Thurs 10-12 ELL/Chicken Noodle Soup Session
Can we talk about the fact that every little kid I have talked to in the past few weeks has a favorite song and it is "Chicken Noodle Soup"....I have got to know it before I go into the schools. It is all about communication.
We had a session with a woman, who presented on students who learn English is addition to their first language (EAL). Many of the strategies that she spoke about can be taken and used, if I am working with an ELL student. I thought that it was really interesting when she talked about decoding, and displayed the question "Where is our school?" in three different languages, Danish, French, and two Asian languages I believe.....actually have no clue......It made it easier to understand the struggles that ELL kids go through. Ripley's Believe or Not: The Los Angeles Unified School District ELL learners make up 40% of the district's total number of students
Wed 10-11 El segundo día de Yukish
This was our second and final day of Joe Yukish. We actually put into practice some of the strategies that he taught us about yesterday. We read a famous children's book called "Quack, Quack, Quack" by Joy Cowley. We watched Joe teach it to a little girl in South Carolina. Something that was very interesting to me was how the attitude of the girl changed before she read the book, till she was done with the book. She was happy but then became very annoyed with herself. Joe's insight into how to make her deal with her "word-skipping" technique helped not only with her understand of meaning and structure, but also with her attitude.
Tues 10-10 uno dia de Yukish
Today, we had Joe Yukish, a senior advisor for Teachers College Reading & Writing Project. He has taught reading for over 30 years. We talked about leveled reading for a while during this session. He showed us ways to recognize the differences between levels and if the children were at a certain level. He also gave us guided reading worksheets to help us work with kids at each level. He showed us how to calculate their proficiency to determine what they should reading on their own, and which leveled books, we should be reading with them. I have learned more practical information in one day of this class, than in most of my other graduate classes. This reading knowledge that Joe is conveying is going to be helpful in the Reading Buddies program, but other activities that I am involved in as well.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Thursday, October 05, 2006
Thursday Session with Lisa Blackwell
She was a good speaker, who talked about the psychology of how and what a child experiences, when they learn. My learning experience is very far removed from what many of these kids must struggle through on day-to-day basis. I have to humble myself each day that I walk into the schools to work with the "struggling" kids. Dr. Blackwell also talked about her work with middle school children and how by that time, most of the students, who are having trouble in academics, believe that they lack the ability. I remember when I was in middle school. I knew many of the kids that I was around still "got it" but they were so stigmatized as being "special ed" and not as "smart" that they hardly had any chances to display their abilities. She also pointed out that all people, even adults, have a hard time feeling comfortable about taking on a challenging learning experience. I know that this was the situation with my own foreign language experience. I avoided and still do at any cost. I was fortunate to have enriching learning experiences early in my life, so that I was aware of the ability to learn that I had inside of me. One of my goals as a Reading Buddy is to be the provider of an enriching learning experience to each of the 5 kids that I work with.
Wednesday Session on Reading w/ Dr. Arno
Dr. Arno talked about many reading strategies that will help us to pinpoint, where the student is having difficulty with their reading. She pointed that it may not be able to fix what the child is having trouble with in a semester, but can definitely learn to identify. I am resting a little easier knowing that. We learned quite a lot about phonological awareness. I had so much fun with "sh" and "ch" stories. I learn children may be able to decode what the words are and say the sentence, but have no comprehension of what the stuff means. Even though I don't remember how I learned phonics, I must have a hard time going from the digraph "ch" to the trigraph "tch". I also benefit in bringing in objects to help the students remember what real life object looks like for their words. I have a lot of stuff to review this weekend, but, unlike many of my courses here at TC, I see the practical real life application of my learning right in front of me.
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Reflections from the Start of RB Training
Since I missed training dates of September 27th, 28th, 29th and October 3rd, what I will reflect on for those dates is what I get from reading the other Reading Buddies' blogs. There are links to each on the right.
September 26th
I have so much to say, like always, but this Reading Buddies training is teaching me to think of learning as "teaching as listening, learning as telling" as opposed to"teaching as telling, learning as listening." I read this quote about student-centered pedagogy in a book by Nancy Jennings called Interpreting Policy in Real Classrooms that I read for Tom Sobol's class Curriculum. http://academic.bowdoin.edu/faculty/N/njenning/
September 27th
I know that I learned through phonics. I guess I find phonics to be very logical and that is what I am good at. Reflecting on that, there are many different types of learning styles and I have to be mindful, not to think that everybody learns the way I learn. People also seem to learn about other people by introducing each other. I wish that I had been there for that. I am just getting to know people. I feel a little shut out. This might be a similar feeling to what a new student feels, who is struggling to read. He/she may feel shut out of the discussion. We have to put ourselves into the "shoes" of the students that we work with. I saw that one person made a very good point on their blog about making reading meaningful to each child individually. I just also found out that there is a girl, Becky, in the Reading Buddy group that is in Educational Leadership. http://www.beckyreadingbuddy.blogspot.com. Maybe she will know the answer to my question. How can we exhibit strategic leadership of the type of learning that goes on in the classroom, if we have no idea of how learning happens on a daily basis within schools? I am starting to "get it", so I think I will go back and read Shark Attack to see how rich with content it is.
