Anthony J. Mullen 2009 National Teacher of the Year
http://www.ccsso.org/projects/national_teacher_of_the_year/national_teachers/13292.cf
This source is interesting because this teacher of the year went to work on a factory assembly line after high school to support his family and then became a new York city cop for 20 years and then put himself through college, majoring in Criminal Justice. He’s a special education teacher for 9th through 12th grade students at an alternative school in Connecticut. His reputation is that he can teach any student, especially those who have behavioral and emotional problems. The source is interesting because this former cop talks about the keys to his success being passion, professionalism, and perseverance and describes what he means by all three. He uses his life experience to help him connect with his students.
Interview with Bill Bigelow
http://history matters.gmu.edu/d/6433
Bill Bigelow teaches high school history in Portland, Oregon. He make certain that his students do not think about history “as a series of dead facts.” He wants his students to understand that history consists of choices that real people make under certain circumstances, and he has them re-enact historical events. This article describes in detail how a creative teacher inspires a whole class of students and gets them to feel passionate about changing their society for the better.
2005-2006 Teacher of the Year – Jason Kamras
http://www.scholastic.com/administrator/teachyear/year2005.htm
Jason Kamaras entered the Teach for America program after graduating from Princeton and went into an inner-city school in Washington D.C. He made the students feel proud of the fact that the desegregation of all Washington D.C. schools came about because of a challenge that came from their school. He raised the math scores incredibly by giving the kids access to technology and using real-world problem solving. This article is a good source about the power of the passion of one teacher to change the whole culture of a school. Although he left the school for a couple of years to earn more advanced degrees, he returned to the school where he continues o teach and is treated like an assistant principle.
Philip Bigler – National Teacher of the Year
http://www.ccsso.org/projects/national_teacher_of_the_year/National_Teachers/188.cfm
Interview with Maurice Butler
http://history matters.gmu.edu/d/7122
Interview with Michele Forman
http:historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6830
Welcome to History Matters
http://.history-matters.com/
This site gives a way of studying an event in history that can be really interesting because it is based on formerly secret documents that are now declassified by the U.S. Government because a certain amout of time has elapsed. The event discussed here is the assasination of President John F. Kennedy. The documents show evidence of conspiracy and show why there was a cover up. I think a study like this could engage a whole class and give a much deeper understanding about truth and lies and mysteries in the history we're taught.
Making History on the Web Matter in Your Classroom
http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/ht/34.3/schrum.html
History Matters seems to be a great resource for teachers to make history come alive in the classroom. One of the things History Matters does is give all the best websites for U.S history teachers to use. We all know that one of the drawbacks of the web is that there is just too much information and so it is really time consuming to sort out the good stuff from the garbage. This site does it for history teachers and it gets its funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities. I think this means it must be pretty good. Also, the way I found this site was by looking for articles about the best teachers in the country. Some of the National Teachers of the Year winners are featured on it.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Sunday, February 21, 2010
HW 40 - School Interviews x 5 & Synthesis
Part A
Questions on School
1. Name a teacher who inspired you in elementary or middle school and talk about how this teacher helped you.
2. Name a teacher in high school or college who had a strong influence on you, positively or negatively, and talk about the effect of the teacher and the course on your life.
3. If you had a chance to relive your high school years, what would you do differently? Academically? Socially?
4. If you could design the perfect high school for you, what would it look like?
5. Was/Is there a special teaching technique that has been most effective for you?
6. If you were the U.S. Secretary of Education, what would you do to make schools more effective in preparing more students for college?
Reed Bye (family friend)
1. Mr. Penny, eighth grade English, opened me to reading literature. Had us read aloud in class and discuss points from the book as a class, as well as write written reports. Reading as a collective class enterprise made the experience of the books livelier and less solitary. I remember reading A Tale of Two Cities this way in particular.
2. I‘m embarrassed that I can’t remember his name, but he too taught English and U.S. lit, and, while very reticent and shy as a teacher, introduced us early to U.S. postmodern poetry and somehow made the world of writing seem very interesting and eccentric without doing anything to glorify or artificially romanticize it.
