Reading History: A Practical Guide to Improving
Literacy
Chapter 1 Building Foundations for Reading Success
In the beginning of the chapter Allen pointed out how school districts are demanding teachers cover more material within a short amount of time. As a result, teachers end up more concerned on trying to get through a lesson as oppose to actually teaching the lesson. But Allen indicates that it’s more important to make a lesson meaningful, interactive, and interesting, otherwise students won’t be willing to participate in the lesson. Another important factor to take into consideration when creating a lesson is students’ prior knowledge on the topic. By identifying this way the teacher creates some sort of foundation to introducing their new unit.
I personally see this happen in my CPD classes. My mentor throughout his lesson always tries to make some sort of
connection between his lesson and his students’ personal lives. He usually does this by using examples of current pop culture, such as movies, cartoons, music, celebrities, etc. By doing this he manages to capture his students’ attention while still teaching his lesson. One reason I think my mentor is good at making these connections and references is because he’s good at thinking on his feet, improvising, and going with the flow of his class.
You brought this tension up in discussion on Friday. I wonder how you are thinking about it now. You mentioned being afraid that it would take so much time. What does your mentor think? Is it worth it?
ReplyDeleteI'd like to see a bit more substantial post for your blog...or multiple posts, if need be, and if you prefer writing in smaller chunks. One thing I like about your post is that you go beyond just talking about the strategies in this chapter; you also engage with the ideas. To do more of that, think about the connections you might be able to make between this reading - in this class and other classes.