July 28th Ethnography in Six Words
Janique Parrott
Peter’s preoccupied; Amyphibian announces morning pages.
Peruvian treats: empanadas, strawberries, bananas, alfajores.
Peter says de-graded classroom; I’m intrigued.
Complete freedom, what would you do?
Katie: No more Standards of Learning workbooks.
Amy: Get rid of whole class novels.
Janique: I’d also stop giving interim assessments.
Problem: “Rubrics made me feel icky.”
In IB, rubrics for everything. Insane.
Rubric: an unfortunate progressive era artifact.
Then Sputnik brings positivism; stupid Americans.
More science, more math, less writing.
Meanwhile, ETS created first national rubric.
Ugh! Standardized assessment equals standardized writing.
Process rubrics solve problem temporarily.
The ick comes back; grading sucks!
Solution: Get rid of all grades!
“Kids will love me,” Peter thought.
“I hate you,” they told him.
One student said, “Grades are goals.”
Another boy declared, “I hate thinking.”
No grades. Kids writing, reading, collaborating.
They’re writing, but are they learning?
Peter: Good question. Shit, I don’t know.
Ask the experts, they will know.
They say, “Sorry, figure it out.”
To what end do you educate?
Michele: Critical thinkers, readers, writers, speakers.
Heather: Resilient, problem solvers with interpersonal skills.
Amber: I have goals. Student behavior impedes.
Gaby: Self advocates who communicate their needs.
What Peter did in his classroom:
Four keywords: concepts, choice, inquiry, composition.
Questions you have about the concept?
What role helps you explore it?
What can you create, produce, generate?
True teacher: Models before independent work.
Amy Frog interjects, “What about research?”
Sarah responds, “Yes, add a column.”
Peter scratches his beard, scribbles furiously.
See this process in action below:
Name
|
Concept
|
Question
|
Role
|
Product
|
Peter
|
Grading
|
Why do I hate grading?
|
Poet
|
-free verse poem about my feelings
-pov poem from a crumpled up progress report
|
Katie
|
Test Prep
|
How do students feel about test prep? Do they think it’s valuable ?
|
Poet
|
double voice or triple voice poem
|
Amy W.
|
Deeper Reading
|
How do I get students to believe that there is a below the surface when then read?
|
Realist
|
Fact sheet about different ways to study a novel
|
Many questions, different roles, creative products.
Diane, a poet, pens a haiku.
Gaby, a realist, composes an article.
Last problem: End of quarter grades?
Solution: Portfolios for reading, writing, speaking, collaborating.
Reflect on four pieces of work.
“I deserve a B,” they say.
B is safe, C is punishment.
A at interim to F. Screwed.
Someone suggests an interim mini-portfolio check.
Alternative feedback: Summarize, explain, redirect, revise.
Miscellaneous points:
Grades, the carrot on the stick.
De-grading is taking a stand.
Quantification obsession: Valedictorian, SMART goals, evaluations.
De-grading is overwhelming, what can I do?
Try process rubrics, not grading homework.
Lunch! Food, drinks call our names.
Ethnography of July 27, 2015
by Amy Langrehr
A Multi-genre
Ethnography in Three Acts
July 27, 2015
Act One (minimalist
impression in words)
By Amy Langrehr
Missing member.
Hole in heart.
Not complete.
Different building.
Unclear signage.
Found the room!
Light.
Space.
People met friendly
lawn mower
or aggressive lawn
mower
on their way to the
new room.
Missing member.
Present moose.
Double Diane.
First
scoop, ethnography:
Inquiring
minds want to know.
Second
scoop, multi-genre research with empathy
But
wait—sprinkles, too---
---Technology
ninja!
Multi-genre
research
Use facts to write
Fakebook pages
Haiku
Reader’s theater
Advice columns
PSAs
Newspaper articles
Recipe
Biographies
Empathy
Asperger’s
Terrets
Self-harm
Depression
OCD
ADHD
So many people
affected
A teacher
Friends
People in this room
People not in this
room
Kimberly Bird
Conlon, Rest in Peace
My aunt
My nephew
My sister
Me
We could all learn
What Diane’s
students
are learning.
Sixth graders
Learning facts
And how to care
How to think
How to write.
Everything
organized digitally.
More than double
scoop.
Four course meal
With
hot fudge sundae.
Next up
Heather Jung!
Use computers
for higher order
thinking
with low SES
students.
Online book club
1.
Avatar
Princess
princess prince princess princess princess prince princess princess—Alchemist!
2.
Webpage
Hidden
for safety
Motivates
Students give deadlines
“Need
these edited and on my desk by lunch.”
3. Read, read, read
Student choice
Teachers read Donalyn Miller
4. Genre study
Characteristics
In teacher speak
In student speak
(duh! Great for students.)
