Poetry Group

One of my favorite aspects of our presentation is that we had a lot of different ways of writing poetry. Most of us choose a poem structure that was less intimidating for students. When introducing poetry, i believe as a teacher, your main goal is to keep it simple to gain appreciation and motivation.
The first poem I believe would be great to create empathy from different perspectives. The I am poem describes a person and their experiences. I believe that it is very important for students to learn about different cultures and different experiences and then express them in their own words. One more important thing to learn about the I am poem, is that it would be a great example to use in a multi genre piece. You can use a person in history and write their perspective on a certain event in history.

The second poem the Found Poem, is a great way to increase creativity and brainstorming for poetry. It is a very fun exercise for students to cut and paste and socialize. It is interesting to see how students use this poetry to create some really amazing interpretations. This poem can also increase their personal vocabulary, as well as, their own personal diction.

The third poem was the Confession Poem. This would be great to interpret characters in a different way, other than writing an essay or report. At the same time, the students are allowed to interact with characters by getting inside their heads and creating a confession that would make the rest of the class recognize each character through their personality. This is also fun and entertaining, and it does allow a lot of room for empathy and creativity among different perspectives.
The fourth and final poem is a little more complicated and involves a lot more time and work. There is a process to complete a memory map and list poem. However, this kind of poem is a great example of how brainstorming can be used to produce amazing poetry. The most important part of the list poem is recreating places, events, and feelings using words and pictures. It is truly beneficial to use personal experiences to write poetry, because that is what students already know and understand.

As a teacher I would love to use all forms of poetry, because you can use all of them to achieve a lesson in any type of classroom. My personal philosophy is centered around empathy and learning through multiple perspectives. Each poem leaves room for creativity and actual facts. In my opinion each poem is great to get students energized about poetry and they also held reduce any anxiety centered around poetry.

Group Teach #2

I enjoyed this goups hard work and well represented team work. The first day was good and there was good class discussion. I think it resembled how our class has been going this semester. It was comfortable for us as a class to interact and responed in that way. However, I think the discussion did get a little off topic, and it is hard for me to remember what we did on that first day. But, I do remember leaving the class feeling like there was a well rounded discussion that was very informative.

The second day was my favorite. I really enjoyed the simulation. At first, i will admit I did not like it, because I had no idea what was going on. But, after some time I realized that was the point. I remember looking at my Police Officer and asking if we can go to the bank to get a building permit, and she said no and looked the other way. After five minutes of asking she said, " why? You are just going to rob the bank anyway." I was like what the-- Anyway, a couple more minutes went by and she finally allowed me to go get a permit, however when we got in line I was sent to jail by the sherriff, for no reason at all. This kind of beahvior towards my group got real frustrating and soon we just sat there. We just sat there because we could not successfully accomplish any of our goals.

After the similation was over, we all discussed the groups we were in. I felt this excercise would be great to used with college students but not high school students. The only way I would use this in a High School classroom is if I changed the groups to fit groups of people in my lesson. For example, Native Americans, French, and the British. It would be more "Safe" to use fictional or old unrelated groups to stop any kind of offensive behavior. Because kids can be so mean.

I think and activity like this needs to be administered with care, especially the talk after. It is really important for people to realize stereotypes and empathize with different cultures. However, many things that can be said, can be siad in a offensive way when they really weren't mean to be taken that way. All in all, this activity could work in my class someday, but i would prefer to change the groups from modern social and racial stereotypes to more of a historical empathy lesson.

Reflection on Group 1

I really enjoyed this groups presentation. I guess I could say I am more thankful than anything. I am taking my pre internship classes this semester. I have LS 3010 with Dr. Allison Baer, and in this class we are asked to explore multiple ways of presenting literature. One of her projects she has us do is building a multi genre peice on anything. After listening to her explanation I thought I understood what I was supposed to do, however, when I started the piece I was lost. As a result, coming to class and learning about multi genre pieces specifically helped to clarify most of the fogginess of the project.

I thought the group was impressively prepared. They came almost over prepared in case some tasks ran over on time, but there was always something for us to do. The groups gave examples and many prompts and materials to start a creative brain storm. Coinciding with thier prepardness and their organization, I learned a lot about multi genre projects.

Linda Christensen questions


1.) What were a few obstacles you encountered your first years of teaching, that you wish someone would have told you?

2.) can you talk about some of the methods you used in your book, on how to develop a class community?