3. I was not a good student in high school. I couldn’t focus on and stay with the texts in any subject very well. That may seem surprising because I began to read and write quite a lot in my twenties and have continued to do that throughout my life. I think I needed broader personal experience of the world before books and academic information could hold my attention and mean much to me. A more active social life might have helped a bit with
triggering academic interest, but really I just wasn’t intellectually activated in any particular direction enough to get very engaged with school work
4. It would include compulsory work projects—these could be of any nature-- scientific, artistic, mechanical, constructive, scholarly—that students would work on both individually and as part of a group. And it would be good if some of these involved specific off-campus assignments—interviews or other information gathering, viewing and note-taking, listening, etc.
5. Those that promote direct interchange between teacher and students, raising provocative questions grounded in the details of particular texts or issues. In general, teaching methods that excite general inquisitiveness as well as relaying personal passionate interest in a topic or subject.
6. I would want to implement a curriculum balanced between developing fundamental arts of expression-- reading, speaking, writing, singing, dancing (?!)—and the presentation of basic knowledge in particular disciplines oriented toward opening up those disciplines so they appear both open-ended and exciting with real questions and possibilities. That would require the enticement and employment of good, engaged teachers.
Marc Rodriguez (friend)
1. In middle school, my humanities teacher pushed me to do better. The reason being that he mentioned that I was barely passing his class and eventually I turned it around when I realized that I should to better and followed his advice and managed to do better and I had a major improvement.
2. In High School, I think my 10th Grade English was a major influence on me. See, I was not a person who was able to be present my work to people in my class and I was afraid to perform. It seems that afterwards, I wasn't afraid of performing or sharing my ideas and work to others, I felt that everyone is afraid and that you just need to have some charisma.
3. Since I'm still in High School, what I could have done prior to the grade I'm in I would've Probably talked more to people or talked more and not be embarrassed about what others said about me. Academically, probably not given up on some of the assignments back in Freshman year and not have been distracted.
4. I would have a school where the students are actively involved, have students that are willing to learn and won't just sit there and make fun of the quiet/dumb kid. Also a school that was more advanced than other schools, and one that isn't so hard to get into.
5. I think that having a teacher who doesn't go in-depth and at least explains work in a simple way has the best potential. A teacher who pushes you (by being encouraging) has best potential. I have seen this first hand, as I interned at an elementary school, where students have ideas of how teachers teach and how one can act to encourage students to work before having to deal with a higher quality of work in Middle School and High School.
6. Have a system in which schools only raise tuition based on need and also have a system in which there would be percentage increases every year that wouldn't make the price skyrocket.
Reed Morgan (brother – in college)
1. Ms. Murphy, my fifth grade English and History teacher, inspired me to work
harder because of her dynamic teaching style and her interesting assignments.
We had to create books and illustrate them: two fiction books (creative writing),
a biography, a cookbook, and an ad campaign for a favorite book. She showed
one of my books to a friend at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum, and this led to
my involvement with one the exhibitions.
2. Dr. Edith Balbach, who taught a community health course my freshman year and became a mentor to me. With her guidance I applied for a summer internship at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, where I was allowed to develop a program for children in Harlem. She encouraged me to major in public health and to apply for an international travel grant. I was able to work at an orphanage in Kenya and had an amazing experience.
3. I would have taken Spanish instead of or in addition to French in high school. I thought about saying that I would have worked harder, but actually I wouldn’t have wanted to work any harder. I would have liked even more time playing basketball.
4. I think all public elementary, middle, and high schools should have the same standard equipment and resources to create greater fairness. I’m talking about playgrounds, libraries, classroom equipment, music, dance, and theater classes – everything.
5. Hands-on learning experiences like internships have been great for me.
6. If I were the Secretary of Education, I would get rid of a lot of the testing in the lower grades and have kids read more in school, discuss books, and write their own stories.
Linda Morgan (mother)
1. Madame Seide was my French teacher in 7th, 8th, and 9th grade, and she made me love learning the French language and reading French literature. Because of her, I ended up majoring in French in college and spending my junior year in France.