5. Visual literacy
Pictures to process and
communicate thinking
6. Audience
Motivates
“ My second grade
teacher likes it!”
“My friend read it?
Cool!”
Student stares at
blank paper. With audience, writes pages.
Result: Families, kids, schools
talking about books. Kids wanting to read, wanting to write.
All
a teacher ever wanted.
Almost
lunch.
So
hungry.
Getting
mean.
Good
words
But
Want
food
More
words
Better
words
But
Hungrier
Angrier
Argh!
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand
………lunch!
*Phew*
Fooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood.
Ok.
Last
writing group.
Don’t
even…
Act
2 (letter)
By
Mordecai Moose
Dear
Not-Mooses,
I
just want to say thank you very much. Before, I did not know a not-moose
classroom. At first, I was scared. Someone said Nick Meneno might be a hunter.
I hoped he did not hunt mooses! I hoped he was not going to come to class and
hunt me! But Ms. Diane told us about her pictures. It was just a picture of
Nick Meneno. Nick Meneno came last week. He was not going to come to hunt me.
I
learned many things in not-moose school. I learned I should go to Ann Taylor
for my first day of not-moose school. (I hope I still looked handsome not in
Ann Taylor. I did not know about Ann Taylor. I hope you are not mad.)
I
liked Ms. Diane’s lesson. Mooses are sometimes not nice to me because I am shorter
than the other mooses. Maybe they would be nice to me if we had this lesson at
moose school. Ms. Maggie was very nice and said she liked my goatee. Then I
thought, I sometimes think not-mooses without antlers are not very handsome.
But that is not fair either. You are all very nice, and that is more handsome
than having antlers.
I
have a lot to think about.
Now
I want to have an on-line book club! Mooses mostly tell stories because we have
no thumbs for writing and no fingers for typing. We read, though. Will you have
a book club with me? I would like that very much. Before, there were no moose
books. But some moose storytellers are using Voice Thread, and Moose literature
will be coming to you soon! We can read books by not-mooses and mooses! That
would be fun.
Finally,
I visited Amy L.’s writing group. They are very nice people. Now I know why Amy
is sad to say goodbye. It’s good that I am cute and huggable. Sometimes it is
good to be a short moose. Also, I don’t want to spoil the surprise, but the
writing group thought I was a very handsome moose and included me in their
picture. You might get to see me again very soon!
Thank
you very much for letting me visit. I learned so much. Sometime, you should
come to moose school with me. Tell your principal it is for professional
development and see if she will pay you.
Your friend,
Mordecai
Moose
P.S. Michael Moose says hi. He has bad allergies, so he did
not come.
Act III. A poem by Amy Langrehr (to be read at the end of the course; it is an ethnography of our four weeks together)
Day 12: Ethnography Newspaper
July 23, 2015
Diane Myers
Day 10: A Multi Tonal,
Impressionistic Symphony in Three Movements
July 22, 2015
Joe Golimowski
Prelude-
We all tune up with Morning Pages, pouring out new thoughts
or painstakingly revising previous drafts.
Co-Maestro Peter ends the prelude with his effervescent,
ebullient “The day’s morning pages are over”.
Instruments drop. Groups form and
conversation starts immediately. Excited chatter suffuses the room with expectation.
Haiku from Maggie for Ethnography
Laughter
Haiku savant brain
Done in an hour
(Maggie’s mastery deserves more than three lines
but the symphony is about to begin!)
Maestro Sarah introduces the first movement with “Mark
has saved my ass this year. He is my
Zeus.”
First Movement-“If
You Really Want to Hear About It: What Holden Caulfield (and others) Can Teach
Us about Voice”
Composer Mark Farrington begins the symphony slowly
with acknowledgment of E. L. Doctorow’s death.
Then Mark makes a stunning revelation about Elvis.
We now know that Elvis is dead and Mark killed him by the Jersey shore (I am
waiting for the full story). Do not
blame Mark-it was Pete’s fault for commanding that writers must kill their
darlings. (That does not sound right-but you all know what I mean.)
Now the music begins to build.
Mark asks, “What is voice in writing?” and “Do you
teach it?”
We agree it is hard to teach voice. Someone asks, “How do you teach voice in
academic writing?”
We sit in rapt attention, eager for the next notes.
The notes arrive with an Olympian thunderbolt of graphic
virtuosity.
“If voice is pizza. Then style is pepperoni.”
We consider the tone of the first paragraph of Catcher in the Rye, one of Amy C.s
favorite novels, and the opening sentences from Great Falls and The House Tibet
Mark reminds us that to understand voice think
about tone and that part of voice is structure.
We write about something dangerous, risqué and fun.
