http://www.perfect-english-grammar.com/grammar-exercises.html

Hi everybody!

I spent a few minutes looking at different English grammar sites.  I really liked this one.  It’s super detailed, and reminded of the exercises that we’re doing in Ela’s class right now.  We’re starting to get into all the past and present, perfect and progressive verbs right now.  I was able to find exercises on all of these combinations.

This site could definitely be used as a resource for English grammar classes here at Chico state!  Like I said, my pedagogical grammar class (372) is doing these exact exercises.

Today’s reading immediately reminded me of my experience last semester while doing my observing at Pleasant Valley High School.  I attended the last two periods of the day, on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays for a couple of months.  I would arrive right after the lunch period, and join the young teacher in her classroom about ten minutes before the bell would ring and the students would begin filing in.  On the first day of class, the teacher informed that the first period was her “good class,” while the second period was comprised of the “at risk” students.  Although they were all juniors, it was interesting that she made this distinction, and that she felt it necessary to tell me right away.  It might just be because this comment resonated with me, but I feel like this was one of the first things she told me after introducing herself.  She specified the second periods “at risk” status by stating that none of them were likely to attend college after high school.  This seemed like a strange thing to say about a group of sixteen and seventeen year old students.  Regardless of their background, or current work ethic, as a future high school teacher, I feel like one of my duties will be to do anything in my power to inspire them to seek higher education.  So it was very surprising to me to hear from this young teacher that she had essentially written them off as college students.

Over the next few months, it became clear that she was teaching the two classes much differently, although I truly could not tell the difference between the students in the two classes.  The only major discrepancy was the number of students in each classroom.  The “at risk” group had only sixteen students left from a class of originally over thirty students.  All the others had apparently dropped out of school.  What remained was a group of students that I was excited to meet with every day, who continuously surprised and delighted me with their inquisitiveness and willingness to listen and learn.  The other period, which was still at about thirty students, moved at a much faster pace, but didn’t exhibit any greater capacity to learn than the other students.  But, as the semester progressed I noticed that the teacher moved at a much faster pace, and trusted these students with more intensive reading and analysis, while the other class slowly, and often painfully moved through the material.  Her lessons were more simplistic, and in my opinion facilitated a less conducive environment for working.  Where one the first class was encouraged to engage in group projects and discussions, the second class was essentially guided through each and every period by the hand.

The lessons for the second class were typically short and to the point, rarely challenging the students to think outside the box.  Some of these students were clearly frustrated with the pace of the class.  One of the students, a sharp kid named Derrick would finish every in class reading on his own, and answer any questions she had posed for the reading within a matter of minutes.  Then he would sit quietly in the back and make faces at the rest of the class as they did what was called a “popcorn” in class reading.  Basically this was a painfully slow reading exercise where they would each read a paragraph or two from their books, then pick another student from the class to read next.  It became a big joke basically because none of them wanted to read, so they delighted in picking on each other.  After a couple paragraphs, the student would stop reading, smile and choose whoever had picked on them in the past, getting their revenge.  The other period rarely did in class reading at all.  They were expected to do the reading on their own, then spend the class discussing the significance of the text, guided by the questions posed by the teacher the day before.

I felt like the second period would have benefited much more from the method used for the other class.  From what I could tell, the marginalized techniques used for teaching them played directly into the teacher’s conception of their learning abilities, and the conception of themselves.  First of all, they knew why they were all in that class together.  On numerous occasions I heard them refer to themselves as the “stupid class” and other self degrading classifications.  What frustrated me was they seemed absolutely as capable as the other students, but essentially weren’t given the same opportunities to showcase their abilities.  The few occasions where class discussions weren’t inhibited by mundane worksheets or in class readings, all these unique students proved to be very interested in the subjects, and more than willing to express their views on the texts.  I think that the watered down atmosphere created in the second period stymied their creativity, and in many cases inhibited a healthy learning environment.  The article reinforced all of my views on this subject, and further inspired me to push back against the concept of remediation.  I saw first hand how this can be detrimental to students, and I can’t wait to have an opportunity to let the brilliance shine from each of my students.  If given the right environment to learn, I’m confident that everyone has something special to offer a classroom of their peers, and me as an educator.

