Olivares_AnnotationWorkshop_02/28/13

1) The process for consuming the text for me is to read it and take notes as I go through on Google docs. The reason for this is because there is a lot of information and since I have to summarize it later, it is good to be jotting down notes, quotations, unusual words, and key phrases for later. This also helps me keep a map of where in the text something was said so that I can go back if needed. If this text was more in a story format, genre, I wouldn’t need to use this technique, but because of its nature, no matter the interesting information, I will get bored and drift off if not concentrating fully.

2) I briefly looked up on a slide show about how to annotate a piece. It gave me some useful and non useful information. Connecting the text to myself, the text, and the world was useful. Looking for the plot of a character’s actions wasn’t that helpful.

3) This text helped me because it connected with the text we read in class last time about genre theory. For example, the author of the text I read made reference to the fact that defining genres is difficult because they are dynamic, changing, and a social communication tool.

Olivares_Annotated Rough Draft_02/28/13

Joining the Club:

A Suggestion about Genre in Early Jewish Texts

            This journal seemed an odd choice, but religion fascinates me so I thought I’d give it a read. What’s interesting is that the author makes references to what we read about Genre Theory in class. That they were dynamic, changing, and rely on a social communication with the language. The author, Benjamin G. Wright 3^rd, wrote the paper with the goal of defining Wisdom and Apocryphal genres through the prototype theory. The prototype theory is a more abstract way of defining genres and is a big move from how wisdom genres were typically formed in the past by biblical scholars. An example is probably the best way to look at what prototype theory. Imagine yourself seeing a new animal for the first time. Most humans wouldn’t make a mental list of the parts that this creature has. They would make the connection based off of other animals that they have seen. If the said animal was say a bird, we’d classify it as a bird because it looks like animals we’ve already classify as birds. Most wouldn’t make a mental checklist of the parts that the animal has or doesn’t have. The prototype theory works in a similar fashion. It doesn’t describe a set of characteristics that make a genre a genre, but has examples that define the genre and radiates from that. By making the connections between texts you get an expanding genre that goes from the “best” examples to the “fringe” examples that begin to encroach on the territory of other genres. Biblical scholars in the past tended to create genres based on classification, definition, and on a list of features. But, according to Wright, this is limiting because it creates exclusionary categories that make it so either a piece fits in a genre or it doesn’t. It’s also limiting because it fails, in the authors opinion, to make connections between different texts which is the overall goal of his paper, to make connections of wisdom and apocalypse genres to the spectrum of Early Jewish Literature.

Olivares_ShafferAttempt_02/21/13

The Shaffer process is good for beginners, but it lacks the ability to fully challenge students to advance their writing. Limiting writing to a pre-constructed format is not good. Some students may want to write more than how much space can fit into the space of two sentences for their commentary. Or maybe they can get it done in one sentence, but have to then think of some trivial point to put into the paragraph to fill the quota. “Writing formulas are attractive, precisely because they render the ‘messy’ more manageable.” The appeal of the structured writing form makes it easier to grade because kids know what to expect and teachers can easily find a benchmark to consistently grade. And if it is the only system the students know they can be good at it, but they are limited and inefficient when it comes to other writing. Students should know and understand the Shaffer method because it does provide some valid information on structure and id terms, but it they should not limit themselves to just this form.

"The Truth will set you free, but first it's going to piss you off"

Wooly Ess
Concept Art Forum

funny little comic

Olivares_Formulaic Writing_2/18/13

            Whether or not you argue for using the Jane Shaffer method, one thing is clear and that is that the Shaffer method has limits and should not be stuck with just this method at your disposal. It is a valid method and it does teach important concepts structural concepts like paragraphs, intros, and conclusions, but it’s a beginner’s tool. “Teachers, while acknowledging that students must move beyond the Schaffer method if they are to continue improving, were nevertheless left wondering what to do next. Unfortunately, there is no next in the Schaffer approach.” The method if followed to the letter doesn’t give the students the room to be creative and that’s what should be taught after the Shaffer method; the ability to go beyond this simple structure and expand on important ideas and talk about your opinions. Shaffer s claims that “students resist writing commentary because it means they must say what they think, a task they are not used to and one they find difficult.” If this is difficult then the next step is to find ways for the students to practice writing their opinions. This could be done by giving the students more leeway in their topic selection so that they can write about something that deeply interests them. Writing essay types like persuasion and pro and con with an emphasis on the getting the writers ideas expressed. Or even having them speak out loud in small and large groups, or individually about their opinions so that they can get those out. Students need to know that their thoughts matter and finding ways to encourage that is giving the students a path to success; one that can be expanded on in new and different ways.

