I am excited about this new semester. My intermediate reading students will be reading two books by Thomas Merton about the Psalms. We are going to have a class blog where we will post summaries of the reading we have done, daily class logs, and whatever else I come up with. I am going to require posts to the blog instead of having them type the same information up and print it out. I am also going to require comments. I haven't worked out all the details yet, but I am on my way!
My advanced writers, if I have any, will also blog. I haven't quite figured out how. I think I will move some of their journaling to the blog. We will also be reading a novel, and I may track their progress on it through the blog. I obviously have a lot of thinking to do on this class still!
Last semester's blogging was good in that it acquainted the students with the concept and with blogger. But that is about all it did for them. They never really got blogging. My goal this semester is to help them/us build a sense of community on a class blog. If they achieve that, they will be much, much closer to understanding what blogging really is and what it can do for them. I will be extremely happy if we get to that point!
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
Saturday, December 17, 2005
What do you want your kid to do?
As the mother of an 18 yr old who is occasionally trying to find some direction in his life, I really appreciated Kathy Sierra's post about career advice. I am so sad to see the number of kids who feel at 14 or even 18 that they have to know exactly what they want to do when they are 40!
Only one of my three children knew what they wanted to do by 18 or so. And even she has altered the picture somewhat. (She is a nurse.) Her sister at that age wanted to be a doctor one day and a diesel mechanic the next. She designed her own Bachelor's degree in "Sustainable Communities" and then decided she didn't want to work with non-profits. At 24 she decided she wanted to go to law school. Since starting law school she has become less sure about the kind of law she wants to practice. And my son? He may want to be a game designer or a chef or a librarian. Or something else.
Kathy says:
I always knew that I wanted to be a teacher. I guess I was lucky. Or maybe just not brave enough to think outside the box. But in my life I have had to be creative and flexible and resourceful. In addition to teaching a variety of subjects Pre-K through college , I have also worked as a bookkeeper, a nursing assistant, a mental health technician, an egg handler, a health club receptionist, a drug store cashier, and probably a few other things I can't remember right now. Right now I am teaching at a college. But what will I be doing in 10 years? Who knows?
As Kathy says, this isn't the the world of the parents of the 1950s, the world of my parents. We need to encourage our kids -- and ourselves -- to take Kathy's advice.
Only one of my three children knew what they wanted to do by 18 or so. And even she has altered the picture somewhat. (She is a nurse.) Her sister at that age wanted to be a doctor one day and a diesel mechanic the next. She designed her own Bachelor's degree in "Sustainable Communities" and then decided she didn't want to work with non-profits. At 24 she decided she wanted to go to law school. Since starting law school she has become less sure about the kind of law she wants to practice. And my son? He may want to be a game designer or a chef or a librarian. Or something else.
Kathy says:
The advice I would give ... is that the most important preparation skills/orientations today are:
* Creativity
* Flexibility
* Resourcefulness
* Synthesis
* Metacognition (thinking about thinking)
I always knew that I wanted to be a teacher. I guess I was lucky. Or maybe just not brave enough to think outside the box. But in my life I have had to be creative and flexible and resourceful. In addition to teaching a variety of subjects Pre-K through college , I have also worked as a bookkeeper, a nursing assistant, a mental health technician, an egg handler, a health club receptionist, a drug store cashier, and probably a few other things I can't remember right now. Right now I am teaching at a college. But what will I be doing in 10 years? Who knows?
As Kathy says, this isn't the the world of the parents of the 1950s, the world of my parents. We need to encourage our kids -- and ourselves -- to take Kathy's advice.
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
As the semester comes to a close...
I find myself trying to see what actually transpired in my classroom. It hasn't been a particularly stellar semester, but I am trying to not get bogged down in the negative. I am looking for some of the good and trying to figure out how to improve the rest.
I didn't give my students a fair shot a blogging this semester. It was complicated by switching blog providers mid-semester. But I just never managed to convey my enthusiasm for blogging to my students. But you know, I never really shared my blog with them, either. Maybe I will set up a class blog for the next semester. Maybe participating in it together will help them see the communal nature of blogging more easily.
I haven't worked this out in my mind yet, of course. As a matter of fact, the idea just came to me now as I was writing. But I can see advantages.
Mostly, though, I have to work on setting it up so they will want to blog. I have to help them see the value in it. I didn't achieve that goal this semester. Hope I do better next time!
