Boys vs Girls

Being a female, it is difficult for me to say whether or not boys are more reluctant readers than girls. I only have my own experience as a reader to go on. When I think back to my school days and envision my various classrooms where reading took place, I can't recall an instance that would lead me to believe that boys are more reluctant readers. Perhaps the content and subject matter that boys chose to read about often differs from what girls chose, but I'm not sure that they are more reluctant to read anything than girls are. I think reluctance comes mostly from a lack of confidence in ones skills or a fear of adhering to something that is socially passe for one's gender roles. I know an argument exists that females do worse at math because it has been engrained in them that math is something for boys to succeed at and that girls who are good at math are just brainy and nerdy. I think that that stereotype is going away now that females are no longer strictly encouraged to simply stay home and look pretty and raise babies and males are no longer strictly encouraged to make lots of money and crunch numbers as the family provider.
Despite my own personal observational experience with boys and reading, however, I can see why highschool aged boys wouldn't want to be caught reading a more reflective, intellectual piece of literature. Take, for example, Shakespeare. Any literature that invovles love and poetry may not seem masculine enough for the types of reading that boys are "supposed" to do when adhering to their prescribed gender roles. They may be fearful of seeming weak or feminine to their peers if what they read does not, on the surface, embody such themes as war, sex, violence, or other themes that are outwardly "boyish." Even though Shakespeare certainly does include these themes, most of what highschoolers think of when they think of Shakespeare is Romeo and Juliette, which may seem feminine on the surface. Even more contemporary pieces of writing like The Catcher in the Rye or the Pigman, which deals less with gore and blood and more with personal reflection and interpersonal relationships, thing that on the surface seem to concern teenaged girls more than teenaged boys, may seem too "girly" for boys to be seen reading. Because of this, I can see why boys, when they enter high school and are required to read heavier, more difficult intellectual pieces of literature, may be reluctant to step away from their prescribed gender roles by reading and actually enjoying these pieces.

Sharon's Essential Questions

How can we develop a community of writers in our classrooms?
I think that developin a true community of writers in the classroom depends on being comfortable enough with ourselves and with each other to really get to know eachother through our writing. It may be difficult for some students to share their writing at first, but engaging in friendly prompts and activities that build a sense of trust within the classroom may slowly help students break out of their shells and feel at ease with one another. Workshopping eachother's writing is a good way of doing this, as long as the criticism is constructive and the students are also receiving positive feedback.

What characteristics exist in a classroom that has created a community of writers?
I imagine a writin classroom that embodies true community NOT having the traditional desk arrangement of rows facing the front. I think a circular desk arrangement or finding a way to arrange the desks to face one another is a better way of embodying community. I also picture there being lots of interaction between the students and teacher and between the students themselves- i picture seeing students helping each other in groups and pairs and I also picture lots of downtime for students to spend on their writing. I think that this classroom would also include more than a blackboard or an overhead for instruction; there would be a DVD player and a projector for digital storytelling and other more progressive forms of multimedia that can help students strengthen their writing skills.

What are some specific ideas or techniques we can employ to create a community of writers in our classrooms?
I definately think that workshopping is a very important one. I also feel that giving students an interesting and creative prompt in the beginning of class is a great way to begin. This seems to lighten the mood and get students thinking in writing-mode...often times these prompts are personal reflections of some sort; this is good for building classroom community because it unifies students through their experiences and their writing. I would try to get students to share as much as possible so that they would get to know one another as more than just another random student in their classroom, but as a fellow writer and fellow human being with experiences worth writing about and with things to much about writing, just like everyone else. I would also probably enact some kind of pair and share every day, and make students pair with a different classmate every day, so that everyone has some one-on-one time with everyone else. I think that this would make the relationships between students become more interpersonal and interactive, which is important in building community in a writing classroom. I would also look into taking my class on numerous field trips to places that would inspire both creative and academic writing. I think that leaving the actual classroom setting and venturing out into the world together is a great way to build community amongst students because it gives them a shared experience beyond that of their actual classroom.

