Reaction to class on 4-7-09

I always love learning tips for writing. Last week, Aaron (Chuck? Charlie?) gave an interesting presentation on using various writing skills. I enjoyed it because I had given a presentation the week before on pre-writing skills, and I got to use that information again when Aaron gave his presentation. It was kind of nice to hear a different take on that same stuff.

After he presented, we got some questions answered about the research we're supposed to be conducting for our observations. What we decided we might want to find out (which is subject to change) is whether or not a student's country of origin affects his or her writing output. We noticed that many students write MUCH more than their classmates, so we want to find out why.

Reaction to class on 4-1-09

My presentation went well. I'm going to try a different tack this week, I'm going to post my verbatim comments from Esther on here for everyone.

Nice start about asking whom among your classmates have taught writing.
It might have been good to show your classmates your agenda before starting. It might be good to have a visual scaffold.
Nice activity to break your classmates into groups according to writing strategies. Nice to give your classmates a time limit to partner up and to finish the activity.
Good that you go around monitoring your classmates’ work. It would be good to have a time reminder, and you just did that. Interesting activity. Good job.

I was a little nervous before I started presenting. Last semester, Veronika and I worried greatly about each slide in our gigantic powerpoint presentation, and we labored to cram as much information into our 30 minutes as we could.

I promised myself I wouldn't bore the class with powerpoint lecturing, and I decided to let everybody talk and share with everybody else their ideas on how to incorporate the ideas presented in the book with a curriculum. For the most part, a lot of positive feedback was received, and except for Adib's skanky picture, most of them were ideas I would use in my own class.

Readings for 4-6-09

Jeez, is it already a week into April?

Like Jodi, I was struck by the idea of having students create photo illustrated essays. The students bring in some photos from home. Then, they organize them into an order that can be used to tell a story. They glue them down or mount them onto something, and then they share the story with the class. After sharing orally, they write the story they want to tell.

The reason I like this activity is because it's one of the requirements of the Photography merit badge and I have quite a bit of experience in using it. It also employs a very good pre-writing technique, and shows students a very good way to organize their thoughts .

Reaction to class on 3-30-09

Urban Dictionary defines an Asshat as "one who is oblivious to the world around them, lacking common sense". That's what I felt like when I showed up two weeks ago and didn't have a presentation ready. I wrote down the wrong date in my binder, never bothering to double check it against the syllabus.
I did, however, learn how an effective teacher can improvise a "plan b" when something doesn't go as planned. Esther didn't miss a beat and she gathered all the students together for a roundtable discussion on how to get students excited about reading, and what sorts of troubles and issues they can and will run into while learning to read. The discussion was lively and educational as well, and I'm glad I got to hear what everybody had to say about reading.

Readings for the last week of March

I love writing. I don't often think that I'm an amazing writer, but I do often feel as though I'm a proficient writer at the very least. Because of this, I was especially interested in this week's subject of writing.
In the P&B book, there are several different techniques which can be used with beginning to intermediate writers to teach the writing process and the organization of thoughts. Being the amazingly ADHD person that I am, I really enjoyed how the different techniques were presented. It was almost like a list, and very easy to follow.
I remember back in middle school and using the idea of clustering to come up with ideas. Maybe I could use this in my presentation tonight? Even though I had used clustering, I had never heard of mapping being used the way it is in this book. I REALLY like the idea of having a prompt in the middle, and then clustering the ideas around it. Even thought I'm a kinesthetic learner, it always helps to see the ideas on paper before me. It helps keep me focused, and the mapping and clustering techniques are chaotic enough to appeal to my nature, and they're organized enough to keep me focused on the task at hand and help me come up with better, more coherent writings.

Readings for March 23rd

I've never been able to read as fluently in my L2 as I can in English, and I've always been very envious of those who can. It was always a little bit of a sore-spot seeing my fellow students read and understand fluidly while I struggled to keep up.
Like Thea, I have trouble stopping and deciphering every word. I read in an ESL textbook that it's best to reread as many times as it takes to get the "gist" of the meaning instead of deciphering every word. It's IMPOSSIBLE to keep up with that much input and still figure out what you're reading about.

Last week

Class was interesting tonight. I really liked how Mariya led a half-hour discussion with two questions, something which I could not accomplish. I suppose if I had to, I could fudge it, but I need more than that to take a half hour. I don't have the focus. :-)

I don't know if I would want to correct students as they made errors, because I think the hardest thing would be staying consistent. I think I would give up after a while, but it would make students rely on me too much, and if I stopped correcting them, they would have a very hard time discerning whether or not they had stopped making mistakes, or if I had merely stopped correcting them.

Comment to Jodi

Jodi - I can't comment on your blog for some reason, so here's the comment I left:
Aaaahahahaha, I love the joke. What about having the students write their own jokes? That may be more useful (or usefuler) for advanced students, but still pretty great.

