How to Survive College: BS, BA or MRS?

Remember all your grand notions from high school…Your hopes, your dreams, your fantasies about going out and changing the world.  Gather them up…toss them out the window. Watch their colors fly as they fall…fall…fall…

SPLAT!  On the pavement below.

Attend lectures.  Take notes until your hand hurts.  Focus so hard that you forget you are not a robot sent there to take over the world if you could just understand what the socially awkward man in the white coat and nerd glasses is saying.

Struggle.

Fight. 

Fail. 

Ask for help. 

Get reminded that “this isn’t high school anymore.” Smile. Thank him for his time.

In your mind, dump the rotten-egg concoction that your lab partner made last week on his head. 

Remember that you’re not a robot.

Join a club to make friends.  Pay the new member fee and attend a few meetings. Realize these people aren’t your kind of people. Abandon club.

Go home to stay sane. Smile as you tell your family how wonderful college is.  Keep smiling as your mom pressures you about being a spinster and remind her that you are only eighteen. Go back to college.

Get a boyfriend. Learn to juggle school, work, and the new boyfriend with what you like to pretend is your social life. Break up three months later.

Start your education over a year and a half in.  Remember what you used to like to do and find a major similar to that.  Break the news to your mother…Heave a sigh as she laments how she will have to change her dreams of having a doctor in the family. Hope that she gets over it sooner rather than later.

Date the same boy for the second time. Learn to juggle school, work, and the new/ex-boyfriend with your social life. Break up three months later.

Attend lectures. Read books. Take notes until your hand hurts.  Focus so hard on the subtext that you forget that sometimes the damn curtains are just blue.  Write until you feel like all your creativity has been sucked out through your fingertips.  Excel. Brag to your mother. Wish she could forget that whole doctor thing already. Remind her that you are only twenty-one and not a spinster.

Get a boyfriend. Learn to juggle school, work, and the new boyfriend with what remains of your social life. Break up three months later.

Ditch your social life for a second major, a minor, and a promotion. Weigh your blossoming work career against the one you’ve spent four years paying for. Imagine you can combine them into one totally awesome wedding gown sewing grammatically challenged small town English teacher.

Fall in love.

Prove to your mother that you are not a spinster.  Explain that there is a natural order of events in life and grandchildren are at the end of it. Remind her that she wants you to graduate from college and get married first so you do not move back in with her for the third time and burden her with a blossoming premarital family. 

Finally...Go back to the street full of fallen colors. Reclaim what you had thought was lost forever.  Enjoy what you do.  Let it break you down so you can learn from it and mold yourself into the best teacher you can be. Gather all your knowledge and experience, hopes and dreams for the future…hold them close…toss them out before you…watch their colors fly as you let them fall…fall…fall on the heads of those who need your guidance most.

Drawing the Line

Two weeks ago, I taught a small unit on persuasive writing based around William Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily."  After learning about southern Gothic literature, reading the story, and discussing persuasive writing, I gave my students the assignment that would prove to be the bane of our lives for the next several months: A persuasive essay.

As it would turn out, the district and state assessments this year will be primarily concerned with persuasive writing.  This gave the majority of the students a concrete reason as to why they should pay attention.  Unfortunately, Halloween gave them all a very fun excuse as to why they should not pay attention at all.  It should be fairly clear as to which reasoning the students adhered...Thankfully, the day after Halloween (Coincidentally also the day that my supervisor came to observe me...Yeah, I didn't think that one through...), they were all quite tuckered out. :)  And, because they all worked so hard that day, I agreed to let them turn in their persuasive papers the following Monday...

Two weeks and a barrage of excuses later, I still have not received everyone's papers. On the one hand, it has really spread out the workload that comes along with grading 27 essays.  On the other, though, how lenient can I continue to be??  First, the late policy at my school says that a day late automatically results in 50% off.  Second, my CT informed me that regardless of my policies, the school's administration requires us to accept late work so some students will not turn in the paper until the end of the semester or even the end of the year. What??? How does that teach students responsibility and accountability? 

Finally, my own personal concern is maintaining the same objective grading state-of-mind as I am receiving a few papers each week.  Over and over again, I have heard teachers say how you don't want to be the first paper they grade because they will be incredibly tough on it.  Meanwhile, the last papers to grade get the best scores because the teacher is tired of grading at that point.  Sadly, as the semester continues to charge ahead and my students continue to drag their feet, my available time for grading papers is shrinking fast!  I am just hoping that my own assignment load does not result in students who just spit out papers getting grades that perhaps they did not earn.

