work diligently on them, it is equally if not more important for the teacher to comment upon them in such a way that encourages deeper thinking.
On the other end of the spectrum, I have had teachers who only give feedback on my writing, and never grade anything. While I immediately saw these teachers as easy marks for "A's", I was also frustrated that I never knew exactly what these teachers thought of my writing. Although the feedback was copious, I knew when I was being handled with "kid gloves", I still know it, and I have resented and still do resent it as a writer. Sometimes grades, or negative constructive criticism, are the only ways to challenge students to improve as writers.
Lastly, I had one writing teacher who was able to balance feedback and assessment more adeptly than any of my other writing instructors. She had us write one piece every week and we had to include our "writer's notes" with this piece when we turned it in to her. In turn, we would email copies of our work to each of our peers, who would print off and comment on them. Class time would be spent discussing our pieces in small peer-editing groups, and by the end of class, we would each walk away with plenty of commentary from our peers, and a detailed feedback from our teacher. This class was strictly limited to fifteen students, so the teacher had time to comment on everyone's work in-depth. This in-depth feedback, although it was often BRUTAL, is what helped me to grow as a writer. She graded us on whether or not we handed things in, how well we commented on other people's work, how well we participated in peer-editing groups, whether all pieces were present in our final portfolio, and finally, an analytical writer's statement we wrote to preface our final portfolios. I knew how well was doing in the class, and yet it did not encouarage me to write solely for the teacher. In fact, her somewhat brutal feedback actually pushed me to write more for myself than for her; I became almost defiant and it was then that I truly found my voice.

I can't get my internet to work very well, and I think I just coughed up my right lung, so, here's a link from way back in Eva's class, one which you all know about, but that I'll bet you haven't checked out in a long time. You know this will help you write your units! You know it will!

www.readwritethink.org

Ah, the internet I "use" isn't coming in correctly

So, just in case this ends up being late, I would like everyone to know that it's not because of my procrastinating this assignment so much as it is my unwillingness to pay for something that I can generally get for free.
Anyhow, on to the (rather extensive) reading we did for this week. I must say that it is interesting to observe a creative writing teacher while reading these books/articles and taking this class. I think that witnessing the implentation of the 6+1 traits really colors whether I agree with the philosophy or not. On Monday, I again witnessed one of my potential cooperating teachers try to teach the first trait (Ideas) to her junior and senior creative writing class. She used overheads of pages she had copied directly out of the book, even using the writing examples that the book gives, and then instructed her students to come up with a "fascinating idea". The students, at this vague instruction, took out their cell phones and began to text. I wandered up to the teacher's desk and asked to see her lesson plan, thinking perhaps I had missed something. Her lesson plan consisted of a heading ("Monday"), and below it, three bullet points (1. Diction Worksheet, 2. Ideas Lecture, 3. Kids come up with fascinating ideas). So, my problem with the Culham text then is that it allows teachers to think that they are teaching. Even though the text does give some great ideas for lesson plans to develop these traits, the traits themselves are so unwieldy that to teach the "system" and the actual essence of the traits seems impossible, especially when you have to give kids class time to write.


Also, I was given this address today by a student who says that she uses it to help her find names and things...I'm not sure if it's a good thing, but it is interesting to see what the kids are doing these days. www.seventhsanctum.com

The Five Paragraph Essay or How I learned to stop worrying and let go of creativity

This week's reading really has me going, and although I know we will get into this pretty good in class, I will try to use this space to set up my argument. First, let me say that in general I agree that formulas and tricks and do not work for writers. I agree with this whole-heartedly, and this is why I cringe as I watch the creative writing teacher I am observing pull out and explain the 6 +1 traits. She goes so far as to have the students learn the difference between a 1,3, and 5 point paper, practice scoring the fake papers in the book, and THIS IS A CREATIVE WRITING CLASS. I can't think of anything less creative than the five paragraph essay or the 6 + 1 traits, or frankly, any other formulaic thing that teachers who don't know how to teach writing love to throw at kids and that testing companies love to assess. 