I didn't give my students a fair shot a blogging this semester. It was complicated by switching blog providers mid-semester. But I just never managed to convey my enthusiasm for blogging to my students. But you know, I never really shared my blog with them, either. Maybe I will set up a class blog for the next semester. Maybe participating in it together will help them see the communal nature of blogging more easily.
I haven't worked this out in my mind yet, of course. As a matter of fact, the idea just came to me now as I was writing. But I can see advantages.
Mostly, though, I have to work on setting it up so they will want to blog. I have to help them see the value in it. I didn't achieve that goal this semester. Hope I do better next time!
Sunday, December 11, 2005
What is wrong with us?
If you read the Washington Post report on the student who was expelled for answering a question in Spanish, I hope you are asking yourself that question.
I can see encouraging students who are learning English to speak the language, but this kid was bilingual. What harm does it do? We should be praising him for being able to speak two languages. But instead, we expel him.
This is old thinking. Native Americans used to be punished for speaking their languages in school. Mexican Americans were often punished for the same thing. But that was 30 or more years ago. Have we really learned nothing?
Check out the article if you haven't yet.
I can see encouraging students who are learning English to speak the language, but this kid was bilingual. What harm does it do? We should be praising him for being able to speak two languages. But instead, we expel him.
This is old thinking. Native Americans used to be punished for speaking their languages in school. Mexican Americans were often punished for the same thing. But that was 30 or more years ago. Have we really learned nothing?
Check out the article if you haven't yet.
Thursday, December 01, 2005
But I am grateful for so many things.
The last post was very depressing, and it is important that you know that most of the time everything is pretty good and I am doing pretty well. The problems we have here are minor compared to what people in many parts of the world experience on a daily basis. I have no real right to complain!
I am grateful for the fact that, even though it is maddening slow, there is progress. Things are improving. Everyone that I know personally is OK. Some have lost their jobs; others have lost their homes; a few have lost both. But they are alive. That is a blessing. My family and I have a place to live and jobs to go to. Everything else is really pretty trivial!
I am also grateful to the many friends from around the world who have taken time to write to me or to leave comments here since Katrina. It is nice to know that people I have never met face to face care enough to send a good word or ask a caring question. Part of the difficulty for us in this recovery process is that everyone around us is in the same boat or worse. There is no one here who can really lend a hand or even an ear because everyone has their own situation to deal with. So you are all especially important to me right now.
I hope to get back to blogging on a regular basis. It is important to me. Thank you for reading and sharing.
I am grateful for the fact that, even though it is maddening slow, there is progress. Things are improving. Everyone that I know personally is OK. Some have lost their jobs; others have lost their homes; a few have lost both. But they are alive. That is a blessing. My family and I have a place to live and jobs to go to. Everything else is really pretty trivial!
I am also grateful to the many friends from around the world who have taken time to write to me or to leave comments here since Katrina. It is nice to know that people I have never met face to face care enough to send a good word or ask a caring question. Part of the difficulty for us in this recovery process is that everyone around us is in the same boat or worse. There is no one here who can really lend a hand or even an ear because everyone has their own situation to deal with. So you are all especially important to me right now.
I hope to get back to blogging on a regular basis. It is important to me. Thank you for reading and sharing.
To give you an idea of what we live with still...
People are always asking me if life here is back to normal yet. Surely, here on the north side of the lake where there was not as much devastation as in New Orleans, things are back to normal! Well, it is 8:35 am. Let me tell you about my day so far.
I got up and got ready for work. I live about 3 miles from the college where I teach, and the trip takes me 5-7 minutes. Well, I was about 2 minutes from work, on River Road, the little road the college is on, when I saw up ahead a lot of trucks and a big machine moving debris from the side of the road and loading it into the truck. There was no warning. They were just there. There were a number of other vehicles lined up along the road in front of me, but they were all trucks of workers involved in the project. I waited a couple minutes, but as there was no workman on my side of the work, no one knew I was there. Now, I have waited as much as 15 minutes for these guys to finish loading a truck before they let cars pass. I have also waited 15 minutes and still not seen any sign that they were going to let cars pass, so I have turned around and gone another way. I chose to leave after just a couple minutes today because it was pretty obvious they had a long ways to go before the truck would be filled. So I backed up, turned around and went back towards home. I had to wait a couple minutes to get back onto the highway because of all the traffic. Finally I was able to get on the highway and get to an alternate way to get to school. Everything was going well. I got back to River Road the college was on, or almost to it, when I saw a big truck -- a semi tractor pulling probably a 30 foot trailer that was built up to carry storm debris. I was on River Road and wanted to turn onto the road I was on. Now, you have to understand that these are not real roads. Two cars can pass on them, but there is no shoulder, so passing a truck that big requires caution. I waited and let the truck begin his turn -- because he gave no sign of waiting for me to do anything else. The turn is not a normal 90 degree turn but, from the side he was on, probably about 75 degrees. And there is, of course, a power pole right on the corner. He could not make it in one try or even two or even three. Finally, he recognized the fact that the truck would have to be perfectly positioned on River Road before it could hope to turn onto the smaller road I was on. So he played around and got the truck back on River Road. After a bit longer, he backed up enough to clear the intersection, and I was finally able to turn onto River Road and get to work. All this took about 30 minutes.
