This week, I observed an Intermediate Reading/Writing class at Global Launch. There were 12 students in the classroom, 8 males and 4 females. The students were from different cultural background. More than a half of them were from Middle East. The others were from Japan, China, Ecuador, and Vietnam. The lesson was on paraphrasing. The teacher had given a handout and homework about paraphrasing in the previous week.
At the first ten minutes, the teacher told that today they were going to have a short vocabulary quiz. Some students seemed aware, but some looked surprised about the test. The teacher gave the students five minutes to review the vocabulary on some pages from the text book. At that time, some students came late; the teacher told them how many minutes they were late.
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The test was five minutes short. There were ten words and ten definitions that need to be matched up. After finishing the test, the students were given a journal book and several topics to choose. The students wrote in their journal for about twenty minutes. They do the journal twice a week in the classroom. If they need more time to finish the journal, they are allowed to take it home. When the journal writing time was over, the teachers asked students to sit in their designated seats (the seat position are changed regularly to assure that students can work with different classmates).
The last forty five minutes of the class were spend on paraphrasing. The teacher started by asking the students what strategies they can use to paraphrase. The students who had read the handbook answered the question. They, then, look at some example of paraphrasing and determined what strategies were used by the author. Finally, the students paraphrase some sentences provided in the
Haas and Flower then provide an example [Page 177], of the differences of a student reader and an experienced reader. The example shows a remarkable difference between the two, the student reader was able to identify the situation and paraphrased what he found out. The experienced reader not only identified the situation, but provided a theory to attempt to explain what the author was trying to do; this is quite different than what the student reader provided. I believe Haas and Flower added the example to emphasize the difference of the conclusions that the student reader and the experienced reader came to. By adding the example, Haas and Flower were also able to support rhetorical reading and the difference it made between the readers. Haas and Flower then state the following: “While the student reader is mainly creating a gist and paraphrasing, the experienced reader does this and more – he then tries to infer the author’s purpose and even creates a sort of strident persona for the writer” [Haas and Flower, 177] The following quote is basically the description of the experiment, and explains the difference in the student reader’s response to the experienced reader’s
3. I will assess my student’s mastery of this objective by creating an open conversation within the entire class by asking questions, and before each student is dismissed, they will each hand in a piece of paper with one difference and similarity between the two texts written down.
As stated in my Week 3 Journal Entry, at one point I was helping in a classroom with a child who speaks Spanish. Instead of trying to force the child to speak English, I tried to use some basic Spanish when I worked with them in order to make the child feel more comfortable. I believe by making this small effort to speak the child’s native language that the child was more willing to participate in class and try to learn English. An additional example of making a relation from the text to a personal experience is when I was in elementary through high school. I did not realize until reading Spring’s book how little cultural diversity was taught in my elementary, middle, and high school. I went to school in a very Scandinavian county, and we did not have a lot of diversity. There were several students in the district who came from Hispanic, Asian, or African decent—but they were very few. I cannot recall a day when a teacher spent time to discuss a one of these student’s cultures, which is utterly ridiculous. With the amount of time spent in school and the amount of diversity in the world, it seems illogical to barely speak of ethnic and cultural diversity. Even though there were only a handful of students in the district from different cultures, it would have been beneficial to learn more about the rest of the world because when high school is done we all go out into that diverse world. I know I will take the time and make the effort to teach my future students about the beauty of diversity and
Draw a line down the middle of the board; write lion and lamb on the top of either side of the line. As a class come up with words describing a lion. Write these words on the board under the lion (i.e. angry, mad, big, brave, fierce, strong, etc.). Do the same of lamb (i.e. shy, quiet, gentle, friendly, etc.). Educator needs to write down words (on paper) in case a student was unable to complete task. Inform the class that they will be writing a multiple paragraph
Knutsen informed the students that they would be moving to the lab for the second period to begin their Scantron Assessment. He explained to them that the Scantron was an online test that allows you to answers questions based on math concepts you learned up to this point in your educational career. He informed them that every student in the building is taking the Math and Literacy tests and that you will use the computers in the lab to answer the questions. Next, Mr. Knutsen presented a few math topics on the SmartBoard in the form of review questions and asked the students to track the speaker and answer the question in their notebook. He set the timer for ten minutes and allowed the students to answer. When the timer rang, he asked students to go up to the SmartBoard, one by one, to answer the problems. The concepts reviewed in these problems were dividing fractions by fractions, creating a number line and solving equations. After the students wrote the answers on the board and Mr. Knutsen went through the problems, he moved on to the introduction of the Scantron
Question: Describe and explain the effect that a writer’s language techniques had on your understanding of a text you studied in class.
Mrs. Smith completed each assessment without a break, but took a 15-minutes in between each assessment. The measures were completed in a room
In preparation for each upcoming class students had required readings assigned as homework to be discussed in the next class time. Throughout this course’s timeframe we have had to read examples of poetry, fiction short stories, and essays. Even though each reading
+Analysing outcomes of the test and summarize it with some theories of need and motivation.
Learning about culture, language and fairness. It is important that educators must aware of the differences and similarity of the families and children. “Families communicate their culture’s values, beliefs, rules, and expectations to their children. What is acceptable in one culture may not be acceptable in another” (Edwards, 2010, p. 55).
Bazerman tries to give good explains to help people understand what the best way to paraphrase is but it still would be difficult for people who are unaware of how paraphrasing actually works. It really struck to me the way he explained that with paraphrasing, you have to try and be open minded. Basically, if you come in reading something with a specific mind set or a strong negative or positive opinion or outlook on the topic, then you will only see the words and things that go with your thoughts. Then, when you start paraphrasing, you will not be getting the main idea or concept of the topic and will probably be writing your own
The school that I visited was new. It was the first year of the school opening. The school board had combined two schools into one, so the students had to adjust to their new environments and new individuals. They seemed to be getting along well with each other. Since the school is new the teacher has to adjust to new problems that araise. Times for the subjects and times for using the computer labs change. So the teacher must always be fixable for anything. In this observation of this classroom I learned about the enjoyment of teaching. How you have to adapt to each of the students.
[20] 'Teachers are finding that students can use the same process in writing in school'
Two days a week in the morning, the children participate in a reading and writing block called “literacy and writing workshop.” The classroom is organized into five different levels with one group having one extra person; the levels are based on scoring of reading assessments. The groups are rotated so that each may spend 15 minutes cycles with either the teacher or Para-educator. The groups not with an instructor were to work on the “Daily-5” (explanation later) until their scheduled lesson. After the students finish their lesson, they are to fill the remainder of the workshop time working on “Daily-5.” This workshop is part of a regular routine. The students understand that after a reading a story with the teacher, they are verbally given a writing assignment. The assignment is usually to write a five sentence paragraph and color a picture related to the reading.
The students that I observed in the classroom were of middle to high school. I went to see 8th, freshman, 10th , and seniors classes, they seemed excited and very curious to why I was there. The middle school was more alive and rambunctious while I observed them. The High school kids were more relaxed, more comical. Some were paying attention while others seemed tuned out to the lecture or involved in socialization with friends within the class. By the end of the class Mr. Hasgil had restored the attention of everyone by using tactics such as history jeopardy with candy as the prize with the high school kids. In both he middle school and high school the kids were mostly Caucasian with a mixture of black, Asian , and Hispanic in the classes.