Our friends get the real stories; important people get a Soviet-era sanitized
version. Audience determines voice.
I think I hear The Blue Danube in the background. Or
is it Die Valkyrie? Siegfried? (I know I
have mixed genres here-maybe Eroica or Jupiter, then.)
Mark slyly varies the tempo at this point with the
following:
“Writers do not believe schizophrenia is an
illness.”
At this comment, the room fills with the sounds of
many voices, murmuring in agreement. Or
does it?
The music swells to a crescendo. (Maybe only for
me.)
I hear “If you struggle with voice, maybe it is
your attitude toward the subject.”
Definitely Die Valkyrie. (Ok, Eroica for the purists.)
Mark gets ready to close the first movement. We all write I am a/an and explain who we
are.
Marshmallow hammer
Drug virgin
Failed impostor
Defender of underdogs
a true frog
With a flourish, the first movement ends. Composer
Mark leaves the stage, succeeding at being brilliant and not tripping. Cheers
and applause. Bravo!
Interlude
The usual things that occur during an interlude.
Movement 2 “Encouraging and Supporting Writer’s through Technology”
Harpist and Kindergarten teacher Jennifer Orr takes
the stage to begin her section of the symphony.
Faintly, in the background, Also sprach Zarathustra begins. (Anyone who knows why this does not technically work, I will give a gold star. Anyone who can discuss at length why it works thematically, I will give two gold stars.)
Composer and Harpist Jen begins the movement with a question.
According to Jen, “writing is a way to cope.”
“Students” she said “do not have an idea of writing
as communication just something to be assigned”.
On a
scale of 1-10, how challenging is writing, in your opinion? Feel free to choose different numbers for you
and for your students.
After
back and forth, we decide it is contingent upon the genre.
Jen demonstrates using Pixie, Voice Thread and
graphic novel creation software to help students compose. Using these programs, helps Jen bridge the
gap between “the stories her students could tell and those they could write.”
Jen moves on to Revising and Editing. We discuss what is more difficult between
Composing and Revising and Editing and the consensus is mixed.
Bringing harmony out of discord, Jen plucks a tune
that rings true.
What is easier as writer is easier to teach; what
is harder as writer is harder to teach.”
The end of the movement is near and Jen delivers a
big finale with Writing for an Audience.
She believes it essential to give students an
audience for whom to compose and revise/edit. Her students write a book and she
puts the creations in a classroom tub. Then the books get into the library. In
addition,
Jen starts a class blog at the beginning of year. Jen writes brief entries, 3x a week, using Google
Translate to put into Spanish. Turns
website over to kids to post in November and December.
The music ends.
Interlude
Amber warns us to get ready for a hardcore
afternoon.
Heather Jung mentions to me that she was thrilled
with Movement Two as she heard the music speak to her as an elementary school
teacher. Bravo!
Murmurs of excitement as Composer Mark releases to his writing group
the final installment of the
new short story we have been reading.
Movement Three
Teacher Voices in the Public Sphere: Educators as Writers, Speakers and Leaders
for Change
Composer Amber Jensen bursts into the room, lets there
be light, and leaps onto the stage to the strains of Le Marseillaise. (Anybody know of a revolutionary symphony?)
We can sense a new day, a new birth of freedom in
the air. The Fourth is past, it is the
22nd! Liberte, Equalite, and
Fraternite. Not to the barricades but to
the Window, to the
Wall! In solidarity, we realize that we all reach
the barricade that robs us of our voice in the public debate about education.
What do we have to share? You may ask. Resistance
is futile. (I could not resist, even if it is an allusion out of keeping with
my theme for the movement.)
But, we do not love Big Brother so we search for
ways up and over or around. How can we
gain our voice, how do we as Paul Thomas states “bring our individual and
collective professional voices to the public sphere?” By paying mere attention! Become aware of the
publications and blogs that are out there for educators. Read them and become part of the
conversation. Marchons, if you dare.
As per the NVWP’s goal of “providing opportunities
for public discourse” and “creating a safe space for us to practice
participation” we engage in a silent online conversation to begin connecting
and finding our voice. But there is more.
Marchons – Journal about
your teaching
Marchons- Write along with
your students
Marchons- Conduct in-service
presentations
Marchons- Write op-ed
articles for the newspaper
Marchons- Join National
Council of Teachers of English or Capital Area Peer Tutoring Association
Amber concludes the symphony by recounting how she
connected and gained her voice one step at a time.
Day 9: Haiku Ethnography
July 21, 2015
Maggie Hodges
An Ethnography
Daily Log of Goings-on
7.21
Old habits die hard
Even if just 9 days old
Sitting somewhere new
Early A.M. snack
Cherries all day, every day
No complaints from me
Roxanne brings cookies
Biscotti to be exact
Single serving size
Morning Pages, Write!