So, while I now have Internet at home, life is hardly normal. Or at least I hope this isn't normal. I am really tired of it. In all honesty, I think they should declare a moratorium on debris pick-up over here. That would help me get back to normal more than having all the debris picked up will. This formerly heavily wooded area will never be back to normal in my lifetime. All we can do is try to make life as easy on us as it can be.
Sometimes I think people who have evacuated feel that they are suffering more than those of us who are here now are. They feel a loss of community and experience a lot of nostalgia for how things used to be. They do not, however, have to deal with the fact that nothing works yet. Nothing. We may have the basic services, but we don't get the bills on time or we don't get them at all or they are totally wrong. Everything is a battle.
I didn't sleep well last night, and that may account for some of this, but my tiredness is deeper than lack of a good night's sleep. I am tired of the struggle that life here is now.
My friend Melanie wrote
So this is my life for now. I don't expect you to really be able to understand because I don't even, really. But I wanted to try to explain anyway. Thanks for listening.
I got up and got ready for work. I live about 3 miles from the college where I teach, and the trip takes me 5-7 minutes. Well, I was about 2 minutes from work, on River Road, the little road the college is on, when I saw up ahead a lot of trucks and a big machine moving debris from the side of the road and loading it into the truck. There was no warning. They were just there. There were a number of other vehicles lined up along the road in front of me, but they were all trucks of workers involved in the project. I waited a couple minutes, but as there was no workman on my side of the work, no one knew I was there. Now, I have waited as much as 15 minutes for these guys to finish loading a truck before they let cars pass. I have also waited 15 minutes and still not seen any sign that they were going to let cars pass, so I have turned around and gone another way. I chose to leave after just a couple minutes today because it was pretty obvious they had a long ways to go before the truck would be filled. So I backed up, turned around and went back towards home. I had to wait a couple minutes to get back onto the highway because of all the traffic. Finally I was able to get on the highway and get to an alternate way to get to school. Everything was going well. I got back to River Road the college was on, or almost to it, when I saw a big truck -- a semi tractor pulling probably a 30 foot trailer that was built up to carry storm debris. I was on River Road and wanted to turn onto the road I was on. Now, you have to understand that these are not real roads. Two cars can pass on them, but there is no shoulder, so passing a truck that big requires caution. I waited and let the truck begin his turn -- because he gave no sign of waiting for me to do anything else. The turn is not a normal 90 degree turn but, from the side he was on, probably about 75 degrees. And there is, of course, a power pole right on the corner. He could not make it in one try or even two or even three. Finally, he recognized the fact that the truck would have to be perfectly positioned on River Road before it could hope to turn onto the smaller road I was on. So he played around and got the truck back on River Road. After a bit longer, he backed up enough to clear the intersection, and I was finally able to turn onto River Road and get to work. All this took about 30 minutes.
So, while I now have Internet at home, life is hardly normal. Or at least I hope this isn't normal. I am really tired of it. In all honesty, I think they should declare a moratorium on debris pick-up over here. That would help me get back to normal more than having all the debris picked up will. This formerly heavily wooded area will never be back to normal in my lifetime. All we can do is try to make life as easy on us as it can be.
Sometimes I think people who have evacuated feel that they are suffering more than those of us who are here now are. They feel a loss of community and experience a lot of nostalgia for how things used to be. They do not, however, have to deal with the fact that nothing works yet. Nothing. We may have the basic services, but we don't get the bills on time or we don't get them at all or they are totally wrong. Everything is a battle.
I didn't sleep well last night, and that may account for some of this, but my tiredness is deeper than lack of a good night's sleep. I am tired of the struggle that life here is now.
My friend Melanie wrote
I wish I could remember being light-hearted and happy, feeling attractive, being fun and flirtatious. I've gotten so old-hearted lately. I've lost my mirth. And I don't know how to retrieve it. Is innocence and joy ruined?I understand completely. There is a heaviness in all of us that doesn't seem to want to go away.
