In my 20 years of teaching I have seen buzzwords come and go much likethe bees--- often times (mostly always) teachers are told you have to do this or that and rarely , if ever, are teachers given the support. Or better yet, there are interpretations by administrators, coaches ,,,,,and things stray from the intended instructions. And teachers are left to do their best usually based on their own philosophy of teaching (remember that class).
Round Robin---for example. If you asked me to explain, I would not be able to give you a definition!!! I don't know what Round Robin reading is. I may be doing it and feel completely comfortable with it! In my "unrefined" opinion, the most important thing in instruction is the how----we must set the "learning" environment such that a student feels cared about. Have you ever been to a spousal social event where even though you are stranger the host and all make you feel so comfortable????and others where you really feel unwelcomed??? I think that we must set the tone such that kids are begging to "learn out of our hands". All these strategies...ie buzzwords...are tools that teachers should try and see if it works for them---- "Research" based strategies must be looked at with care because there is scant quality educational research. I can think of 4 that I place value on---USC followed a cohert of students from preschool to hs graduation; Stephan Krashen--the more students read, the better they get; Jim Trelease, read to kids and the Chicago Project. These have been long term projects/observations. I should add Barbra Flores and the work on writing she has done with very young kids. Currently we have lots of "sail in by day and sail out by night" type research and we need to use our "passionate and learned" professional experience to sift out the junk and keep only the nuggets and then use it in such a way that it benefits our kids. As I reflect on my 20 years of experience little has changed in th gist of my personal way of teaching----daily writing , 2-3 read alouds per day; nurture curiosity and creativity; a garden (with an array of containers); ---the how it was done will vary greatly form teacher to teacher because we all bring something different to the table---isn't this what MOT is all about---and why aren't we applying it to the way we teach----MOT across the curruculum---really shout be MOT across our lives or at least across our teaching. I remember discovering MOT--oh my God!! oh my gosh!!!Wow!!Wow!Wow!! there were people out there that had the same thread of thinking as mine!!!It was so validating--- MOT has really helped me refine my philosophy of teaching because the core of MOT is something that has always been there for me. I have become a better teacher because of all you!!! Yet my students have lagged!!!!why??? why????student make up has changed, adminstrators have changed, parental participation has changed, demographics have changed!!!! I can't control these but I know they affect results. This past year some of my students grew up to 3 years and some grew very little---the ones with the daily exhortations of please make sure your child reads, does the homework are the ones that had the least growth---my environment did not overcome their home culture. Back to Round Robin---I probably do it!!! Am I gonna stop because someone says that it's bad for kids----whoever says it probably did their way, with a group of kids that is different than mine, different text, different objectives, different parents, different administrators etc. So what do I do that comes close to resembling round robin---determine my objective, decide on text, random group of kids (max five) explain objective--expressions, word id. We all become teachers--we each take a turn reading some and we critique/evaluate each other-the good and the bad (glow and grow)-I read also with mistakes so that I can be critiqued!!!we all go back to do independent reading to apply our grows and glows. Anyway these are just my thoughts on how we activate our prior knowledge and use our schema to synthesize our passionate teaching!!! > > >Would this be considered partner reading? > > > >Bonita DeAmicis [EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Question for the passionate round robin folks. What > about when students > are in literacy groups and they CHOOSE to read > together round-robin style? Thoughts on this? > > > >:)Bonita > > > >_______________________________________________ > >Mosaic mailing list > >Mosaic@literacyworkshop.org > >To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go > to > >http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. > > > >Search the MOSAIC archives at > http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive. > > > > > > > > > > Joy/NC/4 > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > How children learn is as important as what they > learn: process and content go hand in hand. http:// > www.responsiveclassroom.org > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >--------------------------------- > >Get the Yahoo! toolbar and be alerted to new email > wherever you're surfing. > >_______________________________________________ > >Mosaic mailing list > >Mosaic@literacyworkshop.org > >To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go > to > >http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. > > > >Search the MOSAIC archives at > http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive. > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Mosaic mailing list > Mosaic@literacyworkshop.org > To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go > to > http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. > > Search the MOSAIC archives at > http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive. > > > > > --------------------------------- > Be a better Heartthrob. Get better relationship > answers from someone who knows. > Yahoo! Answers - Check it out. > _______________________________________________ > Mosaic mailing list > Mosaic@literacyworkshop.org > To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go > to > http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. > > Search the MOSAIC archives at > http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive. > > _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list Mosaic@literacyworkshop.org To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. Search the MOSAIC archives at http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive.
