Website

In Virginia I have noticed there are a lot of ESL students within the school systems. However, as a teacher of Virginia you are not required to take a foreign language. I find this extremely odd. If teachers are not required to know any other languages how will they be equipped to teach the ESL students withing their classrooms?

Through my practicum and my work at Second Home (an after school program), I have been able to use my knowledge of Spanish to speak with some of the children. I have taken Spanish since 5th grade. By no means am I an expert, but I do like knowing the basis of the language. Most all of the children at Second Home are ESL students and this is where my Spanish comes in handy most. I am the only volunteer that knows any Spanish, in my opinion that is ridiculous. I think teachers should be required to take some Spanish courses for education purposes. As of now where should teachers get the adequate information on teaching these students in their classroom? The website iteslj.org/links/ is a website for teachers of ESL students. I thoroughly explored this site and found great information. For the context of this class I spent most of my time looking at the teaching writing section. In this section of the website I found great articles, and resources to help me teach writing to ESL students. There were also links on the writing portion which the students could use as well, which I found helpful.
As I was browsing through the articles, I found one about conferencing. We have discussed this topic in class but never thought of it in terms of ESL students. It said the most common form of feedback teachers give on papers is written feedback. We also discussed this is class. There are various ways to write the feedback but for the most part it is in terms of written feedback. The article discussed hoe problematic this could be for ESL students. If they are having trouble writing in english to begin with, they are going to have trouble reading the comments made by their peers or teachers. This article purposed the idea of face to face oral conferences as the best way for these students to recieve feedback on their writing. I agree with the author. There are also so many different ways in which you could have oral conferences to change up the dynamic. It could be one on one with a teacher, one on one with a peer, or it could be a group conference. This is just one of the articles I found compelling on the ESL website. I was pleasantly surprised at the amount of resources available for teachers of writing, the website was extremely helpful.

Compound sentences

What is the most frequent problem you seen amongst you students writing? Is the problem addressed at all by the teacher? How would you address the problem in your own classroom?

As an early education major, I spend a lot of time reading and writing with my first grade students. My entire practicum is based off reading language arts. The students write extremely creative stories in class but they are filled with errors. Grammatical and spelling errors are to be expected at this young age but on the other hand I think they should receive more instruction on these topics. After reading chapter ten in Calderonello's text I realized one of the biggest issues I see with my students writing is run on sentences. The students are aware that by adding the word "and" continues their thoughts and extends their sentences. But more often than not I see the children use and correctly in a sentence; connecting two nouns but then repeatedly add the word to extend their writing. I read several stories yesterday while working with the students and they all had this problem. Spelling is phonetic and by reading a story you can understand what the child is attempting to say. However I think the children truly need a lesson on sentence structure and the meaning of a compound sentence.
I was not aware of how much this topic bothered me until I began reading this chapter for class.
I realized when reading the text there were so many factors about compound sentences that even I was not aware of. I did not know there was a difference between complex and compound sentences. As a teacher I need to make it my responsibility to become as much as an expert as possible on these topics. If I am not aware of the rules for compound sentences, how will I be able to teach my students. I have not seen the teacher I work with in practicum address this issue of run on sentences. I think the students should at least be aware of a compound sentence and simple ways of avoiding run on sentences. As a teacher I would take the key concepts of what I read in chapter ten and bring it down to the first grade level. I think the author offers great examples and while explaining the essence of a compound sentence I would use these examples in my class. Calderonello explains how to correctly join two subjects and two simple sentences. I would show my children these examples. To modify it for their age I would not refer to the make up of the sentences. For instance he combines two subjects and a subject and a predicate in his examples. Children are not aware of what these words mean, so I would change the way I talk about it. Other than the specific language the text offers great teaching examples I could use and elaborate on for my lesson. Calderonello's text (especially chapter 10) would be my main reference point for ideas and examples on how to teach these first grade students the correct sentence format and structure.

Adverbials

Grammar is always one of the hardest things for children to grasp in their writing. There are so many rules and different parts of speech. Elementary and middle school teachers do not have enough time to spend on grammar lesson as children need. What is one area of grammar you feel you do not know much about? Do you remember learning this content in grade school?