So this is my life for now. I don't expect you to really be able to understand because I don't even, really. But I wanted to try to explain anyway. Thanks for listening.
Tuesday, November 29, 2005
And another apology
Well, after my moaning and groaning about the fact that we still don't have internet access at home 3 months after the storm -- I came home to find out that the cable company finally got here today to solve our problem! So we are back in business again! So this time I must apologize to Charter Communications for not believing them when they told us, yet again, that they would be out to take care of it. And I apologize to you all for taking up your time with this drivel!
An apology
Actually, I have no excuse for having been so negligent with this blog. I truly consider it a casualty of Katrina. I can only hope that I someday get regular Internet access at home again and get over this funk that I have been in. I am ready for normalcy again!
Thanks to any of you who are still willing to drop by or look at my feed. I appreciate it!
Thanks to any of you who are still willing to drop by or look at my feed. I appreciate it!
Friday, November 04, 2005
A blog you might like to read...
I just stumbled across a blog called After the Storm. It is written by a teacher from New Orleans who has been displaced to South Carolina. It is a wonderful read, and I encourage you to stop by and take a look at it.
Thursday, November 03, 2005
Teaching in a Lower Gear
If you haven't read this article on the NEA website, I recommend that you do. It reminds us of the value of slowing down our classes, taking time to really explore topics.
For me, I know that sometimes I allow myself to worry about my students not finishing the textbook or not writing as many essays as I had originally planned. Then I think about what we did instead. Maybe we had wonderful discussions about the topic being studied. Maybe we finally grasped some concept that had evaded us. Almost always there has been something of equal or greater value that has transpired.
I am lucky. I wrote the curriculum. My students don't have to take highstakes tests (except the TOEFL, but that is different). We have the luxury of taking or time and doing a good job rather than rushing through. Sometimes, though, I need to remind myself of that. This article helped to do that.
For me, I know that sometimes I allow myself to worry about my students not finishing the textbook or not writing as many essays as I had originally planned. Then I think about what we did instead. Maybe we had wonderful discussions about the topic being studied. Maybe we finally grasped some concept that had evaded us. Almost always there has been something of equal or greater value that has transpired.
I am lucky. I wrote the curriculum. My students don't have to take highstakes tests (except the TOEFL, but that is different). We have the luxury of taking or time and doing a good job rather than rushing through. Sometimes, though, I need to remind myself of that. This article helped to do that.
Friday, October 21, 2005
Links to my students' new blogs
Changes...
I finally gave up on journalspace and decided to move the students to Blogger. We are working on it right now. I will update the links here as soon as I can.
Where do the days go?
It has been over a week since I last posted. I honestly can't understand why. I am busy, but I think the biggest problem is still not having internet at home. I hope someday to get back in the swing of this.
Thursday, October 13, 2005
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
An example
I meant to include an example of cell phone failure in the last post. It will give you an idea.
I called my son, Parviz, yesterday. The first time I tried, it rang and then went to his voice mail. But instead of the male voice I was expecting, I heard a woman say, "You have reached the voice mail of Roz A..." I hung up, figuring she -- whoever she is -- wasn't going to get a message to my son. I tried a couple more times to get him, but I always got a "System is busy" message. Finally, I was able to make the call. It rang a couple times and then there was silence. I said, "Hello," and a woman's voice answered, "I'd like to speak to Terry, please." I explained that I had been trying to call my son. We hung up. Then I tried calling my son again. I got through this time. As I started to explain what had happened, he told me that he had answered that last call to him. His phone, instead of saying I was calling him, said that he was calling me. And when he said hello, he found he was talking to someone in a store somewhere.
That story, 100% true, is my life in a nutshell right now. Things like that seem to be happening on all fronts. So if I seem a little crazy these days... I probably am!
I called my son, Parviz, yesterday. The first time I tried, it rang and then went to his voice mail. But instead of the male voice I was expecting, I heard a woman say, "You have reached the voice mail of Roz A..." I hung up, figuring she -- whoever she is -- wasn't going to get a message to my son. I tried a couple more times to get him, but I always got a "System is busy" message. Finally, I was able to make the call. It rang a couple times and then there was silence. I said, "Hello," and a woman's voice answered, "I'd like to speak to Terry, please." I explained that I had been trying to call my son. We hung up. Then I tried calling my son again. I got through this time. As I started to explain what had happened, he told me that he had answered that last call to him. His phone, instead of saying I was calling him, said that he was calling me. And when he said hello, he found he was talking to someone in a store somewhere.