 

I spent a good part of this afternoon trying to think of what to do for our weekly gallery walk.  After struggling with the fact that I’m not very creative, and should probably just stick to a weekly blog, I truly realized its value.

For this week, and potentially the rest of the semester, I’m going to use this blog space to become a more interactive reader.  As I try to make sense of the numerous texts, I’ll use my weekly blog to: summarize the content, draw focus to the main points, define important vocabulary, discuss difficult concepts, identify important people, tie in the text to my own experiences, and pose further questions.

I’ll be able to this as a resource while we are in class because I always have the course site running anyways.  Also, if any other students in the class are having trouble understanding the text, they could use my blogs to get the gist of it.

For tomorrow’s class session we are required to read two different texts.

For this blog I’ll focus on Muriel Harris’s chapter of College English.

Basically this paper is about the many benefits of tutoring, compared with teaching in the college setting.  Most of the arguments made in favor of tutoring are concepts that would apply to any writing for school.  Muriel describes tutors in a writing workshop as “middle-men” somewhere in between teachers and students.  Because students are able to meet face to face with tutors, and do not have the same pressures that come with the classroom setting, and the often strained teacher-student relationship, they are more comfortable in the workshops, and communication is fostered.

Two key phrases that stuck out to me were: exploratory language, and presentational language.

Probably all of us had the experience in our first year of college, and perhaps still today in new classroom settings, of being tongue tied in class while trying to communicate an idea to a teacher.  I know in my freshman year at Humboldt State I tried to participate in class discussions, but more than once I completely forgot what I was going to say when the teacher finally called on me to speak.  The pressure of trying to sound educated in front of the teacher, and the other students was too much for me even though I had never had a problem speaking in public.  Muriel argues that this is because of the presentational language that is used in the classroom.

The exploratory language that is more applicable in the writing workshops is much more conducive to learning, especially in terms of writing which can be very abstract.  The thought processes behind any given writing assignment can require hours of just thinking about the topic before any real work can be done.  Having a conversation with a tutor, rather than listening to a lesson from a teacher, offers a student a perfect opportunity to really hash out their ideas on their own terms.  With the help of some guiding questions from the tutor the student has the right tools to  make decisions for themselves on what direction to go with the assignment.  This concept really struck me because I’ve seen it so many times, and experienced it myself.  A particular student will struggle to formulate an idea when speaking to the teacher, but given a smaller group of just students, they have no problem discussing the content.

Tutors in writing workshops serve a variety of purposes, but probably the most valuable is their ability to serve the individual needs of each student.  Because they have the opportunity to see exactly what is causing problems for the student, and try to help them with that specifically, tutors usually offer more than teachers in that capacity.  Whether its the tools and tips for becoming a more confident writer, or just understanding the material better, a writing workshop is undoubtedly a more proficient learning environment than the classroom.  Students not only learn how to understand and complete their assignments, they also learn about their own abilities as a student, and how they can potentially use the tools acquired in the workshop to move forward in their academics.

One thing I’d like to learn more about are the actual techniques used by tutors to get the most out of the students without doing the work for them.  This is a question I’ve often wondered because most of the time when I try to help someone with writing, I find myself taking over their assignment.  I’d like to learn more about the right questions to ask, in order to make the students find the answers on their own, and be proud of that process.  As an aspiring teacher this was a fascinating read because it can be applied to every aspect of teaching.  Although I will find myself at one end of the spectrum, the benefits of tutoring can ideally bridge the gap between teachers and students.  Hopefully someday I’ll be able to break down that barrier which exists in the classroom, and provide the personal attention to individual needs that is so valuable to students.

 

 

 

During our last class meeting we broke up into our groups to discuss Chapter 3 from Lave and Wenger’s Situated Learning.  After wrestling with some of the key concepts within the text, focusing primarily on the section that focuses on Alcoholics Anonymous, we looked at how some of our own abilities developed outside of the school setting.  I volunteered to record some of the notes taken from this group conversation, and some interesting consistencies and parallels between our own experiences and those described in the text emerged.  We agreed that some skills require more than just reading about and then doing, which is typically what school settings require.  Reading, or hearing about fishing, for example, could never fully prepare someone for the intricacies of preparing a fishing line for catching a fish.  Especially in the example that Evan used of fly fishing, it would be almost impossible to translate the techniques involved in fly fishing through a written text of some kind, and a written test would be equally useless.  Fly fishing, like most skills, requires legitimate peripheral participation to fully understand the form and function of the skill.