Time for typing and scrawling
Peter always yells
Kisses Peter’s head
Presenter Lauren Jensen
Weird first impression
Sitting next to Joe
Terrific laptop sticker
On top right corner
Jensen jargon book
Ask Amber to share, it’s great
Heartfelt family gift
Yesterday in pics
Katie’s ethnographic fright
A true masterpiece
Presenter intro
Not sisters; partners in crime
Long Island native
Student confession
“I hate writing; it’s only
For my teacher’s eyes”
How can I change this
Perception, wait it’s really
A reality
We all have something
Important to say and want
To make an impact
Writing a profile
Creates a thread to connect
Each one in the room
Profiles everywhere
The New Yorker; Rolling Stone
SI; Instyle
If I were a bitch
Extra weight goes to his neck
Biff is a boxer
Profile is a real
Representation of some
One in written form
A deep, intimate
Understanding of humans
And our connections
Students read a ton
To be a “damn good writer”
Read like a writer
Must contextualize
To “live and breathe the genre”
Portrait in Writing
-Interruption-
That was the last one!
Took it right out of my hand!
For God sakes, take it!
-Mr. Colon-
Oreos, cream out
People get mad about the
Things that don’t matter
-Back to regular programming-
Need quality quotes
Capture personality
Angle is crucial
Less about answers
Are ordinary people
Extraordinary?
Be open-ended
Person guides the interview
Let magic happen
Cultured empathy
Teaching “how to be human”
Active listening
Show us, now we do
“I want to interview every-
one!” Where is the time?
Kids choose craft lessons
As they draft, draft, draft, revise
Huge portfolio
Characteristics
In this genre: Now free write
Creates confidence
Ownership of work
New York copier pirate
Bind and produce book
-Interruption-
Palpable panic
“Is this required writing?”
“Some good panic sounds”
-Back to regularly scheduled programming-
“You can never see
If your own eyes are alight”
Damn…some good insight
Pastel pink polo
Interviews all through the room
He’s our Grandpa Joe
We get a sneak peek
“Pets remain, until they don’t”
“Room erupts in tears”
Even broken schools
Are in this anthology
Authentic voices
“Shit! There’s two rubrics!
You can burn them if you want…”
Grades are not the point
Watching students read
Even parts of their profiles
True growth and learning
Mind boggling morning
Such great, important info
Need time to digest
Monday, July 20, 2015
Katie Hedrick
"A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words"
July 16, 2015
Michele Evans
Looking Through the Glass
If you look through the window pane glass
of an exceptional seventh grade class
at the Siena School in Washington D.C.,
what do you see?
Initially,
you may believe that classroom is messy
when you glare at the extra large sticky notes
of doodles, sketches, and scribbles
littering the walls, floors, and desks.
But actually,
what you see
is the remarkable work of Ms. Parrott
as she
stimulates the minds of
her young artists
drawing strong verbs
exceptionally.
Oh, what an entertaining sight to see!
If you look again through that window pane glass
of her entertaining seventh grade class
at the Siena School in Washington D.C.,
what do you see?
Initially,
you may assume the classroom is chaotic
when you notice the students up out of their seats
staggering, shuffling, scurrying,
strutting, scampering, and skedaddling.
But actually,
what you see
is the noteworthy work of Ms. Parrott
as she
enriches the minds of
her young actors
dramatizing strong verbs
entertainingly.
Oh, what a captivating sight to see!
If you look once more through her window pane glass
of that captivating seventh grade class
at the Siena School in Washington D.C.,
what do you see?
Initially,
you may presume the classroom is the cafeteria
when you spy students pretending to
gobble, nibble, munch,
smack, chew, and swallow,
every word that Ms. Parrott reads
from Ralph Fletcher’s book Marshfield Dreams.
But actually,
what you see
is the creative work of Ms. Parrott
as she
inspires the minds of
her young readers
discovering strong verbs
captivatingly.
Oh, what a magnificent sight to see!
And if you look one last time through the window pane glass
of that marvelous seventh grade class
at the Siena School in Washington D.C.,
what do you see?
An
entertaining,
captivating,
magnificent
sight of artists, actors, readers, and writers
using strong verbs in their
personal narratives exceptionally!
School of Thought
Ms. Walthen, the chief in charge, at Arlington’s Wakefield High School
uses the skills of running an online newspaper as an effective teaching tool
to encourage her reluctant sophomores to see, write, and revise
the traditional persuasive English research paper through a fresh set of eyes.
Topics that they can relate to and care about is where she starts
not ones like how Shakespeare influenced the world especially the arts.
She uses: “Does social media build or destroy society?” as a guide.