KATE Conference Reflection

This year's KATE Conference was not at all what I expected...I really enjoyed it! Although I was only able to attend sporadically on both Thursday and Friday, I definitely wish I had been available to attend more of it. Everyone was very nice and, after discovering I was a WSU pre-student teacher, very supportive!

My favorite session on Thursday was really informative on how to implement graphic novels in the classroom.  The presenter was extremely thorough, which was great because I have a very limited knowledge when it comes to this genre.  However, after this session, I now have several different ways and resources to teach units that students typically find dry and boring.

The session that was the most helpful to me was the one about using children's books in the classrooms as a tool for learning literary terms. Complete with assignment sheets and examples, this session clearly detailed how to have students write children's books that included examples of literary terms. When the books were complete, the students would go read them to 2nd graders, which I think is a great way of insuring that students put a great deal of effort into their books! I am definitely planning to use this in my future classroom, especially since my students had just finished taking a test over these terms last week and the results were a bit disheartening. After attending this session, though, I feel like I have a new and very exciting way for them to not only learn, but also invest themselves in their work.

The Difference (Genre Reflection #1)

Clean, crisp hallways filled with bright colors; empty classrooms with perfectly straight desks, echoing silence. I breathe in the clean air and know that I belong here; in this place…I will make a difference.

Suddenly, the bell rings for passing period.  Chaos fills the hallways; laughing, screaming, chattering students from all walks of life. I plaster my back to the cold brick wall so I don’t get trampled while attempting to keep a welcoming smile on my face. It takes only a few seconds for boys and girls to begin trickling past me and through the door of my classroom.  They barely spare me a glance as they pass, caught up in the drama of the day. Following the last student in, I discover that the chaos of the hallway has consumed my once pristine classroom…

“Please quiet down and find your seats.”

Rambunctious and happy faces everywhere, shrinking the classroom’s available space and transforming the perfectly straight rows of desks to arches and angles…Ugh, math terms that make me shudder.  Football players practicing their dodging and weaving in the back of the room, groups of girls fixing each other’s hair, and someone’s brave falsetto was keening out a song that I thought I would recognize in a different key... 

“Sit down and be quiet, please.”

I wander through the room, breaking up the clusters of boys and girls and returning order to the aisles.  “Shhh…Have a seat, have a seat…Hush…” I murmur as I go until the crowd settles down.With a second ring of the bell, the lesson begins and a deceptively calm class turns its attention to the day’s tasks.  The bellwork and clearly written instructions on the board bring a limitless parade of questions and repeated answers that pull my attention away from the class as a whole.  The din begins to rise again…

“Quiet down, please…hush now and face the front.”

I read several chapters out of our novel next, performing to the best of my abilities and hoping that my voice is animated enough to keep their attention.  Even so, I must slowly walk the aisles to tap the sleepers, texters, and avid gossipers on the shoulders.  I count fewer taps than the day before and hope that means I am making progress.  At a critical point in the story, I pause to check their understanding.  An answer is given, which inspires a comment from another, and another and another…the contagion of the conversation, now completely off topic, quickly spreads throughout the room, accompanied by a clamor of giggles.

“Hey, quiet down, quiet down…we’re almost through…”

This snaps the class back to attention until a study guide is handed out to a chorus of moans and complaints.  Frustrated, some students throw their hands in the air; others jump up and storm the length of the room only to return to their desks once more.

“Stay in your seats…you may work quietly with your neighbor. Don’t just copy each other’s answers.”

With great reluctance, the class settles into their busy work as I patrol the room, issuing warnings with a press of my finger to my lips.  The students become aware of my pattern of movements and are sure to lower their voices as I draw near…All except a pair in the back. They are oblivious as I advance on them.  I can feel the words beginning to bubble up…If I’ve told them once, I’ve told them a million times…

“No,” the student’s voice is sharp, hands protectively grasping the study guide.  “Do your own! Miss B. said I can do this. She doesn’t want me to fail!”

The words disintegrate before they have a chance to burst from my mouth.  I feel my heart swell.   There is my difference in the world.  Even if it is just one student in the chaotic mob that floods from my classroom out into the once crisp, clean hallways. It is that one difference that makes this whole day worthwhile…and I cannot wait for tomorrow.

Blog Post #2

I am currently working on my lesson plans for my 5-7 day unit, during which I will be covering William Faulkner's classic, "A Rose for Emily."  I am very excited; this is one of my favorite short stories!