September 28th
Dr. Rosa http://www.tc.columbia.edu/news/article.htm?id=2460&tid=dr494 and Dr. Peverlyhttp://www.tc.columbia.edu/faculty/index.htm?facid=stp4 talked about reading and working in a culturally diverse setting and how your presence comes across to these kids. Many of the teachers in our urban schools, who are having difficulty, probably don't do this. I also found out that I am not an "outcast" in the sense that I am not the only one in the group, who does not have teaching experience. http://eduequity.blogspot.com/ It seems like these professors also stressed that we need to look at our views and attitudes and recognize how they shape our actions and our words.
September 29th
Many people seem to feel like this workshop on child abuse was hard, tough for them to process. Maybe it is that I grew up with a father, who was a psychiatrist, and a mother, who was a nurse and social worker, that I find this stuff easy to deal with and talk through. Personally, I think a root cause of this is that American society is too sexually repressive in the public domain. My own experience is that child/sexual abuse can have some of the most harmful and long-lasting effects on a person's mental health. I read in another person's blog that this presenter may have came with a biases of "good" children are. http://biancasbloggin.blogspot.com/ The presenter also seem to have stereotyped how "certain" people raise their children the "wrong" way. Actually, I just looked at a few more blogs and there seems to be a misunderstanding on some of what the speaker said. The speaker, Marceline Watler, works at ACS. http://www.nyc.gov/html/acs/html/home/home.shtml
October 3rd
They went over more on how to present a book to a child. I need to start checking out children's books from the library. I think I am going to catch up by going over what I missed with an I like Detian. http://dwreadingbuddyjournal.blogspot.com/
September 26th
I have so much to say, like always, but this Reading Buddies training is teaching me to think of learning as "teaching as listening, learning as telling" as opposed to"teaching as telling, learning as listening." I read this quote about student-centered pedagogy in a book by Nancy Jennings called Interpreting Policy in Real Classrooms that I read for Tom Sobol's class Curriculum. http://academic.bowdoin.edu/faculty/N/njenning/
September 27th
I know that I learned through phonics. I guess I find phonics to be very logical and that is what I am good at. Reflecting on that, there are many different types of learning styles and I have to be mindful, not to think that everybody learns the way I learn. People also seem to learn about other people by introducing each other. I wish that I had been there for that. I am just getting to know people. I feel a little shut out. This might be a similar feeling to what a new student feels, who is struggling to read. He/she may feel shut out of the discussion. We have to put ourselves into the "shoes" of the students that we work with. I saw that one person made a very good point on their blog about making reading meaningful to each child individually. I just also found out that there is a girl, Becky, in the Reading Buddy group that is in Educational Leadership. http://www.beckyreadingbuddy.blogspot.com. Maybe she will know the answer to my question. How can we exhibit strategic leadership of the type of learning that goes on in the classroom, if we have no idea of how learning happens on a daily basis within schools? I am starting to "get it", so I think I will go back and read Shark Attack to see how rich with content it is.
September 28th
Dr. Rosa http://www.tc.columbia.edu/news/article.htm?id=2460&tid=dr494 and Dr. Peverlyhttp://www.tc.columbia.edu/faculty/index.htm?facid=stp4 talked about reading and working in a culturally diverse setting and how your presence comes across to these kids. Many of the teachers in our urban schools, who are having difficulty, probably don't do this. I also found out that I am not an "outcast" in the sense that I am not the only one in the group, who does not have teaching experience. http://eduequity.blogspot.com/ It seems like these professors also stressed that we need to look at our views and attitudes and recognize how they shape our actions and our words.
September 29th
Many people seem to feel like this workshop on child abuse was hard, tough for them to process. Maybe it is that I grew up with a father, who was a psychiatrist, and a mother, who was a nurse and social worker, that I find this stuff easy to deal with and talk through. Personally, I think a root cause of this is that American society is too sexually repressive in the public domain. My own experience is that child/sexual abuse can have some of the most harmful and long-lasting effects on a person's mental health. I read in another person's blog that this presenter may have came with a biases of "good" children are. http://biancasbloggin.blogspot.com/ The presenter also seem to have stereotyped how "certain" people raise their children the "wrong" way. Actually, I just looked at a few more blogs and there seems to be a misunderstanding on some of what the speaker said. The speaker, Marceline Watler, works at ACS. http://www.nyc.gov/html/acs/html/home/home.shtml
October 3rd
They went over more on how to present a book to a child. I need to start checking out children's books from the library. I think I am going to catch up by going over what I missed with an I like Detian. http://dwreadingbuddyjournal.blogspot.com/
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