Her students read Anderson’s Feed before choosing a side.
But writing engaging introductions is no easy deed
so students use the Chieftain’s motto: the lead is all you need.
Beginning with a question, an anecdote, a provocative statement, or a list,
will help her writers introduce the main point also know as the gist.
Narrowing the topic is an important thing to do.
And then it’s time to revise and edit writing before students are through.
They follow the SSP program by asking these three.
Does it make sense? Do you have proof? Have you used punctuation correctly?
Writing an appealing introduction is just one important part
that will help Ms. Walthen’s students’ papers become works of art.
DAY 7: The Dave and Paz Show
July 15th, 2015
Amy Wathen
Here is the link to the full Prezi.
Day 6: Pilgrimage to Winchester
July 14, 2015
Gabby Rivas
July 15th, 2015
Amy Wathen
Here is the link to the full Prezi.
Day 6: Pilgrimage to Winchester
July 14, 2015
Gabby Rivas
Day 5: Ideament
July 13, 2015
Heather Jung
DAY FOUR: July 9, 2015
Roxanne French
Notes: The Fellows’ Feedback Sessions were held in room 353 before class.
Janique Parrott provided the morning refreshments that included yogurt, bagels, and a fresh, homemade fruit salad with kiwi, grapes, strawberries, and blueberries.
Morning Pages: Peter Anderson announces the beginning of the Morning Pages at 9:01 a.m. at 9:15 a.m. Sarah, OFL, connects speakers for Demonstration Lessons. The Fellows write until 9:28 a.m.
Ethnographer’s Notes: John Dutton reads portions of the notes for Wednesday, July 8, 2015; the notes are an impressive collage of detail, embedded images, voices, music and humor.
Demonstration Lesson: Gabriela Rivas
ESOL Boot Camp
Bush Hill Elementary School
Overview: Before the lesson begins, Gabriela (Gaby) warms scented oils, dims
the overhead lights, and string white lights to create a warm, relaxing environment. When the students are working, classical music adds to learning environment as well. Gaby puts on her lanyard and begins her lesson by expressing her gratitude to the teachers who taught her—teachers she feels without whose influence she would have been in a gang. Gaby is also grateful for being a cancer survivor. Gaby’s Demonstration Lesson includes PowerPoint slides, videos, and hands-on activities. The Demonstration Lesson is an ESOL Boot Camp because there is so much work to do and so little time—one year—to prepare her students for the Reading SOL. The lesson begins with a description of her students—many of whom have just arrived in the United States. Most of her students come from homes where English is not spoken or read. Today “one out of nine students in our classrooms are ELL students,” and by 2025, it is “estimated to reach one out of four students.” The lesson and PowerPoint outline Gaby’s philosophy, approach, and resources. The complete PowerPoint is sixty-five slides; it is an extraordinary resource.
Highlights/Activities: In the warm and welcoming environment of her classroom, Gaby’s first goal is to create community; opening activities with her students include realia and word study, touring the school, building vocabulary and phonemic awareness. TPR or Total Physical Response is another important way to build confidence and increase language comprehension. Gaby distributes an example of an early class activity, the Puzzle Piece to the Fellows. We are given an opportunity to complete our piece of the puzzle; in her classroom the pieces are put together to like a quilt to represent the community that is being created in her room. The Fellows practice jazz chants that extend the students’ vocabulary through motions, such as clapping and hand signals. With TPR, the students are learning “chunks of English” that they can use in other contexts.
Gaby shares information about her life and her home in Lima, Peru, to introduce activities that enable students to draw pictures about their homes. The drawings lead to poems based on the senses that are written one sentence at a time on Post-It notes. Gaby models how she encourages her students to volunteer to share their work. She shows us how she uses technology like Animoto Video Maker and videos of her students to enhance learning. With activity like Poetry Café, the students learn vocabulary and the basics of writing. Gaby encourages the students to base their writing on personal experience and to use signal words. The students learn about sentence looping, sentence frames, and role-playing. Prepositions are introduced with math manipulatives.
Conclusion: The description of the highlights and activities does not includes all or even most of the useful or applicable lessons for our students—that is not possible to do within the scope of these notes. Gaby’s lesson presents the challenges she faces and the solutions she uses in her classrooms. However, what we can all take away from her lesson is that the activities that she demonstrated would be valuable for our students. I will review Gaby’s PowerPoint and handouts; I know that my students will benefit from the insight that I gained today.