Individual Teach: Self-Evaluation

Planning and Organization:
My book was a little different than the others seem to be; it wasn't so much a theory of writing or why we write as much as a book just chocked-full of ideas on what to write about and ideas of different kinds of writing for those who wish to write poetry. When i decided what i wanted to teach from this book, i had a hard time narrowing down which of Kowit's many activities to incorporate into my unit, but ultimately elected to teach the three writing prompts that i would most like to do in my own classroom- the object poems using metaphors and similes, the dream poems, and the in-praise poems. I selected these three prompts because I feel like they best represented Kowit's main suggestions of what to keep in mind while writing poetry: meter and device (the object poems), being comfortable with expirimentation (the dream poems), and putting a new spin on an old theme (the in-praise poems). I especially thought that the dream poems would be good to do in a classroom because the unit can actually extend to other areas of study such as surrealism in art and literature and the history of psychology.
I opted to organize the class in chronology with Kowit's text, which may have been a bad idea in hindsight because the activities seemed to get less serious and more fun as we moved along, which, when in a classroom, usually plays out to be more meaningful in reverse. It was a little difficult to fit everything in on time and in an ideal classroom, i would have lots of time to devote to each prompt and include more in-depth classroom exploration of the some of the themes. The hardest part about planning this unit was deciding how to structure a lesson around a book full of little tips and tid-bits of advice for the practicing poet. I wanted to connect Kowit's suggestions with the possibility of extending those suggestions into a reflective and insightful writing class. However, despite the somewhat reversed order of my unit, I feel that the writing activities were the right ones to do. Even though I probably didn't need to do all three, i'm still glad I had the gumption to attempt it!

Teaching Presence and Authority:
I felt pretty nervous at the front of the class in the beginning. It's strange, because I actually feel comfortable in my ability to conduct a classroom and I've always kindof been really good and at-ease with kids in the middle/high school age range. They do not intimidate me whatsoever and I'm not nervous at all to conduct a classroom full of them all day long. However, it's a different vibe you get when you're teaching your peers and you know you are being critiqued. That being said, my nerves did go away pretty quickly and I felt at ease explaining the book and explaining my reasoning behind the assingments. I definately talked too fast (lifelong affliction) and didn't always make myself clear with my instructions. Something I'll have to work on for sure! However, I do think i conducted myself with good presence and authority when I walked around the class to see how everyone was doing with their dream poems and then to see if people needed help with their in-praise poems. I remember sometimes being stuck with a problem or assignment and really appreciating when my teacher would come ask me how it was going...sometimes you just don't feel like reaching out and you need to be reached out too. I liked being able to extend that hand to my classmates as their teacher for the day. I tried to approach the topic in a way that did not make me seem like i'm the Poetry Teaching Guru, rather, I tried approaching the activities as some good ideas not only for us as practicing writers, but also for us as novice teachers who are going to be experimenting with lesson plans for that first year or two. However, I did have a main objective in mind for the discussions and the activities and I think I did a good job using my authority to move the class along when it needed to be moved along and to let the class engage with myself and each other when there was a good discussion going on.

Incorporation of Writing
Well, considering that my whole unit was planned around writing different kinds of poetry, I think I did a pretty good job incorporating writing. I used writing prompts that were directly from Kowit's text, although I "made them mine" a little bit too by having students bring in objects to write about with the object poems and research their dreams with the dream poems. I think that the book itself benefitted me quite a bit as a future teacher and I can only hope that the activities I chose to reflect the book were able to help my classmates as future teachers, too. The importance of teaching this specific writing unit to the class comes with the fact that as writing teachers, we will inevitably have to teach some poetry at some point in our careers and many of us are uneasy and unsure of how to do this...hopefully my indy teach gave my classmates some insight as to why this subject is sometimes hard to approach and possibly a few ways that we can incorporate it into an eclectic classroom full of writing enthusiasts and non-enthusiasts alike. I think that my peers were able to engage as teacher-writers as well as teachers of writing. We all were able to practice our own poetry writing by doing the actual writing activities that were introduced in Kowit's book. We were also able to discuss the reservations about poetry held by teachers and students alike and were able to think critically about what kinds of activities may or may not work in a classroom. By asking the class about their own experiences with poetry in the classroom setting and discussing the issues that students may have with writing and sharing poetry, I was able to prepare my classmates to better think about and practice the art of writing. I think this was best exemplified by Sharon, when she said at the end of the unit that she valued being able to watch the reaction of her classmates to the lesson itself and be able to think critically about how teaching poetry may play out in her own classroom.

