#becoming-teachers

[edrd345]

On Thursday, you jotted down keywords that express what it is that you value about teaching and learning. Here is the word cloud that I generated based on your jottings. 

The terms in bigger font were those that appeared more frequently across the class. Are there values that you think should be larger? Are there values here that maybe you didn't jot down, but that resonate with you in one way or another?

As we move into curriculum design and reading methods, we have to keep our values in mind - an even more important move amidst "school reform." 

[edrd345]

Pezzettino is every child who has ever walked into a classroom. 'Do I belong here? Does someone care about me?' Perhaps the lonely island Pezzettino is sent to does in fact represent school, where children are broken into pieces in order that adults may observe, label, and classify them. And having been so dissected, how does the child become whole again?

Paley, The girl with the brown crayon, pp. 53-54

One of my favorite quotes in any book I've read. 

[edrd345]

Teachers who understand how books function in their students' lives, and the value children place on books, have a head start in creating a learning environment that connects with children's personal worlds.

Owocki & Goodman, Kidwatching, p. 38.

This quote makes me think about what teachers value in terms of the encounters that students have with texts. A few times during the year, I will ask you to think explicitly about WHAT MATTERS to you when you think about your classroom, your interactions with students, and students' interactions with texts. I tend to agree with the authors in terms of valuing the connections between books (or other texts) children read the their personal worlds. I also really value children's pleasurable engagements with books as they are already-becoming lifelong learners. 

If I were to ask you this question today - what is it that you value for the children in your class? - what might your answer be?

[edrd345]

“Urging all of us to open our minds and hearts so that we can know beyond the boundaries of what is acceptable, so that we can think and rethink, so that we can create new visions, I celebrate teaching that enables transgressions - a movement against and beyond boundaries.”

bel hooks, Teaching to Transgress (p. 12)