Demonstration Lesson: Amy Langrehr
What You Know First: The First Lesson in an Exploration of How Changing contexts and Perspectives Shapes our Understanding of Ourselves, Each Other and the World
Bryant Alternative High School
Overview: Amy’s lesson began with a summary of her experience and background, a description of Bryant Alternative High School—in Fairfax—and a description of her students. Understanding the context of the Demonstration Lesson helps us understand why the lesson works for her ELL students, and it may help us understand how the lesson could work for our students. Amy used her understanding of her students’ outside responsibilities, their jobs, and their personal/family lives as well as their verbal, reading, and writing skills to develop the lesson and the unit of study. One important component to the lesson is the fact that her students enjoy it when she reads to them. The unit is based on comparing, contrasting, and changing contexts which help her students “explore their identity,” as children of a “third culture—the culture of moving.” This identification of the third culture and its importance to the students is key to Amy’s approach with her students. When one of Amy’s professors explained that children who move from one country to another as children have more in common with each other than children from their first or second country, she
knew that ELL students needed to explore their identity as third culture children
to understand that they are “not alone.” The students need to be allowed to grieve,
to be aware of the importance of their experiences as multicultural children.
Highlights/Activities: Amy explains that before she reads the book, she begins with a series of connected activities that will make the book more meaningful to the students. Amy tells the students about her experience—she tells them about “what she knew first.” Her students begin the lesson by writing about what they know first; they write about the topic that is all about the smells, the tastes, feelings, sound, and sights of where they grew up. They write about the people in their town, and they write about what they did during the last few days before they left. Then they write about the connection they do or do not have with “what they know first.” Their personal writing prepares them to use the questions on the conversation grid to find out what three of their classmates miss about their hometowns—the people, the sights, sounds, tastes, smells, and feelings. They also ask their classmates what happened to them before they left their hometown.
The students share their answers and their classmates’ answers. If the students need to work on sentence structure and basic sentence conventions, they write and correct their sentences on the board. When Amy reads Patricia McLaughlin’s book to the students, they are engaged—they complete story maps, they read the book on their own, and after they have discussed the book, they write about it in their journals. Discussion and journal writing help students to identify their own complex feeling and thoughts before they write further. Journal writing is low-risk writing that helps students write about ideas that are important or that have meaning for them.
Conclusion: Amy’s Demonstration Lesson is another example of how and why lessons and activities that are designed to help ELL students will help my students. Modeling reading and/or reading aloud is effective for all students. Finding topics that are interesting or important to students is key to planning lessons. Students learn when they are engage. Creating lessons that allow students to understand complex concepts and feelings is invaluable to developing critical thinking skills. The combination of individual, one-on-one, and class discussion and writing will help
all students to develop confidence in their ideas, and desire to improve their reading, and writing. Finally, at the end of the lesson, Amy asked us what we thought would improve or to help focus the students on the reading of McLaughlin’s book. The questions and discussion helped us to be active participants in the lesson.
Lunch on our own
ISI session reconvenes at 1:20 p.m. The Fellows are released to their assigned writing groups as follows:
Mark Farrington
Michele Evens
Roxanne French
Joe Golimowski
Janique Parrott
Amber Jensen
Amy Carroll
John Dutton
Heather Jung
Katie Hedrick
Maggie Hodges
Peter Anderson
Gabriela Rivas
Amy Langrehr
Diane Myers
Amy Wather
Day Two: Let's Get Ready to RUUUMB - Write!
July 7, 2015
Amber Jensen
Teachers of writing must write. Has that sunk in yet? It’s a Writing Project dictum. And abide by it we do (gladly). So Day 2 of the NVWP ISI starts off with the sacred 30 minutes of Morning Pages. I boot up my trusty Macbook Air, open a fresh Google Doc, and dive into some reflective personal writing, goal setting, and list making, distracted only a little bit by the frantic tap-tap-TAP-TAP-tap-tap-TAP of Peter’s keyboard next to me, and then a sporadic and mysterious musical melody calling out from someone’s purse. It is just enough to make me lift my eyes from my computer screen, connect glances with some fellow teacher-writers across the table from me, and smile as we discover that the owner of said musical melody is probably too engrossed in her writing to even notice (cough, cough, Michele). My eyes wander back to my screen and I re-enter my writing place (writing territory, perhaps?). Morning Pages is like practicing meditation. It requires constant redirection, refocusing, and recommitment. But it is a gift.
Following a welcome and some words from Sarah, OFL (copyright, Peter Anderson, 2015), and Peter’s reading of the ethnography from Day 1, we refuel with the wonderful, shall I say, cornucopia of baked goods and fruit medley and settle in for Demonstration Lesson Numero Uno (Katie, did you get that?).
JOE GOLIMOWSKI (aka blueridgejoe something at gmail dot com) is our first presenter and he asks us to - GASP - reflect on our own writing routines. We dutifully comply, and as all of us begin writing, I pause, look around, and take down some stats. Allow me to describe some writing routines of this particular group in this particular room in this particular NVWP Invitational Summer Institute.
