Literature Circles - Round 1

One of the reasons I enjoy Literature Circles is because students have both choices and variety. We are about two-thirds of the way through the six different books students are reading, which they selected based on both Lexile and choice. Though the books are diverse at a quick glance, all are related to our overarching theme of "Identity."


I've been impressed with the students' grasp of abstract v concrete subject matter in a novel. A few mini lessons making use of personal examples along they way, and the students were off and running. In these pictures, students were analyzing characters in their novels by identifying the character's concrete and abstract traits, and supporting those traits with direct quotes from the book.

Tough the posters are not high-tech, there was some animated collaboration revealing active reading, critical thinking, decision making, and certainly creatively. Besides, we now have colorful, informative posters hanging in our space.

A Deluge of Thoughts about the Flood

When a topic is saddled with paradoxes, how does one focus on what to write? Thus describes my time-sucking conundrum trying to write a belated post about the floods in Thailand, just as I’ve asked my students to do. In the past several weeks, there have been large-scale disaster and personal triumphs, the media has disseminated stories of both utter hopelessness and powerful innovation, my own students have demonstrated amazing motivation and unbelievable laziness, and there remain as many questions as there have been answers. Perhaps the paradoxes best tell the story after all.

40 days off? Cool! Not.
Having never before experienced a unplanned day off of school during my teaching career, the past 40 days of this strange vacation-not-a-vacation makes me truly appreciate the planned vacations even more, while recognizing how much time it really does takes to unwind from the day-to-day physical and mental responsibilities of teaching. Not that a floodcation offers either, it is a very different beast. Vacations are generally hard-earned and finite: work-hard, play hard. A floodcation teeters out of ones control on a weekly basis (will school reopen or not?) and proffers neither a sense of accomplishment nor a semi-reckless desire to let loose. It is surprisingly unsatisfying.

Learning continues, for those who need it the least.
Despite school closures, learning must go on. And so I posted assignments, and readings, and interactive websites for the students; e-mails were sent, and calendars updated. The initial responses from students was barely a trickle. More e-mails were sent, varied tasks assigned, and a few more assignments came in. The irony hit me once again after a few weeks: often, the students completing the work were the ones who probably needed the practice the least - the most diligent. The students’ whose requested parent-teacher conference had been the first flood casualty were rarely found on cyberspace. Whether or not students had been flooded or not offered no prediction in who completed the work. My favorite part: after 40 days of no school but regular posting of diverse assignments, I received a flurry of homework e-mails Saturday and Sunday as students faced the reality of coming back to school without submitting any work along the way. 

“Not suffering enough to be happy.”
While exhausted and sun-burnt, bumping along in the back of a rusty, empty dump truck doubling as a Thai Red Cross relief vehicle, in the height of Friday evening Bangkok expressway traffic, unsuccessfully soliciting friendly greetings from fellow traffic-sitters in plush, colorful buses and shiny, air-conditioned cars, a fellow volunteer keenly commented about the commuting Bangkokians, “they’re not suffering enough to be happy.” At the end of a long day distributing rice, bottled water, canned food, and other necessities for flood victims in hard-hit Nonthaburi, her statement certainly rung true. Along with plenty of flood waters seen that day, I also witnessed an abundance of community spirit, joviality, appreciation, and laughter.  When one loses almost every material possession owned, and the ability to get anywhere specific at a specific time is canceled out by several billion cubic meters of filthy rodent and reptile-infested water, camaraderie, humor, and gratefulness seem pretty fulfilling indeed.

 

The paradoxes are not going away anytime soon, though I am hopeful the water will. Feel free to comment about your own paradoxes, or what you may be thankful for.

Thai Flood Photos by Torie Leinbach CC BY-NC

Fostering Confidence

A recent news item from National Geographic, "Evolution of Narcissism: Why We’re Overconfident, and Why It Works" has important implications for schools, educators and parents. Confidence is hardly a novel concept, particularly in education; many teachers are already aware of Bernard Weiner’s Attribution Theory. But, how many teachers make internalizing confidence explicit in their classrooms? And how many parents are aware of Attribution Theory, and discuss it at home?

Attribution Theory was one of the many psycho-educational models with which I became familiar in my early days in this profession. Yet, it is one of the few that has stuck with me and directly influences my choices in the classroom. Very, very rarely do I wish my students “luck” on a project or test, or any other endeavor, for that matter. Luck is not in their control, or mine. Why a hard working individual would ever credit their success with luck is beyond my comprehension, and students don’t meet and exceed standards based on luck either. Call me an optimist or a pragmatist; I believe one reaps what they sow. Because of this, I attempt to teach and model this belief for both my students, and my son.