Another example, used by David, was learning to sail without any nautical language to fall back on, but simply observation and action.  His experience was similar to Ethan’s, but David took in one step further.  He explained that his sailing skills were adequate because of hours spend participating in the act of sailing, despite a very limited knowledge of the proper terminology which would undoubtedly come up on a basic sailing quiz.  This notion works toward the same logic as the other example but in reverse.  It makes sense that doing something will undoubtedly make you more comfortable with the skills required to do it effectively.  But simply knowing the words and the context for a certain ability, like sailing, does little to prepare you for the actual act of sailing.  Although I’m basically making the argument that participation is a better way to learn than studying at a safe distance with the help of worksheets and test, sometimes the stability and framework provided by an school or learning institution can be very valuable in supplementing an apprenticeship.

Mitch was a great example of this.  The ability he focused on was his phonetic prowess.  He began this journey outside of school by listening to Japanese dramas on the radio.  He had a good ear for accents and could accurately pronounce the Japanese words with no training.  Although he was able to refine this skill by persisting himself, school provided a more concrete base to learn about the language.  We didn’t bring this up in class but I wonder if being immersed in a Japanese city Mitch would have honed this skill more quickly.  I’m sure that with his natural ability and interest in the language Mitch could have achieved the same level of skills in speaking Japanese without the degree in Japanese.  He would have been provided with the opportunity for legitimate peripheral participation  extremely close to the source, therefore allowing for his growth without the constraints of school, probably resulting in a more intuitive and practical understanding of the language.

Megan’s assessment of her dancing skills was very similar.  She was influenced by her older sister who was involved in dancing.  Her sister inspired and encouraged her to pursue dancing in a “company” where she was able to practice more and hone her skills.  So, what begins as an interest without the established goals of a school setting, develops into skill that is supplemented by the structure of a dancing company and individual lessons.  But dancing, like fishing, cannot simply be talked or read about to fully grasp the nuances of movement and rhythm.  Megan had to practice this skill for countless hours to get better.  She didn’t read about dancing and then take a text on the various movements that she would be using.

Choua and I expanded on all of these concepts, while adding some of our own assessments of the text, and our skills learned beyond the scope of schooling.  Choua talked about playing soccer, and the sense of identity that comes from actually playing a sport.  She talked about the fact that she thought of herself as a soccer player despite athletic ability.  The fact that she participated made this a fact, which I thought was a fascinating concept.  It would be very difficult to identify yourself as something if you had never experienced that particular thing!  So now we have an example of LPP making an impact beyond the realm of learning, into how it can affect how someone potentially perceives themselves.  If given the opportunity to actually practice at a certain skill, someone could essentially recreate their perception of themselves.  The satisfaction of accomplishment can be a powerful thing, especially in the midst of people that don’t necessarily have confidence in your ability.  Proving something to yourself is ultimately what matters most, and the atmosphere of an apprenticeship can potentially provide someone with this.

Below are the actual comments made by during the our conversation by means of word processor.  Some of the vocabulary comes straight from the group while a paraphrased some as well.  Overall I thought this was a valuable resource because we see some common language used that lends itself to the diction throughout the reading, specifically words like practice, immersion, and experience.

Mitch: Phonetic ability. Good listener.  Radio dramas (Japanese).  Persisted.  Able to mimic the accents.  Stumbled into the ability.  School contributed to existing abilities.  Framework and practice.

Megan: Dance. Older sister’s influence. Inspired and encouraged.  Joined company.  Individual lessons.  Coach for technique and self-motivation.  Teams and friends.

David: PRACTICE!!  Do it! Apprenticeship!

Learning to sail without reading or writing.

Immersion in the practice!

Evan: Fishing hunting and backpacking.  Observing first then doing.  It would be hard to read about fishing and then go do it.  So much complexity in fly fishing.  Skills far exceed the language.

Choua: Experience and practice in becoming a good goalie.  Want to compete and communicate. Being positive in the face of adversity.  Self motivation.  But also using negativity to motivate.  Label who you are.

Travis:  Communication skills.  Try to listen more than talk. Followed parents example.