Learning Journal #4

I enjoyed doing the Socratic circle for revision of the articles that we read for this week. All of the articles we focused on were excellent. Basically, they all focused on discrimination. Discrimination is all around us. We are discriminated upon because of our gender, race, eye color, hair color, opinions, way of dress, the way we look, the way we think....I mean discrimination is all around us. I think that everyone has a little bit of discrimination in us. There are people that I wouldn't hang around with just because of my morals and values. Or simply because of the way these people act. I am not mean and I don't demean anyone because of the way I feel. Does that make me a bad person? I really don't think so. Everyone has certain attributes that they look for when they befriend others. I don't just hand out with anyone for the sake of being "proper". I'm not blunt about it, though, and I don't beat people up because they look different than me or think differently than me. I just let them be them and I live life to the fullest and leave each one be. Change of subject, isn't it quite frustrating having everyone attack you at once to setup stuff on wikispaces. Errrrr......I have our tech person helping me so hopefully I won't screw up. I have a horrible headache so I am not evening going to interfere with anyone in this activity so.....ce la vie!!

Critical Analysis #3

Whew! I almost forgot about this entry. Any how, last class was certainly interesting. Mostly because of the evaluator that came to observe you/us for a large part of the class session. You know, that really stinks that they have to conference with you during our class time. Observing you is one thing, but going over your evaluation with you during our class time doesn't seem right-especially if they're going to take as long as this last lady did. Not that I minded that extra time to work on our projects....not at all, but it would've been best if she questioned anything you do or don't do they'd want to visit with you on a more personal leve, no?

The group that presented did an awesome job. Unfortunately, I think we all like this jigsaw thing and you might end up being convinced you like it by the end of the coarse, right? Maybe not. It's really neat when you do this jigsaw with a chapter or picture book and put all the pieces together to see the wonderful thought process throughout a story. Well, enjoy your holiday! I'm off to ski in in Brekenridge in Colorado. TTFN

Learning Journal #3

Today's presentation for us went a little longer than originally anticipated. I think our discussions were awesome and everyone was engaged which means that the chapter was interesting. I enjoyed listening to everyone's interpretations of what we read. As we were walking to each group when we began the jigsaw part of our presentation listening to the discussion was interesting. The one article that I didn't care for because I thought there was way too much anger was Malcolm X's article. I purposely went with that one group that was reflecting on it so that I can see what their interpretation of the article was. I was way off base on my view point. I thought Malcolm was negative and focused too much of his anger on the "white" person. I wondered whether his anger stemmed from being in prison and his association with Muhammed or if his anger was evident before his imprisonment. I know that he wanted to educate himself and he did it via writing the dictionary words and their vocabulary meaning. Throughout his imprisonment and his self-education he kept bashing the white race. The converstations with the other groups did not even lean towards these feelings that I felt. That's why they're mine, but..hmmm, was I way off base?

Learning Journal #2 11/29/07

I truly enjoyed having our discussion in a Socratic circle. I disagree with the teacher who mentioned that she doesn't see using this method in an 8th grade classroom. I think you absolutely can use it at least from 3rd grade on down. As we were watching the video presentation I was thinking how I could use it in my classroom. I teach 4th grade. I absolutely think they will benefit them having discussions where they can face each other as they respond critically to any issue or topic that we have in the classroom, that is happening in today's society, or a discussion that the teacher might bring to the class for discussion. The conversation might not be as intense if used in the younger primary grades as much as in an intermediate classroom, however, I think we can get some pretty good discussions going on. I like reading the book and discussing it in this Socratic circle. I'll have to tell you that I think that some of the quiet teachers need to speak up a little more because they very rarely speak (Stacey and Karen). Ha!

Learning Journal #1 11/15/07

I am absolutely excited about getting an opportunity to use technology with my students. Most teachers and librarians are now getting the opportunity to incorporate technology into their classrooms. Our librarian has been speaking to us about getting a hotmail account and then using this certain search engine through Hotmail so that our building can get a penny for every log-in we use. Sounds profitable, right? You were talking about how children nowadays are multitaskers. My daughter is struggling with our direction and instruction as parents. The child wants to do her homework in front of the television while listening to her iPod. Then she's texting like she's the pro.
She doesn't struggle with anything it just drives us nuts that she's doing all these things at the same time instead of completely focusing on one thing at one time. Most children are multitaskers and it's hard for us "older" people to understand something like that. I'm excited about this class. The book we're reading seems interesting and looks like we'll be engaged in reading. That's good because it's a pretty thick book. I'm also thankful that my blog site was also still up and running. I hope I can use it more often than I had been using it. Good luck with that, right??