That said, I am one of those teachers. I have an idea of how to teach writing, but it only consists of how it was taught to me, and I, yes I, was taught to write using the five paragraph essay. Now, I know that it's extremely difficult to tell that I once lived inside that five-sided writer's cage especially given my seemingly God-given talent, but alas, everyone must come from somewhere. I was kidding in that last sentence, but only in part of it (Guess which part). It seems that these formulas, given their widespread use, and given the number of good writers that manage to squeak their way through, can't be all bad. Surely, they are restricting, and for those who are not good at "toeing the line" as they say, they may be debilitating. But, as the other adage goes, you have to learn the rules before you can break them. 

Therefore, maybe the answer is to teach the five paragraph essay in middle school and switch to a more sophisticated form around 10th grade? Or perhaps we just need to get the kids reading more and throw out this entire business about "teaching" writing to begin with. 

www.loft.org- this is a website for a writing center in Minneapolis called The Loft Literary Center. They offer classes for adults and for students, and this would be a great way for students to pursue their writing outside of school AND for future writing teachers to pick up some methods. 

Week One: The Writing Process

As I read the readings for this week, I found myself comparing my  own writing processes with those mentioned. I'm afraid that, although I do a great deal of writing for school, my own personal writing has suffered since I began this program. My process is now different. My writing process, which I honed while I completed my undergraduate English degree with an emphasis in writing, involves constant revision. This remains the same for academic writing as it does for more creative endeavors; I have revised the previous sentence three times already, and I have not come close to finishing this piece. For academic writing, I generally outline (or "game plan", as Dornan, et. al. refer to it) and then write. Also, for academic writing, I revise more intensely while I write in addition to after I have finished. I believe this is because I believe that the strength of my arguments is in their logical presentation: the ideas must flow directly from one another. Most of this "flow" is organized in my mind, and in case it isn't or in case I need to remind myself of where I'm going, I have the outline there for a guide. Since I have entered graduate school, this seems to be the only type of writing I have time or motivation for. Whereas I used to write quite a bit of poetry, some short stories, and even the beginnings of novels, I now usually write in response to an assignment, a question that someone has posed for me to answer. If I sound wistful about this, it is only because I feel a moral obligation to be wistful about it. In reality, writing is much easier when someone else is choosing the topics for you, when someone else has given you a set deadline and format. Even this blog assignment now feels just a little too ambiguous for my well-trained tastes. 

This causes me to wonder, then, whether Dornan, et. al, and Culham are right suggest that students should be allowed to select their own topic. If I were to receive an assignment to write about anything I choose, I would indeed spend a great deal more time thinking about such an assignment than I would if I were assigned a topic. This amount of thought is of course the point of writing in the first place, but as teachers, aren't we supposed to make writing less intimidating for the students? Surely the goal is to get students motivated and confident enough to write on their own, and to take the risks that this type of writing entails, but what about the students who need a lot of support to build this motivation and confidence? Although both texts offer a variety of possible topics for the students, they advise that the teacher not assign these topics so that the students will write for an audience beyond the teacher. This last goal is also very important if the students are to take their writing skills with them into the real world, but the question remains: how are we, as teachers, to encourage our students to write beyond the classroom while simultaneously providing them with the support they need to write at all? Is it a "stepped" thing? That is, do we first make them comfortable in the classroom and then teach them to take their writing beyond it? And if this is so, aren't the five paragraph essay written on assigned topics actually great places for intimidated writers to start? 

I'm not certain as to the answers to these questions, and I would welcome any suggestions. 

Resource Link:

www.thisibelieve.org

This series, originally taped for NPR in the fifties, has recently returned to NPR. The series consists of essays, which are basically personal mission statements. This site has audio recordings, as well as written archives, of essays that have been featured. It also has a link for teachers to lesson plans and ways to incorporate this type of writing into the classroom. Perhaps this is a way to solve the guidance/freedom conundrum I mentioned above: the students have a general topic with numerous different directions to go in.