2. Mr. Pierce taught an English course about James Joyce’s Ulysses, which was one of the most entertaining and stimulating classes I ever had in college. He taught us how to appreciate great works of literature.
3. I hope I would try to be more experimental with my ideas and writing and not worry about what others might think.
4. A perfect school would work to discover students’ individual talents early on so
so that they could be developed from a young age.
5. As part of my French classes, reading magazines in French, listening to French music, and going to French restaurants and speaking French all helped me become more fluent.
6. As Secretary of Education I would demand a much bigger budget to give all
the schools standardized resources so that there wouldn’t be the giant inequities
between rich and poor schools.
Questions on School
1. Name a teacher who inspired you in elementary or middle school and talk about how this teacher helped you.
2. Name a teacher in high school or college who had a strong influence on you, positively or negatively, and talk about the effect of the teacher and the course on your life.
3. If you had a chance to relive your high school years, what would you do differently? Academically? Socially?
4. If you could design the perfect high school for you, what would it look like?
5. Was/Is there a special teaching technique that has been most effective for you?
6. If you were the U.S. Secretary of Education, what would you do to make schools more effective in preparing more students for college?
Reed Bye (family friend)
1. Mr. Penny, eighth grade English, opened me to reading literature. Had us read aloud in class and discuss points from the book as a class, as well as write written reports. Reading as a collective class enterprise made the experience of the books livelier and less solitary. I remember reading A Tale of Two Cities this way in particular.
2. I‘m embarrassed that I can’t remember his name, but he too taught English and U.S. lit, and, while very reticent and shy as a teacher, introduced us early to U.S. postmodern poetry and somehow made the world of writing seem very interesting and eccentric without doing anything to glorify or artificially romanticize it.
3. I was not a good student in high school. I couldn’t focus on and stay with the texts in any subject very well. That may seem surprising because I began to read and write quite a lot in my twenties and have continued to do that throughout my life. I think I needed broader personal experience of the world before books and academic information could hold my attention and mean much to me. A more active social life might have helped a bit with
triggering academic interest, but really I just wasn’t intellectually activated in any particular direction enough to get very engaged with school work
4. It would include compulsory work projects—these could be of any nature-- scientific, artistic, mechanical, constructive, scholarly—that students would work on both individually and as part of a group. And it would be good if some of these involved specific off-campus assignments—interviews or other information gathering, viewing and note-taking, listening, etc.
5. Those that promote direct interchange between teacher and students, raising provocative questions grounded in the details of particular texts or issues. In general, teaching methods that excite general inquisitiveness as well as relaying personal passionate interest in a topic or subject.
6. I would want to implement a curriculum balanced between developing fundamental arts of expression-- reading, speaking, writing, singing, dancing (?!)—and the presentation of basic knowledge in particular disciplines oriented toward opening up those disciplines so they appear both open-ended and exciting with real questions and possibilities. That would require the enticement and employment of good, engaged teachers.
Marc Rodriguez (friend)
1. In middle school, my humanities teacher pushed me to do better. The reason being that he mentioned that I was barely passing his class and eventually I turned it around when I realized that I should to better and followed his advice and managed to do better and I had a major improvement.
2. In High School, I think my 10th Grade English was a major influence on me. See, I was not a person who was able to be present my work to people in my class and I was afraid to perform. It seems that afterwards, I wasn't afraid of performing or sharing my ideas and work to others, I felt that everyone is afraid and that you just need to have some charisma.
3. Since I'm still in High School, what I could have done prior to the grade I'm in I would've Probably talked more to people or talked more and not be embarrassed about what others said about me. Academically, probably not given up on some of the assignments back in Freshman year and not have been distracted.
4. I would have a school where the students are actively involved, have students that are willing to learn and won't just sit there and make fun of the quiet/dumb kid. Also a school that was more advanced than other schools, and one that isn't so hard to get into.