That one reading for that one week

I think one of the worst exercises for teaching an l2 is having the students read a pre-written script to each other. I've always known that stronger connections are made if students are made to think in the l2 "on the fly" rather than reading a prescribed piece. As long as it was written in English characters, I could READ anything handed to me. I would probably learn nothing, but I could form the letters together to make noise that sounded like words. I would much rather be placed on the spot to form a conversational phrase than anything else, and I feel that would be much more efective at cementing knowledge than prescribing a script.

Class from Febtober ninth

I love words. I've always loved words. When I was young, I would often speak in spoonerisms, much to the annoyance of my poor mother and teachers. I used to read books on secret codes and how to speak in Pig Latin and other pseudo-languages because I loved words. Naturally, last week's presentation by Rachel and Officer Stephanie really reached out to me. I was partnered with Lillian, and between the two of us we learned some new words and puzzled out the meanings of others. I was inspired to go home after class and google "Top Ten weirdest words" and see what I could find. I found a list with the words they used with the class, along with some choice other words. Click here to see that list.

You're sleeping on the couch tonight!

Even though we are all in school to become teachers, this program teaches us much more than simply methods of education. There are always delicious little snippets of information which can be used in our daily lives. MCM, for examples, tells us that most days, we listen roughly twice as much as we speak, and almost five times as much as we write! Interestingly enough, this could be potent fodder for fights with that special someone. Take the following dialogue as an example:

Wife: I told you last week we were going to spend today finding out how many shoes I have that match my purses! You never listen! I hate you! You're sleeping on the couch!

Husband: Well, my beautiful wife, according to Marianne Celce-Murcia, we listen TWICE as much as we speak. Why, today alone I've engaged in bi-directional listening 17 times, and autodirectional listening this morning when I was asking myself what I wanted for breakfast! I listen to you five times more than I write to you! Doesn't that count for anything?

Wife: I'm sorry, you're so brilliant and handsome. I love you.

See what happened there? I totally defused a potentially hostile situation just by using information I acquired during my education.

There were a few questions I had during the reading though. Is reading considered unidirectional or autodirectional? Is autodirectional listening considered a constant? As in, am I CONSTANTLY engaged in autodirectional listening, and can I be engaged in bidirectional listening (or a conversation) and autodirectional listening simultaneously? Or do we switch from one to the other? I will have to watch for this.

Time + Distance

Time + Distance

LISTEN

by Leslie Monsour
The tea you pour is black and strong.
It doesn't taste like tea to me;
I must have been away too long.

It isn't jasmine, spice, oolong;
It tastes like an apology—
This tea you pour, so black and strong.

Where's that old fork with the bent prong?
What happened to the hemlock tree?
Have I really been gone that long?

I think I hear the saddest song;
It has no words, no tune, no key.
The tea you pour is black and strong.

You're careful to say nothing wrong,
You seem too eager to agree...
Yes, I've been travelling far and long,

And now it's clear, I don't belong.
I watch you sash your robe, as we
sit, sipping tea that's black and strong.
I went away too far, too long.

Don't "Hey Smidt" me!

What a discussion. Apparently I'm a strange breed, being a native speaker who corrects without mercy. Most of my friends know that when they're around me, they need to watch their grammar and colloquialisms, since I would rather be taken out behind Morris Hall and beaten senseless with a Brook Trout than be caught using bad grammar.

One other thing I enjoyed discussing was how teachers are addressed in different cultures. Esther made a comment that she doesn't mind being called "Dr Smidt" or "Esther" but being called "Smidt" really gets her blood a'boilin'. The biggest comment which stood out to me from class was her saying "You can call me Esther, but don't 'Hey Smidt ME!' "

I also felt moderately smart because I referenced a conversation that Bekir and I had early last semester about personal boundaries. In Turkey (his home country) it's considered VERY offensive to step back when one enters your personal space. I think I would die in such a context. I like having my space, and I can't bear for casual acquaintances or strangers to enter it.

Readings for week whatever

I really enjoyed how Chapter 22 of HDB was laid out. I'm a kinæsthetic learner, so reading material never really quite does it for me, but when forced, I can process the material if there are a variety of formats which I can follow, and chapter 22 with its charts and illustrations helped me with that process. It helps to remind me to keep my students interested in whatever we're learning about, and to not just spit a bunch of text at them. Similar to Jodi, I also enjoyed the sample exercise 1 which suggests using reala to teach posession. I also find some things difficult to teach with ink and paper, and using reala would hit the spot in such a context.