            I remember in high school having a method of writing essays that reminds me a lot of the Jane Shaffer method. I don’t believe any of my teachers taught it with that name, but there are similarities to the style and I remember using that style for a while. When I was just starting out and I felt stuck not knowing what to write I used this formulaic method of writing my papers. Luckily for me I didn't feel constrained by the style and I didn’t stay with it for all my writing. I attribute this to my voracious reading habits. But I understand that some students might feel very comfortable using this style and may stick with it because they are not confident that they can do it another way.

            I agree with James Collins that this method should be taught as just one of many strategies to choose from. The Shaffer strategy may get students the grade, but it lacks the ability to transform writing from a boring school subject to something that the students can get into and willingly use for the rest of their lives. We should be training these students in a way that gets them to want to write in their lives and not just for a grade.

Mind Blowing Quote of the Week

you know hippos. Those big, fat water land animals that swim in the river. Yeah those big  guys can run 19 mph <30 kph>. So unless you run at the Olympic level that's faster than you.



BOOM!!

Olivares_Larson/Maier Discussion quote_02/14/13

Poetry is what I was taught back in elementary school, and middle school, and high school, but it was never something that was truly mine. I didn't write poems on my own free will. I didn't even read many poems. And yet the poetic style and structure was pushed on me when I felt that I didn't even want to write a poem. It wasn't until this past Fall that my view on poetry changed drastically. Love That Dog was a book we read during my English 341 class that portrayed a fictional young boy that we could relate to. He didn't want to write poems because he thought he couldn't. And yet his teacher showed him that writing poems was more than just making words rhyme. It was more than having similes and metaphors, personification and hyberboles. In the same way Professor Kittle showed me the joy of reading and writing poetry. I got interested and wrote in different styles of poetry that were presented. Now I even have a favorite style of poetry, the Sestina. I even wrote a Sestina for my girlfriend this Valentine's day. Can't wait to give it to her this weekend

Olivares_Co-Authoring Classroom Texts_02/13/13

            What surprised me in this text was how much time the students spent on reading. The students started off taking two or three books home a night and ended the year taking ten or twelve books by the end of the year. The books were probably not long, but it's still hard to imagine a group of kids who like reading so much that they'd spend so much of their out of class time doing it. I have friends who read a lot and I know my mom and I can spend hours reading a book, but I consider us outliers amongst other people who feel they have better things to do besides reading. So when a teacher can get a whole class to pick up voracious reading I must say I am impressed.

            "Her belief that all her students were fundamentally authors contributed to an overall atmosphere of excitement, perhaps even a magical enthusiasm about writing." Young children have so much to tell us, even if we don't always have time to listen to them. To teach that they can enjoy telling us those things in written words has many advantages. One is that once they have written those words down they can go back over them and see how they have improved. They can also think about their thinking by going over what they wrote. Maier’s method for Co-Authoring was interesting, fun, and most importantly could be imitated by other instructors. I enjoyed how the students were able to chip in with the story and catching certain words, like working, to put on their list of –ing words. That kind of attentiveness lets you know that the students are paying attention and that they are able to understand past lessons.

            A really nifty rule that this text showed me that I could implement in my class was "read to three then me." It gets the students to show off their work and have it peer reviewed. I also think that it would help improve students grammar and spelling by comparing their own writing with each other and having the teacher help at the end, which is another rule that I enjoyed in the text. The teacher didn't correct for mistakes until after the students had finished their work. This gets the students in the habit of proofreading their work and also getting all of their ideas out so that they have plenty to write with. Sometimes as writers we get so caught up in what is the right word or how the scene should progress, but good writers rarely ever get it down right the first time. They have to go over their work and ask themselves if anything is missing, is there enough detail, does the story make sense, and other such questions. I agree with the premise that students should be this involved in being the author. Getting the students to see the joys of reading from the author’s view point is a wonderful teaching tool and gets them to practice important skills in a way that they can enjoy. I will definitely try to implement the ideas that this text has brought to me in my future classroom.