To put it simply, if a student has prepared, practiced, asked questions, asked for more time, taken advantage of re-dos, and/or whatever else they need to do to make progress and learn, they eventually will. Though it may take some longer than others (hello, differentiation), students gain power in the process. They learn that they indeed have control over their learning and begin to internalize confidence. More confidence leads to greater intellectual risk taking, leads to more resilience, more success, and more recognition, which leads to more confidence... A classic reinforcing loop.


The bottom line is that research continues to prove that confidence breeds confidence. The more self-assurance we can help our students and children muster for themselves, the better off they will be.

Bald Eagle by Ryan McFarland @ flickr (CC-BY-2.0)

Conundrum

Whether you are 14 or 40, your identity is at once obvious and obscure - for most people, at least. When deciding on this year's curricular themes with colleagues, there was no inkling how close to home the "identity" theme would end up being for me. As I ask my students to examine and reflect on their own identity through stories, poems, political theories, discussions, human nature, societal influences, music, and many other lenses; little do they realize how much related introspection I do right alongside them, and because of them.

Blame it on the new 1:1 laptop program. I eat, sleep, teach, and talk technology, or so it feels some days. Armed with a dusted-off website, a brand new blog, lots of tenacity, and a healthy dose of naivety, I attempt to stay slightly ahead of my 8th graders, if on a completely different path - the slow lane, if you will. To this end, I recently shared my blog posts with students in a lesson about responsible blogging and commenting. With new rubrics in hand, they read and honestly evaluated my posts, scored each entry, and explained why I earned the score. They complimented some of my word choices and use of metaphors, though resoundingly concluded that the blog audience was not them.

Oh. Right. Audience. The same basic focus I try to instill in their writing day in and day out. Who is my audience? Why am I writing at all? The questions are pretty obvious, though frighteningly not as instinctual as they should be coming from a Language Arts and Social Studies teacher. So, my conundrum is directly related to the monumental shift in thinking about the ways we communicate, collaborate, and connect in the digital world. The options are truly as limitless and as inspiring as any cultural renaissance that has gone before.

The terrific Learning 2.011 technology and education conference held in Shanghai last weekend proved this point exactly, and added plenty of fire to my simmering consternation: Is there a way to be simultaneously protective and authentic online? Do I want my digital identity to be personal, professional, or some gratifying weave of all my life's elements? Wanting to reap the benefits of the educational potential only available by embracing digital connections force me to welcome the riddle and get out there on the digital map to make my humble mark, whatever it may be.

What are your thoughts about digital identity?

Identity TTT by Torie Leinbach @ Personal Collection (CC-BY-NC 2.0)

Pushing the Envelope

The start of the school year is way more thrilling than the start of a calendar year, even if the confetti and crystal balls are replaced with clean uniforms and bulging pencil cases.  Come August, there are always dozens of students to eagerly greet and meet, a multitude of strategies to perfect, lessons to tweak, colleagues to catch up with, and initiatives to implement.  The 2011-12 school year has been more exciting than usual because of the notable number of new projects taken on for the sake of changing times, and our amazing students.

The 1:1 laptop program is one of the noticeable changes in my classroom. My students are like the astronauts, happily exploring previously undiscovered resources and skills that are accessible in the wonderland wonder known as the internet. I am the commander they rely on for some direction. Truthfully, all I really provide is a nudge. The young teenagers are fearless in the vast space of the 2.0 world.

In the 20 or so days since walking in the door of our educational vessel, the students have taken off full blast with any task asked of them so far: blogging, commenting, making and uploading music videos, e-mail, citing, collaborating, completing forms, and note taking.  There have been some technical glitches and false starts, but none have outweighed our collective determination and curiosity.  In a moment of looking back with awe, I find myself especially eager to see what technological and academic adventures the next nine months will bring.


Laptop by Dan Barbus @ flickr (CC BY-NC 2.0)

Identity

Ready or not, the school year began. Two weeks in, our classroom bulletin boards still await creativity and inspiration, though there are some bold colors to break up the monotonous back wall. Just as I was about to go searching the internet for thought-provoking, maybe famous quotes to support our current theme of identity, and take up some space on the bare bulletin boards, the students provided illumination of their own.

In class this week, we read and discussed Janell Cannon's book, Verdi. The snake with a lot of heart and a challenging identity crisis made for some rich classroom discussion about literary elements, summary writing, snakes, age, and the concept of identity. When asked to write about the book's theme, and connections to middle school life, my students articulated awareness and empathy of which their families, friends, and teachers should be very proud. 

So much for searching the internet. Soon, more than two dozen, student-generated, insightful quotes about identity will adorn our purple bulletin boards instead. As a teacher, I am proud and I am humbled.