I have trouble understanding several different components of grammar in the English language. I have learned a lot through the grammar lessons students have been giving in class. As i was preparing for my lesson I realized I did not know a whole lot about my topic. My groups topic is adverbials. Before reading chapter seven I could not even define the term. I knew what an adverb was and some examples which included words like quickly, happily, finally, ect. However, I did not know there was such a thing as adverbial phrases or adverb clauses. I did not know the flexibility and wide range of variety adverbs could bring to a piece of writing.
There are several key points I took away from this chapter on adverbials. I learned their basic function is modify certain parts of speech. The thing I find difficult about this, is the fact that adverbs can modify so many different parts of speech including verbs, adverbs, and adjectives. I think the author did a great job breaking down the different types of adverbials and how they are used in a sentence. It was helpful when reading about adverbial phrases and clauses to see the specific examples. In the sentence "Bella ran very quickly" I used to think that just the word quickly was the adverb. I was not aware that there was such a thing as adverbial phrases which would consist of very quickly. Now i understand very describes how quickly and quickly is the adverb. There are so many different ways of writing and using adverbials it was difficult for me to grasp at first. I honestly feel through the reading of this chapter and the planning of our lesson I learned a lot on the topic. I hope my new knowledge of adverbials is able to improve my writing.

New Study Shows Boys Lagging Behind Girls in Reading

I read the article, New Study Shows Boys Lagging Behind Girls in Reading by Ron Claiborne and Hanna Siegel on the NCTE inbox. As a future teacher I found this article extremely compelling. The studies have shown across all 50 states that girls have achieved higher reading achievements than boys. The study shows that this result is not only true in every state but it is true amongst every grade level as well.
In my own personal experiences working in a prekindergarten and first grade classrooms I have never noticed this trend. After reading this article I am now looking back at my interactions with the children and am seeing this has been a trend, I have just been blind to it until now. I work in a prekindergarten classroom over the summer months with very bright children. Each of the children are able to read a few words, that is true for both the female and males in the class. However, there were two children within the class that were starting to read actual books by the end of the summer. Both of these children were girls. I also work in a first grade classroom at Clymore Elementary once a week this semester. I help out with the reading and writing groups during the mornings. There are two different level groups, the advanced readers and the slow readers. The majority of the students in the advanced group are girls. There are ten students in the group and only three of them are male students. Meanwhile in the slow reading group the ratio of girls to boys is about equal. Although I have never personally noticed this difference in reading ability it is a present trend in the schools I personally have worked in.
There are several theories associated with the reasoning behind this trend but as a future educator I am more concerned with how to fix this rising problem. We need o take the time to address the situation, and spend more time getting the male students interested in reading. We need to make sure our assigned books and available free reads in the classroom are of interest to both the female and male students. It is proven a child is more likely to want to read, or learn in general if it is about a topic they are interested in. Therefore we need to make sure we have appropriate reading materials that interest the boys as well as the girls in our classrooms. There are several steps we as teachers need to take to help close this gap instead of allowing it to widen even further. I believe grabbing boys interest in reading is the first step to achieving this goal, and I believe it should begin at the early stages of literacy.

Guest Speakers

On Thursday I attended the Friendly City Reading Series in transitions. The program had two published authors come and read excerpts from their published works. Then at the end they stayed to answer questions that the audience had. I was surprised on how many students and faculty showed up for the event. I had not previously heard of either female authors but I found their selected readings to be very interesting. The second speaker, Gina Welch had written a book entitled "In the Land of the Believers." I found her writing and experiences she shared with us to be very compelling. Her memoir was about her journey to becoming a member of the evangelical church. She shared several excerpts from her memoir that were specific experiences she remembered in her bible camps and singles ministry program. I loved how her writing was enriched with specific details. She told a story with specific conversations and great detail. For example of the stories she added the fact that one of the characters was "chomping on his gum." In my writing I always neglect to add specific details like this, although they are not very significant I believe they make someones writing that much better. I thought she had an interesting story being that she was very anti-religious then decided to write about her journey into becoming a member of the evangelical church. I was fortunate to be able to attend the event, I enjoyed hearing the excerpts of both authors. I believe hearing and reading published works helps me develop my own writing in a unique way.