Meaningful Connection with Students:
I really wanted the class to have fun with this unit. To me, writing poetry is indeed challenging and frustrating, but most of all it is enjoyable and theraputic to be able to write creatively about a wide range of introspective (and sometimes silly) topics- I wanted my classmates to see that both the act of writing poetry itself as well as teaching poetry to others can be a fun challenge as a writer and as a writing teacher. I wanted to give my classmates writing assignments that valued both the difficult aspects of writing and teaching poetry, like the meter and devices, but that also valued the universality of poetry itself- it's ability to connect humanity by tapping into common shared experiences (like having bizarre dreams) and by cutting across gender/class/ethnicity/cultural/sexuality lines to connect all humanity as one entity (that is grossed out by foul things like leeches and chubby kids). I think that this did resonate with my classmates and I really think that everyone really enjoyed sharing their poetry with one other and laughing at each others wierd personal objects, dreams, phobias, and general personal tokens of humanity. All technicalities aside, this was really my main personal objective for the unit- after the in-praise poems, I feel confident in the successful attainment of that goal...the other stuff (like explaining my directions clearly!) will hopefully come with more practice.

Writing- Why we do it, what it's comfort is, and where it hides.

There are many reasons why we write-- professional reasons, for which writing is required, academic reasons, for which writing is a necessary step in research and development, and social reasons, for which writing is used to communicate with others. People also write for more personal reasons-- it is a creative and sometimes very theraputic way of expressing oneself ...among the other aformentioned reasons for writing, I also chose to write for the last reason. It helps me to clear my mind and organize my thoughts. It helps me to identify issues with which ive been struggling internally. To me, that is the "comfort in writing." I also love language in general and am a word freak; I like to find new ways to say things and exercise that part of my brain.
I think that writing can literally "hide" anywhere; we often tend to think that a person needs to have experienced something extreme in order to have something good to write about-- something extremely tragic, extremely ecstatic, extremely strange, extremely romantic. In class we read poems and stories that deal with heavy personal or social issues that are intimidating subjects for students to tackle in their own writing. While they should practice writing about these extremes, I also think that students should practice "finding" where else writing "hides"-- in common things, in everyday experiences, in simple pleasures and tiny grievances. Great poetry especially does not have to be so tragic as most students are lead to think it is. I would probably give my students Neruda's "Odes to Common Things" to show them examples of where in the world around them writing "hides."
I think that a person's life is a great reservoir of experience that can potentially contribute to writing. I know that I always use my own experiences to derive the meaning of poems or stories that I write. However, I don't think a person's general life experience necessarily dictates their writing ability, but the presense of certain things in ones life probably does. If there is a history of reading, good instruction, and more time for practicing writing in ones life, they will probably be a better writer than someone who didn't have those things. People who have speech or learning disabilities may have a harder time with some aspects of writing than people without those differences. Some people just seem to be natural writers, while others have to work at it a little harder. However, I think that if our students are all taught in classrooms that really focus on their longterm and self-directed success with writing, everyone can be a better writer than they were before.

For poems by Pablo Neruda, Check Out: http://www.poemhunter.com/pablo-neruda/

Two well-written sentences & "Best Practice"

I was never allowed to have a dog as a child; my parents didn't trust me to take care of one.

My all time favorite poet is Charles Bukowski, however, I consider myself very partial to Pablo Neruda and Jim Carroll as well.

As for "best practice," i'm really not entirely sure what is meant by this...if I take the two words separately and combine both of their respective meanings, it would lead me to believe that it means the highest level of training for something specific. In regards to a writing classroom, however, i'm not sure exactly where this concept would apply...I feel like it could apply to everything, which leads me to believe that my innitial assessment of the meaning of the phrase is probably wrong.

