Mrs. Love's Blog-0-Rama!

I enjoy these teachers’ blog about writing. One of them recently went to a conference, and I must admit, there is something about being surrounded by other teachers who share the same passions about this profession. Here’s what she had to say:

Swirling Thoughts from NCTE

Posted on Friday November 20, 2009 by Ruth

Today was a good day, but what day at NCTE isn’t?  Since we just finished our last session and have dinner plans in a few minutes, you’re getting a list of swirling thoughts.  Expect more blog posts about NCTE  in the future.

• Choice matters.  Today I’ve been inspired to stand up and defend student choice in reading and writing.
• Poetry parties are fun.  Stacey and I attended one this morning in honor of Lee Bennett Hopkins.  There was sparkling cider, cookies, and party favors.  A toast started the session and then a series of amazing poets paid tribute with words and poems.  I walked away with the reminder that it is OKAY to be passionate about something.  Lee’s passion was bringing poetry to children.  I was left with the question tumbling in my mind:  What am I passionate about? I’ll need to think more deeply about this, but off the cuff, I’d say:   I’m passionate about using everyday, ordinary stories from our lives to understand ourselves and the world more deeply.
• At the end of my career, I want to look back and be able to say I stood up for things that mattered in the grand scheme of life; I spoke out against injustice; I did what I knew was best for students, even when it contradicted what “they” told me to do.
• Stories matter.  My story. Your story. Their story. Reading stories.  Drawing stories.  Writing stories.  They all matter.
• When all is stripped away, I find I want students knowing they matter in the world.  I want them to know their voice matters.  In order for this to happen, they must read widely, talk honestly, and write the tough stuff.  Only an individual knows the things which are important enough to read, talk about, and write.  My job is to foster the desire and provide the time for students to do this important work of living a literate life.
• I will remember that a single person can make the world a better place.

I have a problem.  This doesn’t add up. I feel negative about this. This is less than, not equal to, what I want to see. I was helping my son with some pre-algebra homework, and decided to go to the website his teacher says is a good source for help. I’ve been there before, but the links to the “free” help are hard to find. While searching, I found this page:

Now – here’s the problem. Actually, I have a few:

1. Look at the “bias.” They advertise if you want to be “happy” and “stop crying” you should use this website.
2. The pretty girl creates bias as well — the viewer,  girl or boy, sees this girl, who signs her name coyly,  ”me,” and she looks happy and friendly, and who doesn’t want friends? And look–she’s holding a sign that says:
3. ASK YOUR PARENT TO PAY.

As many of you know, in persuasive writing, there is a ‘call to action.’ Well, the call to action is clear on this page, (got to hand it to them on that one!), and it is this: if your parents love you, if they really love you and want you to be happy, and not cry over math anymore, they will fork over their hard-earned cash that, gee, I don’t know, they might need for food or rent, and buy you on-line math help. The more they pay, the more help you will receive, so if they really, really  love you, they will pay more.

Oh, dear.

Well, grab your hankies, dear boys and girls, dry those tears, because I am going to give you FREE help with math: Y+O+U.

Yes. You.

You know more than you think you do–you may just not be aware of all the resources you have. One thing you should know is that the math teachers at our school are awesome, caring people who will do just about anything to help you. For free. There’s homework help after school. There are resources aplenty, and you can use your laptops to search for great, free math help, like:

http://mathforum.org/dr/math/

http://cte.jhu.edu/techacademy/web/2000/heal/mathsites.htm

http://www.mathnerds.com/mathnerds/ (in Spanish, too!)

I ended up calling some of my math teacher buddies to help out – I was close to figuring it out, but the little extra insight really helped me help my son. Being a Language Arts teacher, I used my own reading strategies to help me dissect and analyze word problems, and that helps a lot, too. I love when a solution really comes together.

The television show Sesame Street turns 40 this year.

One of my first school memories is my first grade teacher telling us about this new television show called Sesame Street. My mom was very busy with two little baby girls – my sister Laura was a baby, and Anne would be on the way soon, if she wasn’t already there. I pretty much ignored them. I was almost five years older than Laura, and really didn’t want younger sisters to interfere with my perfect little world of Barbies, dress up, and reading. I loved to write little books, too. I remember liking Sesame Street, but growing out of it pretty quickly. My sisters, however, loved it, and were a better age to appreciate it. While I watched it, my favorites were Kermit the Frog, and Bert & Ernie. I could never quite figure out why Bert was always so grumpy. Squidward has taken his place these days, to Spongebob’s Ernie. But Squidward and Spongebob never taught anyone how to read. It was revolutionary, too- Oscar the Grouch was the first anti-hero I had ever encountered; later came Max in Where the Wild Things Are. (If you don’t know what an anti-hero is, why don’t you research that and get back to me?)

