Multi-Genre Experience April 9, 2008
I really enjoyed this project – especially the making of the scrapbook and the sharing of our final products with one another. In completing this for myself, I really enjoyed having a complete free range of topic choice. Being able to choose something that I was interested in and then finding many personal connections to my topic made this a meaningful project. In reading Paula Deen’s story, her will to succeed was such an inspiration. In my own life, this is a particularly dark time – probably the darkest of my 27 years – and to read about someone’s hardships and successes touched my heart. Having to make written artifacts that she would have written really helped me to understand – and even emulate – her thinking.
Listening to our classmates’ presentations, seeing how affected they were by their own topics, was just as important. It forges a connection that I don’t think the people in those business classes that also meet on Wednesday night feel. To learn something about each other – to see each other share funny stories or sad stories or sweet stories is a remarkable experience.
I have shared it with my students as well – and they were so interested. Seventh-grade students are not always easy to hook – but they were ALL curious about each stage of the project. During our SSR time, while they were reading their literature circle books, I was reading my Paula Deen biography. Lunchtime and outside time left them time to ask questions about what I was reading and what I liked about it and what I was learning. When I told them what the project entailed, they wanted me to bring it in and show it to them when I was done. When I showed them, they asked IF THEY COULD DO ONE. In their words – OMG! I’m trying to work a “mini-multi-genre” unit in before the end of the year!:)
I won’t lie, there were some tense, time-crunch moments. But my final product represents something that is creative, something that represents a personal connection, something that I am proud of. However, I think the relationships that it built as we worked, stressed, and presented with one another are as valuable as the final product. For me, that was the best part: it made me feel closer to my classmates AND my students – and very few things bridge the gap of adult to adolescent.
Weekly Readings April 2, 2008
Wordless Picture Books
In examining the wordless picture book material for class, I can see several uses for this in my classroom. Elaboration is a serious struggle for my students as they write. Using wordless picture books as jumping off points for description might be a way to encourage them to use descriptive language in their elaboration. In addition, I think that having students interpret the books and then JUSTIFY why they felt the way they did would be excellent practice with persuasion. Writing these interpretations would be valuable practice in grammar lessons as well. I could also see these being used with my struggling readers, giving them confidence in their growing abilities.
Chapter 3 in Best Practices
As writing teachers, I feel like the pressure put on me to have my students perform is (obviously) stressful. However, this chapter reminded me that writing is a process, and my students can only perform with what they have been given. It gave me helpful strategies and “signposts” to look for in their writing development so that I can help them more specifically. As a teacher, it helps me to feel a little less panicked to have research that can help me pinpoint where my students are so that I can help them become better writers.
Response to Weekly Reading March 18, 2008
So the universal theme for this week’s readings is assessment – always a tricky subject for me. Perhaps it was growing up in a testing culture and then teaching in a testing culture that makes me apprehensive about any kind of assessment that isn’t black and white. What an awful thing to say – but with defensive parents, I am always nervous to do anything that isn’t black and white.
Anyway – although the writing test is over for us (yay!), this chapter made me think about all the ways I can incorporate writing for the rest of the year on my current students/guinea pigs. Much of what the chapter said is so true – writing with an authentic task with a clear purpose to a definite audience. I love the idea of incorporating writing into daily tasks – I feel like that should be one of my major goals for next year – to find more ways to incorporate meaningful writing into curriculum. There are a couple of important things I plan to keep in mind…
1. the difference between assess and evaulate
2. the JOY of collaboration in writing
3. using rubrics that gauge student growth instead of pure acheivement
In Writing Without Boundaries, again the idea of flexible assessment came up. Both of these texts really force me to think about how I assess and evaluate my students’ work. Again, the idea of flexibility and even collaboration within assessment are key – new things I hadn’t thought about before.
Multi-Genre Thoughts… March 3, 2008
What is a multigenre project?
A multi-genre project is a project that takes a focused topic and uses mediums that encourage students to think deeply and critically about their subjects. It is a project that encourages student discussion and creativity. In addition, the completion of such a project should be celebrated and presented to those important people in students’ lives.
What are the ingredients?
To complete a multi-genre project, students need a topic that they truly care about and in which they have an interest. They need access to a variety of resources – books, CD-ROMS, internet, magazines, etc. Students will also need STRUCTURE, from tasks like organizing a timeline of work to models of final products. Time is also something that students will need in order to work, research, and discuss. Teacher support (obviously) is a critical need that can be met by structuring time, conferencing, giving access to resources, and providing a system of organization for works in progress.
What is your recipe for HOW you might create a MG project?
This is something I think would be interesting to try after EOGs since it plays on the interest of individual students. Careful structure would have to be an important part of this project – with lessons on selecting topics, researching, etc. Helping them make a timeline of work and having scheduled dates for checking progress would be helpful as well. I definitely would like to make a big deal out of it – inviting parents, guardians, etc. to view the projects in some sort of special something at school.
