On the margins in a high-performing high school: Policy and the Struggling Reader

Franzak, J. (May 2008). On the margins in a high-performing high school: Policy and the struggling reader. Research in the Teaching of English, 42(4). pp. 466-505.

In this article, Franzak sets about to answer the following questions: "What constitutes 'policy' in secondary school reading and literature study" and "In the context of how it is constituted, how does reading/literature policy shape the experience of struggling readers in a traditional high school English class?" (Franzak, 2008, p. 467). She finds there is a disconnect between state/district created policy and its implementation in the classroom, describing implied policy and phantom policies that existed within the district. The focus of analysis is the student participants' understanding of why they read specific literature in language arts class--namely Romeo & Juliet and The Odyssey.

In the discussion of the research, Franzak suggests that the integration of teaching literature and teaching reading needs to be added to teacher education programs as well as educational policy.

Beneath and Beyond the Truth: Studying Literary Narratives to Research Human Phenomenon

Otto, S. (April 2007). Beneath and beyond the truth: Studying literary narratives to research human phenomenon. International Journal of Research and Method in Education 30(1), pp. 73-87.

In this article Otto discusses using literature as data in qualitative research involving the human experience. Otto calls her approach "novel inqury".  She argues that novel inquiry is particularly important in educational research because it may show how individuals contextualize their educational experiences.

I find this idea particularly interesting if only because in EDUC 576 last semester, I referenced multiple young adult novels to illustrate points about how teachers, students, and society as a whole, view the concept of bullying.

Act 4: Philosophy of Teaching and Learning

There's a lot here that I didn't get in. Here are the citations:

References
Abrams, P. (Producer), & Leder, M. (Director). (2000). Pay it forward [Motion picture]. United States: Warner Bros.

Brandt, D. (2009). Literacy and learning: Reflections on writing, reading and society. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Bransford, J. D., Brown, A. L., & Cocking, R. R. (Eds.). (1999). How people think: Brain, mind experience and school. Retrieved from http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=6160&page=R1

Freire, P. (2005). Teachers as cultural workers: Letters to those who dare teach. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

Green, H. Helen Hunt. This machine pwns n00bs [CD]. Missoula, MT: DFTBA Records.
(Hear the song at http://dft.ba/-helenhunt) (less info)

Rdg 608 board notes

 

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"Five Things I've Gained from Reading Literature"

This was the NCTE Inbox blog post by Traci Gardner that I thought of while I was reading through Sumara's Chapter 2 "Learning how to create insight".

The post was a response to a report written by Carol Jago (who I believe is the current president of NCTE), which I have attached. Instead of being told the reason to read literaature, the idea is that by answering five questions, people can come to see the importance of reading literature on their own. The five questions are as follows:

1. What piece of literature has stayed with you, even though you haven't read it recently?

2. What character or story has influenced something you've done?

3. What character or piece of literature seemed to relate to a recent news story or personal experience?

4. What character has made you wonder why he or she did/said something?

5. Name something from a work of literature (such as a character, setting, or quotation) that you find beautiful or vivid.

At the very least, it's something to think about.

 

The original blog post can be found here: http://dft.ba/-fivethings
Carol Jago's report can be found here [PDF]

Sumara, Dennis. (2002). Why reading literature in school still matters: Imagination, interpretation, insight. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Assoicates.

Chapter 1 from How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • The scientific achievements include a fuller understanding of: (1) memory and the structure of knowledge; (2) problem solving and reasoning; (3) the early foundations of learning; (4) regulatory processes that govern learning, including metacognition; and (5) how symbolic thinking emerges from the culture and community of the learner.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • The emerging science of learning underscores the importance of rethinking what is taught, how it is taught, and how learning is assessed. These ideas are developed throughout this report.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • Teaching practices congruent with a metacognitive approach to learning include those that focus on sense-making, self-assessment, and reflection on what worked and what needs improving. These practices have been shown to increase the degree to which students transfer their learning to new settings and events (e.g., Palincsar and Brown, 1984; Scardamalia et al., 1984; Schoenfeld, 1983, 1985, 1991).

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • Constructivists assume that all knowledge is constructed from previous knowledge, irrespective of how one is taugh
  • there are times, usually after people have first grappled with issues on their own, that "teaching by telling" can work extremely well