That story, 100% true, is my life in a nutshell right now. Things like that seem to be happening on all fronts. So if I seem a little crazy these days... I probably am!
An update
Well, I guess it is time to give you an update on life in these parts. There really isn't much to say except that we are all still recovering. Those of us who suffered no real damage - and I am fortunate to be in that group - have the luxury of talking about how our cell phones don't work half the time and we still don't have cable. Others, of course, are not so lucky.
Time here is still screwy. We can't remember what day it is. Did something happen last week or three weeks ago? Now, normally I have a little problem that way (old age, I guess), but this is way beyond me and my normal forgetfulness. Things are not helped by the fact that a trip that used to take a half hour may now take an hour.
You have to think about what stores are open and what hours they are open. Most stores still aren't back to normal hours -- largely because there aren't enough employees to keep them open. The ones that are open (which is most of them), have trouble keeping items on the shelves because so many people have had to replace so much.
We are trying to retain a sense of humor, but for all of us from time to time, it gets old. We are short on patience. We want things to be easy again.
And then we hear the stories of more bodies found or someone's elderly relative having suffeed due to being evacuataed. Then -- if only for a moment -- we are grateful.
Time here is still screwy. We can't remember what day it is. Did something happen last week or three weeks ago? Now, normally I have a little problem that way (old age, I guess), but this is way beyond me and my normal forgetfulness. Things are not helped by the fact that a trip that used to take a half hour may now take an hour.
You have to think about what stores are open and what hours they are open. Most stores still aren't back to normal hours -- largely because there aren't enough employees to keep them open. The ones that are open (which is most of them), have trouble keeping items on the shelves because so many people have had to replace so much.
We are trying to retain a sense of humor, but for all of us from time to time, it gets old. We are short on patience. We want things to be easy again.
And then we hear the stories of more bodies found or someone's elderly relative having suffeed due to being evacuataed. Then -- if only for a moment -- we are grateful.
Tuesday, October 04, 2005
Links to my students' blogs
Another glitch
Well, as you may know, I have chosen journalspace for my student blogs because it was the only site we could access at school with our regular ISP. (Things are different now because of Katrina, but I didn't want to set them up anywhere else in case we go back to the old ISP next semester.) Well, Bud just told me that he can't access the site at his school because it is blocked. I hope there won't be many people who have that problem.
Journalspace is really clunky to me -- probably just because I started here on Blogger. For instance, I had trouble figuring out how to get links to my students' blogs on my journalspace blog. And it says there is RSS feed, but I haven't gotten that straightened out on their blogs yet. Next semester, if it looks safe, I will set my students up here. It is so much easier.
But at least we are up and sort of running. I'm happy about that!
Journalspace is really clunky to me -- probably just because I started here on Blogger. For instance, I had trouble figuring out how to get links to my students' blogs on my journalspace blog. And it says there is RSS feed, but I haven't gotten that straightened out on their blogs yet. Next semester, if it looks safe, I will set my students up here. It is so much easier.
But at least we are up and sort of running. I'm happy about that!
Monday, October 03, 2005
An invitation
Well, my students have started posting to their blogs, and it is quite exciting. They have really gotten the idea of publishing their work! They were writing stories for another class and told me that they wanted to post them on the wall outside the other class so others in the college could read them. I suggested that they post them to their blogs, and they are going to do it!
So here is the invitation: Come over to my blog at journalspace. In the top right corner is the list of our class blogs. Click on them and see what has been posted so far.
I guess I am going to have to go back in and look at how to set up RSS feeds for their blogs as I couldn't get it to work today when I tried to subscribe. I probably just need to have them change a setting. Until then, though, you can get to them easily through mine.
So here is the invitation: Come over to my blog at journalspace. In the top right corner is the list of our class blogs. Click on them and see what has been posted so far.
I guess I am going to have to go back in and look at how to set up RSS feeds for their blogs as I couldn't get it to work today when I tried to subscribe. I probably just need to have them change a setting. Until then, though, you can get to them easily through mine.
Wednesday, September 28, 2005
Problems, problems
Well, my students have set up their journalspace accounts and have begun writing in them. They posted introductions and an essay about immigration. They are next supposed to be comparing their own personal immigration history to that of the group they wrote about before. They seem comfortable with the format, but I am not finding journalspace as comfortable and easy to use as blogger. So I am not sure what to do. I guess I will stick it out this semseter and then change to blogger -- assuming we can still access it then. Anyway, the students are almost ready to have visitors to their blogs. Once they are, I will let you know how to find them!
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