Synthesis Blog #2

At Greenbrier High of Augusta, Georgia, there are three teachers that most students learn to highly respect once an alumnus: Ms. Lowery, Mr. Cummings, and Ms. Jackson. These teachers were the most talked about, the kindest, the silliest, the most approachable, the most understanding, and some of the most influential educators I know. There’s something about these three that stood out from the other teachers. Ms. Lowery was quite intimidating but towards the end, you hoped your writing gives you an A+ just to make her proud. Mr. Cummings, this Georgia Tech alum, taught some pretty tough mathematics… but he was such a nice guy, always joking around with us. And Ms. Jackson, I remember the first day of AP World History with her. She played with her hair but threatened that if we don’t intend to work hard, it’s best for us to drop now. I sat in her classroom for fun during lunch everyday senior year.

In the article "5 Tips for Better Relationships With Your Students," Dave Foley helps uncover the difference between the most influential teachers from the ones that go unremembered.

“Should teaching be a popularity contest? Probably not. But skilled educators know the value of having good relationships with students. Establishing goodwill can help minimize classroom disruptions, improve student engagement, and reduce stress for everyone.”

Foley recognizes the two-way benefit when a good mutual relationship is developed between teacher and student. I not only felt very comfortable walking into their classrooms at all times or sharing bits and pieces of my personal life that influenced my day, these 3 teachers taught me so much. I tried especially hard in their classes. These classes were engaging because I knew these teachers wanted me to succeed! They believed in me and I felt this through their trust, their understanding, and the amount of respect they showed me as their student. I think there are many ways to help a student but this relationship is what helps push students to their maximum potential. [336 words]

Book Pitch

When I think of aquatic life, I think of a beautiful coral reef filled with different shapes and colors swimming with life! I think of clear clean blue water and schools of different types of fish moving in every direction, maybe even a sea turtle in the back swimming slowly, a very pleasant and peaceful environment.

Now what if you found out these peaceful creatures’ homes are being threatened by human sewage? Most sewage finds its way into oceans as poorly treated or untreated discharge. Untreated sewage isn’t safe for people, let alone our marine life. In the book Flush, Noah is determined to prove that the Coral Queen casino boat is an environmental offender, flushing away their sewage into the Florida Keys! But how does Noah prove that the casino is dumping illegally?

Flush by Carl Hiaasen

• Lexile: 830L
• 272 Pages [Paperback]
• Grade Levels: 5+
• Theme / Subject: Environmental Conservation and Preservation, Boats and Underwater Crafts, Animal Conservation and Protection
• Genre: Comedy, Mystery and Suspense, Young Adult Fiction
• Content Area: Middle Grades Science, Earth Science [6^th grade]

Read about the effects of sewage on freshwater ecosystems here and how sewage is a threat to coral reefs here!

Strategy Lesson Reflection

Annotating Text

Today I had my Strategy Lesson on Annotating Text! I think my Think Aloud went significantly better and there are several things I would do differently, for example, better preparing for my presentation. I can place some blame on technology malfunctioning but educators need to be able to adapt. I also got tripped up on quite a few words at times and my delivery wasn’t the most effective.... In the future if I am ever teaching the strategy of annotation, I would be sure I am more prepared to present the benefits and different variations of annotating text. Annotating text is very important skill that higher-level readers implement in their daily reading almost automatically. Annotating text also comes in many forms and styles – “Annotation is the mother of all during-reading strategies.”

Going into this presentation, I was a little concerned about distinguishing the difference between annotating text and a think aloud. Subjects Matter agreed that these two strategies are very similar but with annotating text, “we want kids to focus on the content as much as the thinking process, so we write a little bit more on the page.”

Overall there were a lot of things I need to work on but hopefully my presentation wasn’t too poor, got some good laughs! – whoa, whoa, whoa… involuntarily?!

Also, in case you were wondering, hair follicles do technically have muscle. There are small muscles attached to hair follicles under the skin. Contractions of these muscles cause hairs to stand on their end, resulting in what we call a goose bump! [261 words]

Blog #8

Reading about implementing content-area book clubs reminds me a lot of a reading assignment from my high school AP Literature class. On top of preparing for our AP test in class, we formed groups for book readings. It wasn’t a traditional book club seeing as we formed groups of friends before choosing our reading, and then found a reading that everyone seemed interested in… but every group selected different books that each member read individually. We then had to meet with our group for discussion outside of class and prepare a presentation for the class towards the end of the year. My teacher provided a massive list of books that were recommended for AP literature students (wise references to make on the AP exam). Instead of reading several books, we presented key concepts and themes from our chosen books to our classmates.

Maybe this was my teacher introducing book clubs to us? I, unfortunately, don’t remember being very interested in this assignment when I was her student though my book, Slaughterhouse Five, was indeed an interesting read. Looking back, I think I would have executed this assignment differently than my teacher, taking advantage of some of Chapter 9’s tips and tricks of implementing a successful book club. For example, I don’t remember having to meet with my group during the reading but only once after finishing the books to make our presentations.

High school might be a little different but I think small group book clubs are rather fun activities to have during class time! It’s not that much different than getting together with a group of friends and just chatting about something. With these tools – connector, questioner, passage master, vocabulary enricher, illustrator, and researcher - we can avoid students sitting in awkward silence wasting time while leading them towards more natural and free flowing discussions. [306 words]

Just like Friends talking in a coffee shop.