In the Company of Children

I found this book by Joanne Hindley to be very insightful. She describes several experiences working in the public school system in New York City. I particularly found her experiences, teaching tips, and ideas to be very helpful because I would also like to work with inner city elementary school children.
I found the discussion between Joanne Hindley and her nine year old student Billy very compelling. He uses a metaphor when describing his feelings on writing in a notebook. "Well, writing just stories and then having a writer's notebook is kind of like the difference between driving on the highway and taking the scenic route. You see when you drive on the highway you kind of go by everything so fast you don't really have time to think about it-it's a blur because you're really thinking about getting to the final destination. When you take the scenic route, you slow down and pay attention and probably notice things that you have never noticed before." (12)
The boy describes writing in his notebook like taking the scenic route. It is an outlet for him to write what he truly cares about and is passionate about. Having his own writer's notebook is a positive experience for him which has helped him develop his writing. This boy gave Joanne his insight into why keeping a writer's notebook is greatly different than just writing separate pieces. The notebook is personal and a chance for writers to get out their thoughts in any form that they like. Joanne was inspired by this student in her class and she herself began keeping a writers notebook. She also encouraged her fellow colleagues to keep a writer's notebook and discussed the benefits they could provide for teachers as well. The entire chapter incorporates methods, ideas, and reasons for using these notebooks in her personal life along with in her classroom. I thought it was interesting how she shared her writing in her notebook to her students. Before making them write their own notebooks she read several passages from hers. This provided them with examples of situations where they could express their ideas in writing and it would be appropriate. She also shared these stories with them because she wanted them to know she thought it was meaningful and she herself would be doing it to. I enjoyed the different teaching tips she shared at the end of the chapter. She even went as far as providing a list of ways to incorporating notebooks into your classroom. I found her stories as well as tips to be very helpful as I myself have to start thinking of creative ways of writing in my own classroom.

Evaluation Question: Do you think the stories, experiences, tips and examples provided in Hindley's text are helpful to future teachers?
Yes, after reading her book I had different feeling about writing in the classroom. I thought it was helpful that she provided examples of the children's writing with the explanations of her reason for doing the activities. She expands on everything and goes into great detail in providing tools for teachers to become effective writing instructors in their own classrooms.

Analysis Question: Compare and contrast Hindley's book to other books we have read for this class or your other education classes about the approach to teaching writing. What parts did you find helpful and useful?
I personally enjoyed Hindley's book and found it to be the most insightful piece of writing we have read for this course thus far. I believe I found it to be most helpful because it dealt with all of the specific questions I had about writing in an elementary public school setting. A lot of the other pieces we have read for class deal with high school level and college level writing. I find those pieces to be interesting however, this book helped me expand my knowledge at the level I am most interested in teaching at.

Application Question: How will you begin to use Hindley's ideas in your own classroom? Offer examples from the text you would like to apply to your own classroom to develop your students writing.
I found the process of having each individual child keep a writers notebook to be a positive idea I would like to use in my classroom. I agree that having free time to write your own thoughts and ideas gives you an outlet to become a mover developed creative writer. I always write best when it is something I care about and I believe that will still hold true for my students. I also liked her idea of having the students bring in their notebooks and decorate them and make them special. I think the author does a great job in making the writing experiences fun for the children and I hope to do the same.

Thompson, C. (2009, August 25). Clive Thompson on the New Literacy. Wired Magazine, 17, Retrieved February 28, 2010, from http://www.shannoncarter-blog.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/Clive-Thompson-on-the-New-Literacy.pdf

Several professors and teachers believe that the quality of students writing is on the decline because of new technologies such as Facebook and text messaging. However, the study being done by Andrea Lunsford at Stanford University argues otherwise. Lunsford has collected 14,627 writing samples from students at Stanford between the years of 2001-2006. After her extensive research Lunsford argues,"I think we're in the midst of a literacy revolution the likes of which we haven't seen since Greek civilization." She goes on the explain that students are writing so much more these days through the use of blogging, Facebook, Twitter, mobile phones and other technologies. The extensive use of these technologies helps improve students writing, not hinder it. The online world of writing allows students to write in a different context than they had 50 years ago. Students today almost always write for an audience which is a remarkable change and is one aspect of becoming a great writer. She also agrees that good teaching is crucial for students to improve their writing skills but these technologies have had a positive effect on student writing. She believes new technologies are, "Pushing our literacy in bold new directions."