To accompany the reading and evaluate my students' understanding, I am also planning a brief persuasive essay.  The students will be expected to convince their audience of Emily's guilt or innocence by giving supporting evidence from the text.  If I feel that there is time, I may need to cover some basic MLA citations and formatting rules.  This is something I am a little worried about since I am unsure of how familiar they are with citing.  I feel like this is something that can get extremely confusing, so I'm looking for a very simple overview of MLA that will cover the necessary basics. 

In my searching, though, I found a neat little website: http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/interactives/storymap/index.html, which allows students to do story mapping online, then print out all of their notes. Depending on the story, or the topic covered that day, students can do up to 4 different story maps. Each one comes with prompts and the whole thing is just more interactive than a worksheet, which is becoming more and more necessary for effective teaching nowadays.  I do think that it may be much too elementary for some classes, though. 

On a side note, my pre-student teaching is going fairly well.  My goal of late seems to be to eliminate the cheating that half of the class partakes in whenever they get handed a worksheet.  I've had several discussions with students about the value of doing their own work.  It is difficult to tell sometimes if I've actually made an impact when I discuss the ramifications of cheating with them, though.  Usually, it is clear once the next worksheet is handed out...

Blog Post #1

I am currently in the process of attempting to narrow down the topic for my impending three-day lesson plan.  As juniors in high school, they are in American English and lack the time to cover any Shakespeare around the items dictated by the English 3 Pacing Guide.  Thus, my CT and I have been throwing around a handful of different ideas...The Great Gatsby, a short story unit that would include classics such as "The Jilting of Granny Weatherall" and "A Rose for Emily," or a grammar unit that would involve writing a short paper.

As one may have gathered from my previous posting, the students lack strong writing and grammar skills.  My worry with that, however, is developing a lesson that is in-depth enough to last three days but not so complicated that it will leave them in the dust.  For this class it also needs to be EXTREMELY relatable to their everyday lives in order to keep their focus.

My current idea involves deeper thinking questions such as:
1. What does it mean to be a voice of modern culture?
2. What are the most influential voices in American culture?
3. What makes these voices so influential?

The students would write on each of these questions for 5 minutes or so and then discuss them as a class.  These questions would of course need to tie into the literature they should read, which I would love to be very recent pieces instead of something they would consider old and out of date. Suggestions for such pieces would be greatly appreciated!

The lesson would then be completed with a brief writing assignment of some kind.  I am uneasy about having them write a paper because, even though it is definitely a skill they need to have developed before college, it is not something they would take to.  In other words, many of the papers they would turn in would lack in effort.  It is something I will certainly have to give more thought to.

Stardate -311644.8

As my first week of pre-student teaching comes to a close, I find myself wondering about the current state of English classrooms across the city, state, and ultimately the country. Let me explain...
I walked into my Junior English classroom to see the basics of writing complete sentences on the board:

1. Begins with a capital letter.
2. Ends with punctuation.
3. Has a subject.

From my understanding, these were more than helpful reminders.  For some of these students, this was new information that needed in-depth explanations.  Perhaps I should not have been so taken-aback, but I did feel that as Juniors in high school (just 1 year from graduating and moving on to higher education), they should already have a solid understanding of the basics of sentence writing.  Didn't I have a firm grasp of this knowledge upon entering junior high?? 

That is not to say, however, that they did not have proficiency in other areas.  For example, I learned that the majority of the class has a great talent for writing poetry! They had been working on Langston Hughes' "Theme for English B" and writing their own personal variation of the poem.  Many of the students took to this with the same enthusiasm as they would when asked to write in a journal as their poem became an outlet for some of the frustrations in their life.  This can potentially provide myself and their teacher with great insight into their daily lives.

However, I still find their lack of knowledge in writing simple sentences concerning and cannot help but wonder what is being taught in English classrooms that is taking the place of this most basic and necessary skill.  As such, I intend to make writing a focal point for some of my future lessons. Therefore, my goal this semester is to pay close attention to those most basic skills needed for success that my students may be lacking and assist them in developing them.

Everyone knows that good intentions can often go awry, though, and I am worried about the students recognizing the simplicity of such lessons and viewing them as an insult.  Thus, how do I teach secondary English students the same lessons as their elementary counterparts?

"Each day is a gift; untie the ribbon and look inside."

First day of Pre-Student Teaching is finished and I have a great group of kids!