Poem for 2-4-09

Of The Terrible Doubt Of Appearances

LISTEN To this poem

by Walt Whitman

Of the terrible doubt of appearances,
Of the uncertainty after all, that we may be deluded,
That may-be reliance and hope are but speculations after all,
That may-be identity beyond the grave is a beautiful fable
only,
May-be the things I perceive, the animals, plants, men, hills,
shining and flowing waters,
The skies of day and night, colors, densities, forms, may-be
these are (as doubtless they are) only apparitions, and
the real something has yet to be known,
(How often they dart out of themselves as if to confound me
and mock me!
How often I think neither I know, nor any man knows,
aught of them,)
May-be seeming to me what they are (as doubtless they
indeed but seem) as from my present point of view, and
might prove (as of course they would) nought of what
they appear, or nought anyhow, from entirely changed
points of view;
To me these and the like of these are curiously answer'd by
my lovers, my dear friends,
When he whom I love travels with me or sits a long while
holding me by the hand,
When the subtle air, the impalpable, the sense that words and
reason hold not, surround us and pervade us,
Then I am charged with untold and untellable wisdom, I am
silent, I require nothing further,
I cannot answer the question of appearances or that of
identity beyond the grave,
But I walk or sit indifferent, I am satisfied,
He ahold of my hand has completely satisfied me.

Poem for 2-3-09

I Heard You Solemn-Sweet Pipes of the Organ

by Walt Whitman

LISTEN

I heard you solemn-sweet pipes of the organ as last Sunday
morn I pass'd the church,
Winds of autumn, as I walk'd the woods at dusk I heard your
long-stretch'd sighs up above so mournful,
I heard the perfect Italian tenor singing at the opera, I heard
the soprano in the midst of the quartet singing;
Heart of my love! you too I heard murmuring low through
one of the wrists around my head,
Heard the pulse of you when all was still ringing little bells
last night under my ear.

Reaction to class on 2-2-09

One thing that will always stick with me from tonight is Esther's wedding story, and how well it contrasts with traditional American wedding values. She was telling us about her matron of honor, and what she went through to get her to be in that position. Her fiancee at the time was dumbstruck by the fact that she was not going to ask her friend to be her matron of honor because her friend simply knew. She knew it would not be an issue. Had she asked, her friend may have been offended because their bonds of friendship did not allow for assumed knowledge like this.
Such discussions really open my eyes to subtle cultural differences like this, and really make me want to be a better teacher and understand the different contexts my students are coming from.

Poem for February 2, 2009

'Faith' is a fine invention...

by Emily Dickinson

I like a look of Agony...

by Emily Dickinson

"Faith" is a fine invention...

"Faith" is a fine invention
When Gentleman can see—
But Microscopes are prudent
In an Emergency.

I like a look of Agony...

I like a look of Agony,
Because I know it's true—
Men do not sham Convulsion,
Nor simulate, a Throe—

The Eyes glaze once—and that is Death—
Impossible to feign
The Beads upon the Forehead
By homely Anguish strung.

A rolling stone...

When looking back at last semester, it's very apparent that I saw school differently at each end of the semester. At the beginning, I was about an inch away from clawing my face off with the anticipation of how much work needed to be done. By the end, I managed the work much more efficiently and I was a LOT less stressed. It seemed that the more work I did, the easier the work became. One could make the metaphor that I was pushing a giant stone, and once I got to the end of the semester, the momentum seemed to carry me through. Now I have to start all over, since the stone came to a standstill and filled itself with beer and holiday cookies over the last few months.

It was nice getting back to class and seeing presentations again. Last semester, class was my oasis. I loved and still love going to class. Oftentimes, my classmates will remark that I seem to be in an exceptionally good mood ALL THE DAMN TIME. It's not that I'm in a good mood all the time, it's just that going to class PUTS me in a good mood. It's hard to miss the fact that sometimes I'm squirrely in class and it often appears that I'm completely unaware of the task at hand, but nothing could be further from the truth. Through the hardships of advanced academia come very tight-knit friendships which are very hard to break. I feel very lucky to have found such friends and I also feel very lucky to have the chance to work with them every week. To me, getting to go to class is worth every minute I have to spend reading or doing what appear to be menial assignments.

One thing I dreaded last semester that I'm not dreading this semester is the class presentation that everybody is assigned. Last week, Brian (Bryan?) bravely volunteered to do his first. I liked his use of an outline on the overhead, which gave me something to reinforce the topic and purpose of the discussion and task to be accomplished. I thought he did a splendid job of teaching us about what people other than our book authors were saying.

Poem for February 1, 2009

Bright Sun after Heavy Snow

by Jane Kenyon

A ledge of ice slides from the eaves,
piercing the crusted drift. Astonishing
how even a little violence
eases the mind.

In this extreme state of light
everything seems flawed: the streaked
pane, the forced bulbs on the sill
that refuse to bloom...A wad of dust
rolls like a desert weed
over the drafty floor.

Again I recall a neighbor's
small affront — it rises in my mind
like the huge banks of snow along the road:
the plow, passing up and down all day,
pushes them higher and higher...

The shadow of smoke rising from the chimney
moves abruptly over the yard.
The clothesline rises in the wind. One
wooden pin is left, solitary as a finger;
it, too, rises and falls.