Olivares_BookchoiceHW_02/13/13

I chose the book Nonfiction Matters because I don't know how to teach nonfiction as fun. That is not a style of writing that I would typically look for in a book store. So to inspire a student through my own experiences with nonfiction would be difficult to say the least because I don't have much experience in the first place.

The books description says that it can show how students can read expository text, get engaged in research, and write nonfiction that is captivating and full of voice. When I thought about this and compared it to my reservations about teaching nonfiction I realized that there could be a lot of potential in teaching nonfiction to children at an early age. After all, the easiest way to get a student to write about something they enjoy and what can be more beneficial than writing about something in real life that relates to you. A younger student could write a story about their family that is engaging and interesting and full of detail. An older student can write about a role model or someone they admire deeply. When I think about the genre of nonfiction in this way I see that there is a lot more to it than I assumed at first. I would like to learn some of the strategies that this book has to offer so that when I have my classroom I can feel inspired to teach this genre of writing.

Blog Reading Assignment 2

The only way that this person says to be able to study and find a definition for literature is through ethnographies. I had to look this up, but its the scientific description of the customs and cultures and people. Its a term I learned in my anthropology class. It makes sense that to understand what literacy is in our modern world you have to understand what people use literacy for. Most students in school hate assigned reading, but tend to read many different things, some of them not considered traditional reading. and many students hate assigned writing. I myself am not happy having to write this blog at 10:21 at night. Yet students write a lot outside of the school settings for their own personal use. The way people use reading and writing is definitely what literature is about. Students now use reading and writing as communication tools across an electronic medium. This medium is entirely new and  the experience has begun to change the language of writing. Texting and emoticons have created new ways of expressing thoughts and ideas. Should this new revolution be treated as writing and be included as literature? 

"We are inheritors- if unwilling inheritors - of another nineteenth century perspective, one of distrust of mass society and culture, if not simply of the masses themselves." I have heard many people think that the reading patterns of the youth today is degrading as they see them moving away from traditional reading. But should we judge the youth so harshly. After all, most of these kids are reading, but not reading what we want them to. A study in my English class that we saw took high school kids and measured how much they read the assigned reading and how much they read outside of class. The students read maybe 0 to 3 of the assigned readings that year, but outside the classroom the reading they did was closer to 20 books and higher that year. The youth today wants to read, but they want to read what they want to read. That isn't so bad an idea. There could be some books that are a must read for students, but the most important thing that should be accomplished is creating a culture where reading is accepted and enjoyed. We should not be shoving the classics down the throats of students who will then learn to hate reading and think themselves poor readers because of it.

Mind Blowing Quote of the week

Picture this in your head. Your traveling down the freeway at 80 mph. Now imagine yourself reaching for that radio to change the station. That hand of yours. . . is traveling faster than 80 mph.



BOOM!

Curriculum as a means, not an end

As a great pirate once said, the Pirate Code is really more of guidelines.

So to are the curriculum guidelines that direct the learning experience. In Dewey they talk about the perfect classroom setting where the child states his experiences and his misconceptions are corrected. Where statements are made, inquiries arise, topics are discussed, and the child continually learns. This is the direction that schools are heading to now as opposed to a standardized test school. the standardized test were meant to measure a child's performance, which isn't a bad idea, but instead a culture of teaching to take a test instead of teaching to learn arose. I remember and still practice hints and tips for figuring out the answers to multiple choice problems that i don't know and understand. We need to get on the track towards having the children learn in a way that makes them yearn for more knowledge, not discourage them from seeking it.

"There are two challenges to overcome when writing. The first is worrying about what to write about when you start. The second is trying to stop writing after you've started."

The School and the Life of the Child

https://docs.google.com/document/d/15-D2dOFYW2HJKZX6sseP_5gzeBhq3i_nvMBgc5zgReg/edit?usp=sharing

“Think of the absurdity of having to teach language as a thing by itself” (page 49). This article talks about shifting the gravity of the education experience. That the life of the child should be what is most important in the education of the child. As to language this does seem absurd, yet I remember language being forced on me and others who didn’t want it. When I was younger and we had our reading levels assessed mine was higher than average, so I was forced to choose from a selection of books that didn’t really appeal to me. . .

Quote

"No one is paying as much attention to your failures as you are."