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?