5. I think that having a teacher who doesn't go in-depth and at least explains work in a simple way has the best potential. A teacher who pushes you (by being encouraging) has best potential. I have seen this first hand, as I interned at an elementary school, where students have ideas of how teachers teach and how one can act to encourage students to work before having to deal with a higher quality of work in Middle School and High School.
6. Have a system in which schools only raise tuition based on need and also have a system in which there would be percentage increases every year that wouldn't make the price skyrocket.
Reed Morgan (brother – in college)
1. Ms. Murphy, my fifth grade English and History teacher, inspired me to work
harder because of her dynamic teaching style and her interesting assignments.
We had to create books and illustrate them: two fiction books (creative writing),
a biography, a cookbook, and an ad campaign for a favorite book. She showed
one of my books to a friend at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum, and this led to
my involvement with one the exhibitions.
2. Dr. Edith Balbach, who taught a community health course my freshman year and became a mentor to me. With her guidance I applied for a summer internship at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, where I was allowed to develop a program for children in Harlem. She encouraged me to major in public health and to apply for an international travel grant. I was able to work at an orphanage in Kenya and had an amazing experience.
3. I would have taken Spanish instead of or in addition to French in high school. I thought about saying that I would have worked harder, but actually I wouldn’t have wanted to work any harder. I would have liked even more time playing basketball.
4. I think all public elementary, middle, and high schools should have the same standard equipment and resources to create greater fairness. I’m talking about playgrounds, libraries, classroom equipment, music, dance, and theater classes – everything.
5. Hands-on learning experiences like internships have been great for me.
6. If I were the Secretary of Education, I would get rid of a lot of the testing in the lower grades and have kids read more in school, discuss books, and write their own stories.
Linda Morgan (mother)
1. Madame Seide was my French teacher in 7th, 8th, and 9th grade, and she made me love learning the French language and reading French literature. Because of her, I ended up majoring in French in college and spending my junior year in France.
2. Mr. Pierce taught an English course about James Joyce’s Ulysses, which was one of the most entertaining and stimulating classes I ever had in college. He taught us how to appreciate great works of literature.
3. I hope I would try to be more experimental with my ideas and writing and not worry about what others might think.
4. A perfect school would work to discover students’ individual talents early on so
so that they could be developed from a young age.
5. As part of my French classes, reading magazines in French, listening to French music, and going to French restaurants and speaking French all helped me become more fluent.
6. As Secretary of Education I would demand a much bigger budget to give all
the schools standardized resources so that there wouldn’t be the giant inequities
between rich and poor schools.
Devin Morgan(self - in high school)
1. Mrs. Nan O’Shea was my year-long 4th grade teacher, and she is the elementary school teacher I will never forget. She was the most dramatic teacher I ever had with her sweeping gestures and booming voice. She was a great storyteller and really knew how to connect with her students.
2. Ms. De Rothschild taught my 9th grade English class, and she really pushed me and all her other students to try to write consistently well every time. In her class I made graphic novels and wrote poetry and a lot of papers. What made her one of the best teachers I’ve had was her method of making detailed suggestions of how to improve a paper and then giving us a chance to get a better grade by redoing it.
3. For my freshman and sophomore years I would definitely try to get more sleep. I would go out for the soccer team both years so that I could get to know more kids.
4. The perfect high school for me would look more like a college campus with buildings located around a huge green lawn. It would be called Sports Tech (yes I’ve put a lot of thought into this), and it would be dedicated to improving the athletic talents of kids in sports ranging from basketball, soccer, swimming, tennis, football, track and field, baseball, and lacrosse.
5. An effective teaching technique for me is having a chance to revise a paper once the teacher has made corrections. In this way the corrections sink in better.
6. If I were the U.S Secretary of Education, I would have classroom helpers in middle school for all kids, not just for special needs kids. These helpers would spot academic weaknesses with each student and arrange one on one meetings daily to prepare them for highschool.