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • A logical extension of the view that new knowledge must be constructed from existing knowledge is that teachers need to pay attention to the incomplete understandings, the false beliefs, and the naive renditions of concepts that learners bring with them to a given subject. Teachers then need to build on these ideas in ways that help each student achieve a more mature understanding. If students' initial ideas and beliefs are ignored, the understandings that they develop can be very different from what the teacher intends.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • The new science of learning does not deny that facts are important for thinking and problem solving. Research on expertise in areas such as chess, history, science, and mathematics demonstrate that experts' abilities to think and solve problems depend strongly on a rich body of knowledge about subject matter (e.g., Chase and Simon, 1973; Chi et al., 1981; deGroot, 1965). However, the research also shows clearly that "usable knowledge" is not the same as a mere list of disconnected facts. Experts' knowledge is connected and organized around important concepts (e.g., Newton's second law of motion); it is "conditionalized" to specify the contexts in which it is applicable; it supports understanding and transfer (to other contexts) rather than only the ability to remember.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • limitation of early behaviorism stemmed from its focus on observable stimulus conditions and the behaviors associated with those conditions. This orientation made it difficult to study such phenomena as understanding, reasoning, and thinking—phenomena that are of paramount importance for education.
  • hallmarks of the new science of learning is its emphasis on learning with understanding. Intuitively, understanding is good, but it has been difficult to study from a scientific perspective. At the same time, students often have limited opportunities to understand or make sense of topics because many curricula have emphasized memory rather than understanding.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • behaviorists held that the scientific study of psychology must restrict itself to the study of observable behaviors and the stimulus conditions that control them.
  • Drawing on the empiricist tradition, behaviorists conceptualized learning as a process of forming connections between stimuli and responses. Motivation to learn was assumed to be driven primarily by drives, such as hunger, and the availability of external forces, such as rewards and punishments (e.g., Thorndike, 1913; Skinner, 1950)

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • • • First, we focus primarily on research on human learning (though the study of animal learning provides important collateral information), including new developments from neuroscience.
      • Second, we focus especially on learning research that has implications for the design of formal instructional environments, primarily preschools, kindergarten through high schools (K-12), and colleges.
      • Third, and related to the second point, we focus on research that helps explore the possibility of helping all individuals achieve their fullest potential.

    The scientific literatures on cognition, learning, development, culture, and brain are voluminous. Three organizing decisions, made fairly early in the work of the committee, provided the framework for our study and are reflected in the contents of this book.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • n the early part of the twentieth century, education focused on the acquisition of literacy skills: simple reading, writing, and calculating. It was not the general rule for educational systems to train people to think and read critically, to express themselves clearly and persuasively, to solve complex problems in science and mathematics. Now, at the end of the century, these aspects of high literacy are required of almost everyone in order to successfully negotiate the complexities of contemporary life.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • Thirty years ago, educators paid little attention to the work of cognitive scientists, and researchers in the nascent field of cognitive science worked far removed from classrooms. Today, cognitive researchers are spending more time working with teachers, testing and refining their theories in real classrooms where they can see how different settings and classroom interactions influence applications of their theories.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • competition among students for teacher attention, approval, and grades is a commonly used motivator in U.S. schools. And in some situations, competition may create situations that impede learning
    • Like how students who participate in AR read for points and rewards, but when they exit the program, stop reading altogether

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • expose students to the major features of a subject domain as they arise naturally in problem situations. Activities can be structured so that students are able to explore, explain, extend, and evaluate their progress
    • Another caveat for Problem-based learning. Students see a need and cultivate a desire for learning through the process of solving a meaningful problem.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • School administrators were eager to make use of the "scientific" organization of factories to structure efficient classrooms.
    • Are we not moving back toward this model? Consider the focus of using "research-based" methods of teaching and the "programs" that assume that each child learns and functions the same.

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • inquiry-based approach, had a better grasp of the fundamental principles of physics
    • Further support for problem based learning rather than that which is teacher centered or rote

• How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School

  tags:EDUC 604

  • In reaction to the subjectivity inherent in introspection, behaviorists held that the scientific study of psychology must restrict itself to the study of observable behaviors and the stimulus conditions that control them.
    • Add to developing definition of behaviorism

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Teachers as Cultural Workers, briefly

I think I need to add this book to the ones I read yearly. While Friere tends to write in circles, I keep coming back to a few key ideas that he presents, and discovering more as I learn. My favorite letter, the one that transformed my teaching the first time I read it was the one about moving from talking to learners to talking with them and from listening to them to hearing them. I know it comes from a social justice perspective, and maybe it's also social justice in the context of my classroom, but I've learned that I get so much more out of kids if I take the time to listen to what they have to say, then use that to make my book recommendations. It's harder to listen to some kids than others, since they've been so disillusioned by the system that they lack the trust or respect for educators, but that's a no-longer-blind-spot that I'm going to have to deal with as an educator.

Four "A"s Text Protocol

adapted from Judith Gray, Seattle, WA 2005

One of my professors introduced this method of attacking text a few weeks ago. It has helped me tremendously in terms of how I approach and interact with the selections I'm asked to read. I feel like it also prepares me to better contribute to discussions. That, by itself, is huge because I'm usually one to be timid in class, especially when I'm intimidated by my classmates. In the case of what we were given (the handout says that we can add out own As), we looked at

**Author's assumptions,
**Where I agree with the author,
**What I want to argue with, and
**The parts of the text I aspire to.

My hope is, and my reason for writing this here, that I'll remember this strategy and continue to apply it to my reading.

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