Recap

I believe that this is my penance for sharing my journal entry today, but I will graciously accept the challenge.

Recap for Tuesday, July 28th
Journal sharing was a melting pot of emotions today. We hope that Julie's friend will be o.k. We certainly hope that Tim works through his midlife crisis and that Caroline is in a much healthier place a year from now!!!

Our guest speaker Keith Sanzen put a nice twist on Critical Literacy. I loved the integration of Youtube into the literacy block. I especially liked how he introduced the levels of literacy in the beginning and was then able to reflect with students on all 3 levels throughout the year. On an elementary level however, we need to introduce just inferencing for example, separately and spend at least a month modeling and reviewing the strategy. I especially like how critical literacy does allow students to make connections to the world around them and work through solutions for problems they encounter.

Our handout discussions were truly engaging. Sue's article on "Willing to be Disturbed" taught us that it is ok to tell a student that you don't know the answer to a question rather than bs your way through it. It made me also realize that confusion and "different" is good. I truly believe that out of confusion comes clarity. More importantly, if we make the effort to understand why people are different it will help us to empathize. Empathy can only lead to open mindedness!

I like Caroline's artice on "When Kids Make Books" mainly because it was geared towards elementary teachers and 1/2 of us teach in an elementary school setting. It made me continue to believe that writing must be meaningful and engaging for our students. By allowing students to think of themselves as writers and publish their own books for example, the desire to write increases along with many other literacy skills.
Good luck to all presenters. I can't wait to hear all the presentations