Part B
For me, and obviously for others, teachers are the focal point of school. Teachers have to feed kids' natural curiosity and find creative ways of getting kids to learn. Kids don't all learn the same way so teaching require a big bag of tricks, especially in the early years. Teachers are huge role models for kids and often get them interested in a subject they want to pursue for the rest of their lives. Adults always remember the teachers who inspired them the most. They would also remember the teachers who made life miserable for them. Our society should pay teachers much more to attract more of the best people to become teachers.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
HW # 39 - First School Assignment
HW #39
Part A
Questions:
1) How much does school mold us? A much as our families?
2) What is it that makes some kids hate school?
3) Do the schools we attend have a big part in determining our future?
Ideas
1) I wonder if teachers realize at the time what a powerful influence they are over students’ lives.
2) I wonder if some teachers don’t want to take that much responsibility for the influence they have over students’ lives.
3) A lot of famous and successful people say that their big regret is that they didn’t work harder in high school. When kids here this, why don’t we find it that
motivating.
Experiences
1) Dealing with kids who think their school is superior to theirs
2) Realizing that acting the same way to kids who are considered cool or who think they are cool and to kids who aren’t considered cool or who think they’re not cool is important to the way you think about yourself and to your whole community.
3) Questioning the fairness of the GPA grading system, making it so that even one bad grade freshman year can affect how colleges look at you your senior year.
Part B
When I was in 8th grade biology, I cut off the tip of my finger which flew across the room. Someone screamed, and I looked down to see a fountain of blood shooting up from my left pointer finger. My teacher, who was very athletic and regularly did well
in marathons and other competitions, swooned. She almost passed out. I think she
actually did. I yelled out, “Sombody find my finger.” I heard groans, and someone
said, “Oh gross!” One of my friends said, “I’ll get T-Bone, a teacher aid with dreadlocks and tattoos, who was afraid of nothing. T-Bone organized the search for the bloody stub and bandaged my finger. The problem was that it wouldn’t stop gushing.
The next thing I knew I was at St. Vincent’s Hospital, where Dr. Ho immediately inserted three needles into my minifinger with no warning whatsoever. The microsurgery was successful, and since Dr. Ho happened to be a plastic surgeon as well as a hand surgeon, I have hardly any scar. For weeks I had this huge bandage on my finger with a splint, and everyone I passed at school would put up a pointer finger in a mocking “We’re number one” gesture. I got the same reaction at soccer practice with my huge digit. My teacher apologized a thousand times for being such a wimp at the time of the accident. I told her that if I hadn’t already had ugly accidents like breaking my arm and wrist in three places each during soccer games and having my leg pierced by cleats, I probably would have passed out too. It also came out that I was running with scissors at the time of the slicing so all the school scissors didn’t have to be replaced.
Part A
Questions:
1) How much does school mold us? A much as our families?
2) What is it that makes some kids hate school?
3) Do the schools we attend have a big part in determining our future?
Ideas
1) I wonder if teachers realize at the time what a powerful influence they are over students’ lives.
2) I wonder if some teachers don’t want to take that much responsibility for the influence they have over students’ lives.
3) A lot of famous and successful people say that their big regret is that they didn’t work harder in high school. When kids here this, why don’t we find it that
motivating.
Experiences
1) Dealing with kids who think their school is superior to theirs
2) Realizing that acting the same way to kids who are considered cool or who think they are cool and to kids who aren’t considered cool or who think they’re not cool is important to the way you think about yourself and to your whole community.
3) Questioning the fairness of the GPA grading system, making it so that even one bad grade freshman year can affect how colleges look at you your senior year.
Part B
When I was in 8th grade biology, I cut off the tip of my finger which flew across the room. Someone screamed, and I looked down to see a fountain of blood shooting up from my left pointer finger. My teacher, who was very athletic and regularly did well
in marathons and other competitions, swooned. She almost passed out. I think she
actually did. I yelled out, “Sombody find my finger.” I heard groans, and someone
said, “Oh gross!” One of my friends said, “I’ll get T-Bone, a teacher aid with dreadlocks and tattoos, who was afraid of nothing. T-Bone organized the search for the bloody stub and bandaged my finger. The problem was that it wouldn’t stop gushing.