WHAT TOPICS ARE YOU CONSIDERING FOR YOUR MG PROJECT?
Paula Deen!
How might you begin in your classroom?
I think my students would benefit from beginning by seeing some of the examples from the book and the Moulton article. Having a discussion about “What does a research paper look like?” and then showing them those examples might pique their interest.
Multi-Genre Article and pp 1-41 February 26, 2008
One of the comments in the Writing Without Boundaries text stuck out to me: “[Multi-genre writing] encourages writers to find their own voice and culturally meet their needs and expectations as they choose and define appropiate genres.” (7) This really connects to journaling for me as well as hits on a nerve that in teaching writing, I haven’t taught my students how to find and share THEIR voices. I hadn’t really thought about the connection to journaling, but besides the former comment, the author also points out that students can flip thorugh their journals to find topics for their multi-genre study. Being ever so slightly OCD about things being tied together and connected, more ways to tie writing and reading together in a meaningful way is quite appealing.
I also liked the idea of the daily writing workshop within the classroom that connect reading and writing. I do, however, need some suggestions a/o time to think as to how to adjust that to the 7th grade persuasive slant. Should I spend large amounts of time on how to write other genres? Or should I focus my time on persuasive, expository text and write different genres of it?
It was also helpful to read the Moulton article’s presentation of potential problems with multi-genre – one of the most significant for me was how to grade it. I like the idea of grading the learning logs and the whole process, but some rubric would have to exist for the final product for me.
The idea of multi-genre is appealing to me as a 7th grade teacher. It allows for creativity, flexibility, and differentiation with my random grouping of students. The element of choice in topic and product would also be something adolescents would enjoy.
My “I poem” (Great Wall of China) February 21, 2008
I am a silent sentinel, who kept careful watch over my charges.
I wonder if I will last on into the future – so many of my sod sides are disinegrating daily into dust.
I hear voices from the past – the laughter of the father and son reunited at Xifengkou, the sobs of Meng Jiangnu as her husband is buried deep within my walls.
I see my pathways, rising and fallings over the steep hills and into distant China.
I want to reach farther, stretch longer, until I wrap myself all the way around the world, shutting out danger – or am I shutting it in?
I am a silent sentinel who kept careful watch over my charges.
I pretend my value has not diminished into that of a mere tourist attraction, even though
I feel their trinkets tossed on my decrepit sides.
I touch the sky, my watch-holes straining up and up, away from the hordes of tourists that carelessly peruse my surface.
I worry as their scuffed tennis shoes kick wrappers through my embrasures and children run their sticky fingers down my parapets.
I cry because the reverence and respect I once commanded has slipped away, as centuries of raindrops have slid down my sides.
I am a silent sentinel who once kept watch over my charges.
I understand my days are numbered, and I must live in my glory days when I felt the slice of Mongol steel in my mud walls – yet I held strong.
I say to myself – find strength in who you WERE. Otherwise, how can I face my uncertain future?
I dream of a quiet respect, reflection on all I have done and all I have provided – appreciation for my role and contribution to China.
I try to carry on – time passes whether I like it or not. I fear my destiny is already set.
I hope for restoration of my walls and of my very presence.
I am a silent sentinel who will keep watch over my charges.
“I poetry” February 18, 2008
After reading the “I poem” books, several things seem to be true of “I poetry.”
1. The topic of an “I poem” can vary. Subjects can find inspiration from history, science, and everyday items.
2. The form of an “I poem” is flexible. Some were rhyming, while others were not. In the Dirty Laundry book, part of one of the poems incorporated concrete poetry in its text.
3. Language is key. All the poems used specific words, facts, and sensory details in their personification of the particular object. In Dr. Frye’s article, she points out that the liklihood of plagarism is lessened because students are given opportunities to find “innovations based on informational text.” (2) Students must use their own thoughts on the topic, combining research and vocabulary about a particular topic to create a work all their own.
In response to the selections we read, I was really interested in the I Am the Mummy Heb-Nefert with the cat. I hadn’t realized beforehand that the pet was buried with the person. I feel like that fact probably would not have struck me so much if I had simply read it in an informational article as opposed to the “I poem” format.
Since I am both the Language Arts AND Social Studies teacher on our team, I feel like this is an excellent activity to making Social Studies more personal and exciting. I always feel like I am running out of ways to make them interact with informational text in an innovative way, and I feel like they would enjoy doing this. My students this year would definitely do best with a form of some sort. Dr Frye notes that “[f]ormula poems provide a scaffold for students, but at the same time, provide students the opportunity to think flexibly and develop their ideas with careful and specific word choice.” (2) Even for myself, as I was trying to write an “I poem” today, I had to resort to the “I am, I think, I feel” form to write my poem, so I think it is something that would be helpful for them.
