Christian's Blog; Teaching's of Literature

I read Edgar Allan Poe’s The “Bells” (pg. 785-787). The bells in this poem are all different and represent different meanings. We have the silver bells, “Silver bells!/ What a world of merriment their melody foretells! / How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, /  In the icy air of night!” (785). These silver bells represent joy and merriness in the winter times. Other bells are the golden bells, “Hear the mellow wedding bells / Golden bells! / What a world of happiness their harmony foretells! (785). These golden bells ring to mark the bond of marriage of man and woman in a joyful way. As the poem goes on, each stanza starts with describing the ringing of new kind of bell. The third stanza mentions brazen bells, and the fourth is iron. The poem begins with joyfulness and happiness with beautiful looking bells, then transitions with terror and melancholy. What I like about this poem is its mystery that surrounds it. I feel like this poem was dedicated to his wife that died in 1847. “Th...

Batman: The Long Halloween By: Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale "Jeph Loeb has crafted a story that is unique to the characters. It's a complex murder mystery, but it's also a Batman story." - Yannick Belzil Plot Taking place shortly after the events of Frank Millers Batman: Year One , this novel focus around Batman’s earlier days of crime fighting in a noir-ish mystery tale. The Long Halloween focuses on the crimes of a mysterious murderer named Holiday, who kills a members of Gotham City’s mobsters and corrupt officials on major holidays. The Caped Crusader works with district attorney, Harvey Dent, and GCPD captain, James Gordon, to solve this mystery. While stopping this crime, Batman and the GCPD are still at war with the two most powerful families in Gotham, Falcone and Maroni. As there are speculations and most likely theories, the true identity of the killer is still a mystery today. What was your rationale? For whom is this text appropriate? This g...

The Round House is a novel by American writer Louise Erdrich. The ROund House is told from the perspective of Joe, a young boy. Joe's mother, Geraldine, was a strong beautiful woman at first read, then she was raped. This made his mother empty and fall into a deep depression. Hoe and his father, Bazil, try to help Geraldine and get her out of the house and have her live once again. Joe take the responsible role, a coming of age type role, and helps his father with the case of convicting his wife's rapist. What a powerful story, I for sure would use this text in the classroom. This reminds me of a statistic I found last year when hearing that native woman are mostly raped and the case is never solved. According to an additional New York Times article, “American Indian women are raped and sexually assaulted at a rate four times the national average. They are also 10 times as likely to be murdered than other Americans” (New York Times). I think this reading can bring up topic...

Teaching students how to read is probably one of the most challenging aspects of teaching. They are all challenging do not get me wrong, but this is a big one. Teaching how to pronounce words and sound them out is one thing, teaching them to understand the context of the reading and analyze the literature is a different thing. As students progresses in school, reading literature becomes more difficult. Using tools to help students read and understand it is the job of an educator, and we should use all the strategies that we can find. To teach students how to read literature and understand the context, you must know strategies. In chapter 9, “What's the Plan?”, strategies of how to read are available with examples following them. A strategy I found most useful is “stopping the readings”. That is right, stopping the reading. A good reader stops when they do not know something or if they do know something. Good readers use the information that they know to help them understand they...

I read an online article called "Introduction: Creating Classroom for Equity and Social Justice". A short read, yet what I found most interesting was that this articles main point was to change the minds of teachers to rethink the way they teach. This article defined social justice is justice in terms of distributing opportunities and privileges. Social justice is for the people as it includes "the lives of all those in our society, especially the marginalized and dominated" (1). Basically, social justice is creating a working community in the classroom. A social justice classroom offers more to the students rather than a traditional classroom. A traditional classroom leaves very little room for students to incorporate their own thinking, involvement, and initiative. A social justice based classroom would give students the opportunity for their own thinking and challenge knowledge, such as questioning reading for example. That is not all what happens when we ...

It is  a philosophy of mine that students will interact more and pursue the knowledge in the classroom if the topic is something that they can relate to. Reading the International Journal of Reading I learned more on how to put relatable topics in my curriculum, and also learned how to shape it in a way for them to learn. It is easy to teach students something fun they can have fun with, but I do not take in regard that they still need to learn. The hip-hop project stuck with me and made me think over my unit plan. Students in this project were studying hip-hop. Not just to learn some new hip-hop artists or new songs, but to understand the impact of hip-hop and various other reasons in a relatable way for students. Students were experiencing the effect of hip-hop in their lives, why not put it in the learning process. This project helped students decipher hip-hop lyrics and discover the meaning, understanding the world we live in and out hip-hop society, and comparing hip-ho...

“The outstanding characteristic of this narrative education, then, is the sonority of words, not their transforming power. "Four times four is sixteen; the capital of Para is Belem." This quote stuck with me in the readings because I have been through this process as a student. As it continues, “The student records, memorizes, and repeats these phrases without perceiving what four times four really means, or realizing the true significance of "capital" in the affirmation "the capital of Para is Belem," that is, what Belem means for Para and what Para means for Brazil.” Memorization and not learning the true content is such an applicable thing I see in classrooms. Teachers deposit information into the students brains. All the students have to do is receive, memorize, and repeat for the rest of their scholarly life. Yes, this banking method is important to remember terms and methods, but it is not learning; it is memorizing. This method does not ...

Standards‐based grading and reporting (SBGR) allows teachers to report back to students and families a more accurate depiction of a students achievements and shortcomings. As a teacher, I would want to show students an accurate picture of what they have learned and what they need to improve on. I find it astonishing how teachers in today's society still have trouble with responding to a students grades. I am a college student and still struggle with knowing what I need to improve on from a professors horrible feedback. It takes a great professor to sit down with a students and help them in their time of need. I want to praise my students in every chance they get on improvement. I want their confidence to shoot to the stars as I praise their work and make them work harder when I tell them they must improve. Like it says in the S econdary Standards‐ Based Grading and Reporting Handbook, "When a student makes progress they feel motivated and more successful because enhancing per...

As a teacher, I would want all my students to explore different dimensions of arguments as I ask different rhetorical questioning from a reading. I want these students to question the readings. In the article  Expository Reading and Writing Course Assignment Template  it is said that teachers recommend students to read “with the grain”. In re-reading a text, it is important for students to read “against the grain”. After this process, this is where students start to question and annotate the author, reading, and the meaning of the reading. To get students to think critically is a great method to transition your students thinking from asking normal questions about literature to deeper questioning and understanding. I remember the best moments in my English classes was when my professor would question the writer and the reasoning behind his writing. To do this you would need to think of logic (logos), ethos (ethical), and pathos (emotions). After a certain reading of a po...

         The Common Core State Standards is an act established by states to set general goals for a students learning to help guide them through K through 12. As future teachers, your primary goal should be helping students reach their full potential. To do so, teachers look to the Common Core State Standards. It is said that you must “adopt your school’s curriculum mandates tied to the Common Core State Standards”. As important as that is, this quote is followed by the choice of developing your own ways of teaching into the framework of what's mandatory, Common Core State Standards. The Common Core State Standards are somewhat guidelines into teaching, for you should adopt status quo spaces and curriculum while at the same time adopt your own way of teaching or experimenting new ways of teaching. This includes determining what is read, written, taught; as well as what ideas and topics that will be covered in the classroom. The Common Core State Standards ar...