We have 6 fellows typing on Macbooks (primarily Airs, not that I’m biased or anything), 3 sputtering away on Dells, and 1 loyal to the HP brand. Four of us keep it old school, sans typing machine. Roxanne writes on her trusty blue legal pad (left-handed, I notice), and Mark wouldn’t be seen drafting any other way than by hand with a window nearby. Maggie plugs into her headphones, and she, along with some other computer users, put their machines to rest during writing time, opting for the journal-by-hand method.
We munch on foods ranging from cherries, strawberries, mango, pineapple, and cantaloupe to
nuts, pretzel crisps and an egg strata to lemon bars, pimento cheese muffins, banana bread, and scones. (Thanks, OFL and daughter). Don’t forget about the water, tea, and coffee. And endless amounts of gum.
Joe, self described as “a grumpy old man,” leads us in a discussion about what our individual and collective writing routines are. A sampling of our discussion:
- Wrapping up in a “study burrito” or layers of comfy clothing
- Writing late at night vs. early in the morning
- Self regulating through running breaks, water & food breaks, bathroom breaks
- Minimizing distractions, or attempting to - (Mark says he’s just fine to get into the writing zone “as long as I won’t be responsible for doing anything for anyone else”)
- Embracing the chaos of people and music or requiring complete & utter silence
- Starting early on and getting it done over time or waiting for the pressure of the deadline to begin (Katie said she likes to write the whole paper in one day, if not one sitting)
- Setting the environment with aromatherapy oil drops
After a discussion of the difference between word vomit and brain dump (did I mention I hate the smiling poop emoji?), this results in the very profound, and probably universal conclusion (and I quote): “We don’t follow the traditional writing process as we teach it.” Note that down.
Next, we reflect on the process itself; interestingly, there is a lot of bleeding over between writing routine and writing process. What is the difference between the two? Why are we all so quick to assume the first prompt is really about process, when really Joe was just trying to get us to describe our physical surroundings? Our students will likely not be aware of their writing routines either. All the more reason to engage them in this kind of metacognition.
“Let’s Get Ready to Rumble!” the mustachioed man tells us, as we embark on a reflection of our writing processes, so we write, we share, and this is what we come up with:
- Some of us overwrite first
- Roxanne “welcomes an unexpected idea to the page”
- Mark throws out a half dozen words and then picks the right one later when he’s stuck
- Gaby invokes a spiritual experience - every word is her child that she nurtures
- Katie starts with the intro, then goes in order through the paper
- Some of us allow the writing to take us on a journey - we don’t know where we might end
- Peter writes in fragmented paragraphs (dendrites?) then goes back and adds to them
- Janique teaches us about the Read and Write Google extension app that students can use to read their work back to them. We get a free sampling of it, actually, but I think that’s just an accident.
Our discussion leads us to some reflection on practice, lots of great ideas of how to embed this kind of metacognition in specific writing tasks through the year, and even a shout out to my undergraduate mentor and friend, Dr. Debbie Dean! Joe says something about rewarding himself (us?) with a piece of chocolate (or “something manly like jerky,” perhaps), and with that, we re-up our coffee and scones and launch into Demo Lesson Numero Dos!
MAGGIE HODGES makes us - GASP - move into new seats. A disruption of a two-day old writing routine is welcome, in my book. Getting a new perspective on the room and getting to sit between two Amys is quite the treat. We discuss and practice Nancy Atwell’s Writing Territories, adapted and modified, of course, by Maggie herself.
Writing Territories are a place to define ideas, topics, people, places, and memories that are worth writing about. A great kickstart to future morning pages. “They are something about which you have something to say,” Maggie explains. So I won’t write about dogs, for example. Got nothin’ to say about them. But poop emoji? Lots of opinions.
I like the graphics. It gets me off the computer. It gets me thinking like a 6th grader and unlocks the floodgates. It gives me direction. We draw Heart Maps of things we love (Richmond, VA! Snuggling! Peanut butter and chocolate!). We draw big question marks and write thing we wonder about (Why are toilets white? Can’t get past that question). We make long, long lists of things we dislike (anything with tentacles, the word tentacles, the poop emoji - you knew that was coming - DC traffic, four way stops, people who talk too much, unkept promises). We draw Passports about where we’ve been, and trace our hands to talk about our feelings and the experiences we’ve had that led us to feel those feelings.
And then, with all of this potential energy and lists upon lists of things we can write about -- our Writing Territories -- we scurry along to lunch before heading to our reading groups and finishing the day with more lists, more potential energy, and so, so much to write about as the Institute starts getting real. I think we all deserve some jerky. Turkey jerky.