Group 1 Evaluation

One powerful revelationt that i had from this unit was that every bit tof descriptive writing is a specific part of a grammatical structure. I always thought of grammar as being punctuation, nouns/verbs/adjectives, direct object pronouns, etc...i actually never new about the "brushstrokes" of writing...the participles, absolutes, appositives, etc...those "image grammar" stylings are so essential when teaching creative writing, which in and of itself i believe to be essential to teaching professional writing. I really love the writing as painting metaphor; i always kindof had that idea as a writer and as an education student but i wasn't able to translate it into a teaching method as this group did with the help of Noden's text.
I thought that the unit itself was organized well; i like that it went through the book in order emphasizing the important points that the group had chosen for instruction. I also would have chosen to teach the same points from the text that the group chose. I thought that the structure of the unit was strong-- Sharon would start out with an intraductory concept and discussion, exemplified and elaborated on by Samantha and her activities, and then kindof concluded and unified with a meaningful, critical-analysis ending by Meredith.
One of the teaching methods that most stuck out to me in this unit was the way the teachers had the class tap into their prior knowledge and then expanded on that knowledge. The also showed the class rather than told the class about Noden's concepts and strategies. The activities were insightful and went along well with what the group was trying to convey; they didn't seem random or subordinate or like simple time-fillers...although i do wish that the timing was planned a little better on the second day so that we could have had more time to work on the activities rather than rush through them. Other than that, i think the teacher-leaders managed the classroom quite well; they gave the class lots of opportunities to contribute our own ideas to the discussion and gave us opportunities to share our assignments (even though these opportunities weren't always siezed by the class). Sometimes the instructions for activities or homework assignments were not explained quite clear enough but that was usually corrected with a second, more contrived explanation.
An important question that the group raised was the concept of in-context teaching as it relates to memorization. I like that we were asked to think about this question and brainstorm about it because we often forget things that we worked so hard on memorizing and remember things that seem random, obscure, or obsolete in hindsight. Why is that? I think it does have something to do with whether or not we learned the material in context...I think that all content from all subject areas can be taught in context in school, even in contexts related to eachother (like when teachers of science, english, and social studies, for example, will get together to do a combined unit on one topic.) When we learn things in context, it seems to have more relevance to our own lives, therefore, we seem to remember it more. I think that is important for writing teachers, especially when it comes time to teach grammar, which can at times seem completely boring and unrelatable to students.
As a teaching colleague i would congratulate Sharon, Samantha, and Meredith on their group teach. I think it went very well overall and I can tell they put forth a lot of effort in planning their lessons, discussions, and activities. The only negative thing that i would critique them on was that i think they sometimes seemed to forget to address us as a class of colleagues and were more in the mode of addressing us as students in a classroom. I think that focusing more on how Noden's mothods would or would not work in a classroom would have been beneficial, rather than implementing his methods "on" us as if we were students in a writing class. However, I don't think this was a big enough problem that it distracted the class from the presentation as a whole...there definately were times when I felt that they unified us all as teaching colleagues.
I will definately keep this book so that i can implement some of these methods, strategies, and activities into my own classroom.

On Variations of Imitation

I actually think that all of Noden's Variations on Imitation are something i would want to incorporate into the classroom in a unit based around Imitaion as a means of practice and skill development...it is difficult for me to select just one that I think would be better to use than the others, but if i had to i'd probably pick The Hamill Approach. I like that it takes the structure of an excerpt of good writing and lets students use it as somewhat of a skeleton for the actual body that they will be building with words, particularly descriptive words and the elemental "brushstrokes" such as participles and absolutes. I think that this would go over well in a classroom because it would supply students with a strong enough basis to work with, especially if it were a piece of writing that they themselves picked out or if it were an excerpt from a book that the class decided on together as being a good jumping-off point. This would also work well because as long as the excerpt is stripped to its bare essentials of conjunctions and blanks are left for nouns/adjectives/participles/etc, the door is left open for students to be creative and write about whatever they so desire.
I think this is a little more creative than the Franklin option, although I do think that option is a good way to get students to see how to use good image grammar and descriptive writing, and how that usage adds to an otherwise dry or unoriginal narrative.
I do think that the Pooh Perplex is another great variation on imitation that i would use in my classroom, however I think that for it to live up to its potential would would be better assigned as homework or as a project that could be revisited for revision later on to allow for more time to think it through and be original.
My only problem with the Van Gogh approach is that it may be hard for students to really be able to get into the mindset of someone like a corporate bureaucrat or news reporter because to be able to write in those personas would often require lots of arcane jargon that students may not posess. Because of this, they may chose to select personas that they are more familiar with which rely heavily on stereotypes in the media, such as rappers; a reliance that, when translated into writing, may offend some peers.