Areas of Expertise

In Kluth's text, I thought displaying a particular student's knowledge and special abilities really makes a difference. Kluth suggests having students participate in a match game where students have to come to the student that has the specialized knowledge about that topic to retrieve information.

This reminds me a little of "Star of the Week" where one or two students display their strengths, abilities, and hobbies through posters, photographs, and valued objects brought from home. Students have an opportunity to connect to the"Student of the Week" where they may not have before.

Linking Related Literacy Ideas

According to Phyllis Whitin's article, The Interplay of Text, Talk, and Visual Representation in Expanding Literary Interpretation, "...Making collaborative sketches would give the children an opportunity to practice linking these literary ideas in the companhy of their peers"(Vygotsky,1978).

Whitin makes an interesting point that we need to question the reason behind a particular student's response. Creating opportunities for students to reflect upon their answers through small and whole group discussion. Whitin emphasizes, "To be most effective, the teacher must demonstrate clear expectations for discourse in a way that maintains students' active construction of meaning"(V.39, 2005). For instance, Whitin describes how a teacher uses the book The Story of Ruby Bridges by Robert Coles to have student groups discover examples of the metaphors within the story text. While the teacher asks for examples, one student in particular uses his knowledge of about nuclear fusion such as a "diamond" to create an image of the type of character Ruby Bridges was. Then the students were to critique their metaphors through more small group dialoguing. Creating time as well as opportunities to discuss, share ideas, and critique each other in a collaborative environment is important.

Power Ranger Literacy: Re-Positioning Superheroes

According to Vivian Vasquez's article, "Our Way: Using the Everyday to Create a Critical Literacy Curriculum" from class, "This power ranger story helped me realize that I needed to listen to my students differently"(2000).

I keep thinking about observing my second graders at recess. Sometimes students make up games according to what they have seen on TV or heard about through others. Since the Twilight movies have come out, students have mimicked the way the vampires run and they try to catch their peers in a particular form of the game "tag". The students would run around with their arms behind them and they acted like bats flying through the air to portray the popular image of the vampire. One of the ways that students seem to learn how to interact with their peers is using what they have seen or heard through numerous literacies in the world they live in.
I agree with Vasquez that teachers need to carefully listen and speak with their students in a way that connects them to their own life experiences and support appropriate behavior at the same time.

Foldables and Literacy

http://wrhs.pasco.k12.fl.us/wordpop/WordPOP/Foldables.html

I went to a foldable workshop at my school where we learned how to make numerous foldables for each content area, especially reading. I have used foldables within my second grade classroom and they enjoyed creating the foldable using drawing and writing (learning logs). Students seem to take pride in taking home their completed foldable projects to present to family members and friends.

Bloom's Taxonomy Revised with New Digital Literacies

This is an article that I found on "Rampentred's Blog" http://rampantred.wordpress.com/multimodal-literacy/. The original Bloom's Taxonomy diagram is what I remember being taught in my undergrad. and I believe it is important to continually research how to connect to the lives of students and one the key ways is through digital technology. The revised Bloom's Taxonomy is difficult to read but some of the verbs used under the key term of "creating" are: programming, animating, filming, etc.

Here is an excerpt from his blog....

Bloom’s Taxonomy is used regularly by many teachers to extend their student’s thinking through engagement in stimulating learning tasks. This diagram of the revised taxonomy from Andrew Churches webpage, identifies key verbs associated with learning at each skill level.

More importantly, Andrew links new technologies with digital literacies in each level of the revised Bloom’s taxonomy. In the diagram below, the blue words represent the new skills required at each level for students to engage in using new digital literacies. He elaborates on how digital literacy can support the development of each of these thinking skills particularly as most of our students encounter these new literacies on a daily basis outside the classroom. This is a valuable guide for teachers in looking at ways to incorporate contemporary literacy practice into classroom teaching.

Can Drawing Facilitate Problem Solving?

The two drawings above are ways to incorporate technology within the classroom. The first picture of the tractor is where students can use the computer to help tell a story and the second is where students can create their own pictures and scan them into the computer to create a story or present a current issue within the world.

According to Australian Journal of Early Childhood, "Given children's constant exposure to such texts(writing, TV/DVD, etc.), it can be argued that they are in all likelihood busy interpreters and constructors of meaning in all its various symbolic forms, including drawing"(Lambert, 2006). In school, I find students bringing in varying types of technology from home such as cell phones and nintendo ds players. The school does not allow the use of this technology during the school day except before and after school. The knowledge that students already have about these types of technology (DVDs, texting) can be used as an advantage within the school curriculum. For instance, teachers can have students use learning logs and educational videos to connect to what the students already know and develop questions on what they would like to find out. Additonally, students can create a story about the life cycle of a pumpkin through podcast or moviemaker to help engage and motivate them.

Here is the link to the article:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb6418/is_2_31/ai_n31676977/?tag=rel.res5

A Parent's Perspective on Autism

This is a youtube video that expresses a parent's perspective on autism. I thought it was neat the strategies that are used to help students with autism such as music therapy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFVAuPu90eE