The Project School

I have come to really love the Project School. the kids are great fun to work with and I love the environment the school has worked hard to create. It feels warm and safe at the Project School. I think morning meeting is a great idea as it allows kids to start off the day in a familiar and relaxed setting. One morning, I recall playing a game with the students called wizards, giants, and elves. I was great fun watching the students come up with different poses for each character. We then went outside and played the game by pairing up. Another morning, we greeted each other with an action card. Each card gave a specific action or mood and the child had to greet someone while acting out the command on the card. the children then had to guess what action was on their card. It was a lot of fun.

I look forward to the day I can do such things with my students!

Genres in Research

In class I enjoyed being able to see the different genres we can use in our research. My partner and I decided to do a movie review of B .F. Skinner. I feel we did a good job. The project we did in class gave me so many more ideas. At first I wasn't sure how to turn my topic into a different genre, but I think I get it now.

I may do an interview with teachers and B.F Skinner. Or maybe I'll do a survey.
I'm not sure exactly what I am going to do, but I feel that I have better understanding of what we can do.

Oh The Stories They Will Tell

As I walked around the room I asked students what they were writing about. Some would be more than ecstatic to show me their work, others were a bit more timid. As i read the different stories around the room I found that many had such sorrowful tales to tell. One student wrote about how his aunt died the day after Christmas. Another told of her dad losing his job. And, perhaps the saddest of them all was a girls story of how her dad died when she was young and her mother lost her job and her dog ran away and how her uncle was now living with them but that he was expected to die soon as well. I didn't know what to say. How tragic it must be to live in this students shoes. Children are such precious things, they shouldn't have to face the tragedies of this world.
Kids have so many stories to tell. Writing becomes a venue for the sad tragedies of their lives, but also the joy in their lives.
Aside from the sad, sad tales, I found stories of adventure and travel.
It's amazing what a young kid can experience and write about.
This experience only strengthens the need for a writers workshop.

My Multigenre Research Paper

I think I've decided on a topic for my research paper. I will more than likely write about conditioning and manipulation in our everyday lives and society. My last research paper was in high school, I wrote about a "sadistic society" in which i used to psychology to explain and show how everyone can be and are sadistic. So i thought maybe I should write an opposite on masochism, but I felt that would be too similar to my last paper and that i should focus on a different topic. Though maybe i will write about masochism in my own time. Who knows?

reflection

Today was our field experience and I am with the 6-8 kids. Usually, my teacher teaches math, but today, I switched with another teacher who was teaching writers workshop. The teacher covered the three main points as expressed in "Reading with Meaning". She began with a mini lesson about using detail in writing. She then allowed the students to do their own writing. I got to work one on one with a student who was struggling with this concept. I think the student started to grasp the idea by the end of the day. The teacher then ended with a reflection and sharing of ideas from the children. It was so exciting seeing the ideas in the books we read being used in the classroom.

I'm looking forward to next week. Though I hope I get to stay with that teacher, I enjoyed working with the kids during writers workshop. I'm not very good at math and I feel like I can't help as much in the math classroom.

That's all I have to say for today.

Thanks

Inquiry In Writing Article

After reading the inquiry in writing article, I must say that I really agree with and like what this teacher was doing. By allowing her students to read articles that are written in a co-ed way, she is allowing them to see the different styles of writing. I was very impressed with the writing samples from the two fifth grade students. It was clear that they knew what they were writing about and how they wanted to write it. As teachers, it is our job to help kids explore the world of writing. Like the author of the article said, I have never found any writing in the real world that was set up in the five paragraph way with a thesis in the first paragraph.

After reading the first few chapters in the book, About the Authors, I've come to have a more clear view about how a writing workshop should be set up and how well students can flourish in an environment that allows for discoveries and exploration.

The readings make me excited about becoming a teacher. I have so many ideas I want to try.

Day 2 of class

I really enjoyed the project we did. I wish we had had more time. I feel like i learned a lot about the people around me. I loved how the teacher showed us different examples of the spelling techniques we read about.

I don't really have much else to say. I'll try to type more next time.

Bye