3.) How do you correct some social injustices within your class?

"Untracking English"
Christensen Chapter #8

"Many students who come from remedial or regular classes are bright. But the abilities they bring to class often go unrecognized because they aren't the skills traditional education has prized: reading and writing" (171).
No truer words have been spoken. When I read this chapter I had to stop and say "WOW" when I read that, because I saw an example of this in real life just a couple weeks ago during my Pre Internship. I have been continusously blown away by this 6th grade boy in the English class. The topic of this quarter is "Loss", so the class was reading a short novel by Ralph Fletcher, dealing with loss. My mentor teacher asked the kids to take a piece of contrution paper and divide the back into three sections," National, local, and personal loss" then he had then list different kinds of loss. Then he had them flip over the paper and draw a picture representing loss. As I walked around the classroom peering over these kids shoulders I saw pictures of soldiers in Iraq, the tornado that hit Tennessee, and the school shooting at NWU. But, when I peered over this one boys shoulder I saw a beautiful displays of colors of mutliple designs within a circle, it was beautiful. I sat down next to him, and I asked, " what does this picture represent?" The boy looked at me and said, "This is how I felt when my brother died." I wanted to tear up right there, because I saw it. I saw the craziness of his mind when he found out, and every color had a different emotion that he felt. It was amazing!
If this boy had had a different teacher, and I am sure has had the traditional teacher and always will, I am not so positive that that drawing, that meant so much to him, would be accepted as a peice of literature. Or how many teachers would ask about it, rather than handing it back and scorned him for doodling instead of drawing the assignment. He is an amazing thinker and he is very intelligent becasue he thinks so abstractly, but how many schools, how many teachers notice or take the time to notice the potential of a non traditional form of intelligentce. My teacher and I had a great discussion about allowing students the oppurtunity to find thier own individual ways of learning and expression of learning. This had to be one of my favorite and most influencial moments as an intern and for a future teacher.

"So What's Your Story"
Gilmore Chapter #7

I like the way Gilmore expresses the differences in creative writing and research writing. They are like two different countries: the United States and China. Both are countries but both have their differences on how the country is ran and the government and economies are developed. This analogy is good for research writing and creative writing. Both are forms of literature, but how they are developed and the criteria for both are completly different.
I am definitly a better creative writer than I am a research writier, which sucks because I am a history major and all I do is write research papers. But, I actually enjoy writing creativly and I love researching, but I do not like writing about the research to the way WMU history department wants me to.
I don't know if i had mentioned this before, but my mentor teacher's teaching philosophy is amazing when it comes to reading and writing, and it compares to Gilmore's very nicely. Gilmore says that we had better make writing fun because, in turn, it will make students better at reading and writing. My mentor teacher explained to me that the hardest part for teachers when reading a book for class, is to keep the students engaged until the climax, because once they reach the climax of the book they are hooked and most likely will be motivated to read. However, he said if in your cirriculum there is a book to read and you find it boring and think it will not fit your class, DO NOT HAVE THEM READ IT! He said once you force them to read or write something that is boring, you kill reading and writing.

"You're Just My Type"
Gilmore Chapter #6

Yes, this chapter is a great chapter to allow me to vent! I like technology. I think it makes life and jobs a lot easier, to a certain extent. However, I definitely get frustrated with technology almost every single day. Gilmore had brought up some good points in his arguement for pro technology. How technology is used in classrooms is almost a bitter sweet experience. It provides a student multiple ways of learning, and is easier on the teacher to make different teaching methods easier and more fun for the students. Sometimes, however, technology fails and becomes more frustrating then easier and conducive to learning.
My mom is a 4th grade english teacher at Olivet Middle School. She has been teaching for 31 years and have one teacher of the year multiple times. BUT, the woman knows nothing about technology! She is great with students, classroom management, ect... but when it comes to technology she is lost. She tries to learn more about it, because it is her job requirement. She repeatedly keeps telling me that the more experience with technology I get, will be better, because education is headed down a technological advanced classrooms. EW!
I and the schools have to remember not every student has access to a computer at home or have a way to make it to the library to use a computer. As a teacher I have to realize the frustration that comes with assigning computer assignments. One more comment on having students send me thier papers via email... OH NO! I hate recieving emails, and I hate sending them. Unless the student is absent I think it is an aweful idea to send a paper through email... That is something I will not change... you loose the individual interaction and connection if your cirriculum is based around technology!