The next thing I knew I was at St. Vincent’s Hospital, where Dr. Ho immediately inserted three needles into my minifinger with no warning whatsoever. The microsurgery was successful, and since Dr. Ho happened to be a plastic surgeon as well as a hand surgeon, I have hardly any scar. For weeks I had this huge bandage on my finger with a splint, and everyone I passed at school would put up a pointer finger in a mocking “We’re number one” gesture. I got the same reaction at soccer practice with my huge digit. My teacher apologized a thousand times for being such a wimp at the time of the accident. I told her that if I hadn’t already had ugly accidents like breaking my arm and wrist in three places each during soccer games and having my leg pierced by cleats, I probably would have passed out too. It also came out that I was running with scissors at the time of the slicing so all the school scissors didn’t have to be replaced.
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Home work 38
HW 38 Art Project Cool
1. I wanted my graphic story (true) to illustrate the hot and cool aspects of the cool culture from West Africa that has affected African-American culture and I think probably almost every culture’s idea of cool. The cool part of cool is the detached attitude that shows a feeling of calm and strength, and the hot part is the energy and power of movement or action. These two sides of cool are obvious in jazz music’s hot and cool sides and in African-American dance, where the head stays cool and the body gets wound up. Our cool cultural heroes are usually detached in that they stand apart from everyone else, and powerful because they show great energy in some area. I tried to show in this graphic story how just focusing on the cool side of cool, the detached side, can be a negative thing. The players on the soccer team who don’t work hard have their idea of being cool on an underdog team that involves not listening to the coach and not making an effort. When the team starts winning and standing apart in its own way, these players start working harder. What I am trying to get across here is that just acting detached from whatever you don’t want to be a part of or what you want to stand out from in order to be perceived as cool and not using your energy to develop some part of yourself is self-defeating because this is the part of cool that gives you more self-esteem.
2. I decided on a graphic story because I didn’t have enough to create a video at
School. I chose to write about the SOF soccer team because it lost all but two games the last year and won all its games (on the field) this year. I decided on how many graphics I wanted to have to tell the story, decided on the sequence of the action and what I wanted the coach and players to say. I completed each graphic before going to the next one so that there would be continuity and then added color at the end.
Creating art is extremely cool because when you are drawing,
painting, singing, acting whatever), you are expressing yourself and your own originality.
An existentialist might say you are creating your essence, what makes you you. This means you are developing your own potential separate from anyone else and giving your life some meaning. In African tradition it is the hot part of being cool.
1. I wanted my graphic story (true) to illustrate the hot and cool aspects of the cool culture from West Africa that has affected African-American culture and I think probably almost every culture’s idea of cool. The cool part of cool is the detached attitude that shows a feeling of calm and strength, and the hot part is the energy and power of movement or action. These two sides of cool are obvious in jazz music’s hot and cool sides and in African-American dance, where the head stays cool and the body gets wound up. Our cool cultural heroes are usually detached in that they stand apart from everyone else, and powerful because they show great energy in some area. I tried to show in this graphic story how just focusing on the cool side of cool, the detached side, can be a negative thing. The players on the soccer team who don’t work hard have their idea of being cool on an underdog team that involves not listening to the coach and not making an effort. When the team starts winning and standing apart in its own way, these players start working harder. What I am trying to get across here is that just acting detached from whatever you don’t want to be a part of or what you want to stand out from in order to be perceived as cool and not using your energy to develop some part of yourself is self-defeating because this is the part of cool that gives you more self-esteem.
2. I decided on a graphic story because I didn’t have enough to create a video at
School. I chose to write about the SOF soccer team because it lost all but two games the last year and won all its games (on the field) this year. I decided on how many graphics I wanted to have to tell the story, decided on the sequence of the action and what I wanted the coach and players to say. I completed each graphic before going to the next one so that there would be continuity and then added color at the end.
Creating art is extremely cool because when you are drawing,
painting, singing, acting whatever), you are expressing yourself and your own originality.
An existentialist might say you are creating your essence, what makes you you. This means you are developing your own potential separate from anyone else and giving your life some meaning. In African tradition it is the hot part of being cool.
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