If you have little brothers, sisters, nieces or nephews who are about 3 to 4 years old, please have them watch Sesame Street. My sister Anne could read a newspaper when she was 3 years old. Now, as an adult, she routinely tromps me and Laura on Facebook Scrabble on a regular basis, using words that I didn’t know existed. She’s a kindergarten/first grade teacher in Texas, and she rocks. Laura is super-smart, organizing intense school functions, raising her kids, and all-around amazing mom and friend.

If you didn’t watch Sesame Street when you were little, and feel like you missed out on some early reading opportunities, I’m sorry. But it’s never too late to get hooked. I’m not suggesting you start watching Sesame Street –only, it’s not too late to read. A lot. Of  books. Now. Don’t live in a trashcan of ignorance your whole life.

Urban Camouflage

http://www.biomimicryinstitute.org/

There’s a new hybrid of science — biology and engineering — called “biomimicry” (by-o-mim-ih-cree – I make up my own pronunciation tricks, by the way…). “Mimicry” is means to copy, to mimic.  Now, biomimicry is what IDEAS do scientists and engineers take from nature to help humankind, such as

From: http://biomimicryinstitute.org/about-us/what-is-biomimicry.html

Biomimicry (from bios, meaning life, and mimesis, meaning to imitate) is a new discipline that studies nature’s best ideas and then imitates these designs and processes to solve human problems. Studying a leaf to invent a better solar cell is an example. I think of it as “innovation inspired by nature.”

The core idea is that nature, imaginative by necessity, has already solved many of the problems we are grappling with. Animals, plants, and microbes are the consummate engineers. They have found what works, what is appropriate, and most important, what lasts here on Earth. This is the real news of biomimicry: After 3.8 billion years of research and development, failures are fossils, and what surrounds us is the secret to survival.

Like the viceroy butterfly imitating the monarch, we humans are imitating the best adapted organisms in our habitat. We are learning, for instance, how to harness energy like a leaf, grow food like a prairie, build ceramics like an abalone, self-medicate like a chimp, create color like a peacock, compute like a cell, and run a business like a hickory forest.

The conscious emulation of life’s genius is a survival strategy for the human race, a path to a sustainable future. The more our world functions like the natural world, the more likely we are to endure on this home that is ours, but not ours alone.

Main Entry: mim·ic·ry

1 a : an instance of mimicking b : the action, practice, or art of mimicking
2 : a superficial resemblance of one organism to another or to natural objects among which it lives that secures it a selective advantage (as protection from predation)

Focus on the “superficial resemblance of one organism to another or to natural objects among which it lives that secures it a selective advantage…” Basically, what do some animals do to hide so they survive? They don’t want to get eaten. Well, who does? So…what do they do?

This lead me to think about: what do we humans do to survive in our natural habitat?

Well, many of you try to keep your hoods on. Or your hats. You don’t wear anything that is not the ‘normal’ clothing, so you don’t stand out. You won’t read your papers to the whole group, or do a presentation. You won’t raise your hand, take a risk–you might be wrong, and people might think you’re a geek, a nerd, you’re dumb, etc. Some of you survive by doing  just the opposite – standing up in class, shouting a bad word at the teacher (well, not me, but a guest teacher –you’re too smart to say a bad word to me) and you make your escape – you escape from the lesson, the learning, the assignment – and you spend your time in mental camouflage in the detention room.

You escape to get a drink of water, go to the bathroom (where we know you are texting your friends), and once in awhile, when you’re actually in class, or post an assignment, you take a risk–you show what you learned, or where you need help. And you hear another reminder to take off your hood. “Oh, my bad,” you say, yet–you were just trying to survive.

Perhaps it’s time to make a new survival plan: Mimick those behaviors of students who are successful. We just talked about this, but it bears repeating. I’m not trying to make you all into little robots who can recite or who know everything. I’m trying to help you survive the big, bad, world out there–build your background knowledge so you have skills and strategies to navigate the world. Look outside the classroom. Acting like a turtle and putting your hood on, or bellowing like a lion to bolt out of class doesn’t get you too far.

Those survival behaviors again: Ask Questions. Read Directions. Ask Questions again.