Note About the Writing of This Ethnography. I typed this piece between 11:30 pm and 12:21 am on my Macbook Air. I had been taking notes on my laptop (in a Google Doc) all day during the ISI, and while I had to run errands all afternoon after leaving Mason, my mind was mulling over various approaches to writing the ethnography while I was away from it. I wish I could have gotten a run break in there, but it wasn’t gonna happen today. After I got everything out of the way - went to the grocery store, set up the party I’m hosting tomorrow, responded to outstanding emails, and put in a few loads of laundry - it was time to write. I guess I’m a procrastinator? I will admit, if I had more time, I’d have liked to have recorded today’s highlights in infographic form (ethnoinfography!), but alas, I had to settle for a more traditional approach because my time was limited. I found myself going back and reading it out loud once or twice, but because my brain felt tired, I just allowed myself to keep going. It’s easier for me to do that when I’m enjoying what I’m writing and when it’s not too complex. I’ll probably read it again to myself tomorrow morning during Morning Pages, though, because the stakes are higher with a public read-aloud and a publication on the blog. No bathroom breaks, no study burrito, a looming deadline and wam, bam, I’m done! ZZZZzzzzzz.
PPS - I think wrote too much.
July 6 - Day One
Introduction
The
first day of school is typically an exciting affair. The body is alight
with crackling activity. Synaptic pathways bathe in neurotransmitters.
The rat brain’s fight-or-flight mechanism serves up heaping plates of
epinephrine and cortisol until students’ sympathetic nervous systems cry
“uncle!” Students cast furtive glances around the room, sizing up
potential new crushes and avoiding last year’s misguided romances. The
first day of ISI isn’t much different, minus the crush stuff. Probably.
Starting
time is 9:00. Assistant directors arrive between 7 and 8. The director
lives here, I think. By 9:30 everyone except those stymied by Northern
Virginia’s maniacal traffic have arrived. ISI begins, as these things
often do, with a modicum of necessary administrative tedium. I-9’s are
filled out, parking passes are distributed, and ethnographies are
scheduled.
Administrative Stuff
Sarah,
our fearless leader (OFL), leads us in a round of ‘One Thing You
Probably Didn’t Know about Me.” These sorts of icebreakers follow the
dictum that you can learn more through a few moments of play than you
can through hours of work. I’m still unsure whether or not I think these
sorts of icebreakers are purposeful, but I know lots of people find
them helpful.
What
a wonderful cornucopia of individuals and experiences we have. What
follows is an incomplete sampling of ISI 2k15’s impressive human
capital:
-Career switchers
-Cancer survivors
-Reading specialists
-Rugby players
-College professors
-Slug haters
-Ferret owners
-Over one hundred years of teaching experience
-Cancer survivors
-Reading specialists
-Rugby players
-College professors
-Slug haters
-Ferret owners
-Over one hundred years of teaching experience
We
discuss the syllabus and expectations. We talk blogs, statements of
inquiry, writing groups, and reading groups. We discuss ISI’s four
dimensions of writing: for self, for the classroom, for
colleagues/admin, and for public/publication. And lastly we discuss the
two main tenets of the Writing Project:
- Teachers teach teachers.
- Teachers of writing must write.[1]
These two directives are so simple. And yet what power lives in them.
At
this point we break. Any teacher worth his or her salt knows when the
audience has hit a stopping point. We refresh and return. Then, we
write. Some plop down on the floor. Others put headphones in for a
soundtrack. Keys click, journals flip, and quickly the weight of
freshly-written words permeates the atmosphere. The Northern Virginia
Writing Project’s 2015 Invitational Summer Institute has officially
begun.
Reading and Writing Groups:
We
returned from lunch ready to dig into the good stuff. Reading Groups
are going to be awesome. We have all the major topics covered: creative
writing, technology, at risk youth, theory, workshop, and mentor texts.
Our capacity to learn is affected by time and not much else. This is
what teaching is all about. This community we are building has the power
to transform. This only happens when you’re willing to remove the yoke
of top-down control, to lift the veil and truly examine what’s going on
around you, inside you.
We
end with a discussion on Writing Groups. Our rules? Write stuff, read
your stuff, then talk with each other about it. That’s it. No
technocratic measurement. No transactional writing where I’m only
producing because I want something in return. Writing Groups are my
favorite part of ISI. We are born again as students, neophytes to the
written word. The space between us and the written page is both finite
and boundless. I remind myself to erase my ego and commit to being fully
present for every letter I write. To leave behind cynicism and irony
and plunge into the murky business of carving out a tiny chunk of
meaning from the dizzying totality of life. What a month this will be.
[1] I would like to add here Dr. Paul Thomas’ exhortation that teachers must become not only writers, but scholars of writing.
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