Final Synthesis Blog Post

At the beginning of the semester when I realized what this class would be all about I honestly didn’t think that I would get much value from it. I thought I understood what the content would be about, and I thought what we were discussing wouldn’t really apply to mathematics anyways, which is my main content area. Although I came in with a negative attitude towards the content, I feel like there were assignments that really shifted my view. I don’t think I would have the view I have about literacy in the classroom without engaging with these texts and assignments. Now, at the end of the semester, I am glad that I have the opportunity to reflect on them and remember how they help this semester and the knowledge I know have can for years teaching students.

As I mentioned, there are a few assignments that I found to be extremely helping in changing my attitude towards literacy in the classroom. I believe the first of these assignments was our think alouds. Being that math is my main content area, I really didn’t understand the process of a think aloud at first or even the types of texts that worked well in mathematics. Although I do believe these assignments were a learning process for me, I think that they initially opened the door to me understanding the importance of literacy in mathematics. For instance, the problems that I was trying to solve could not be comprehended and completed effectively without understanding how to read and interpret the information given. Literary tools are needed to do this, whether a student or a teacher. Think alouds essentially made me see this by requiring me to slow down and pay attention to the thought processes that were happening internally.

The next large shift in my understanding occurred when we started to use and incorporated the thinking strategies of effective readers that we read from our textbook. These strategies allowed me to understand and comprehend text so much better and it really made me think about how helpful these strategies would be for students of all reading abilities. Some of these strategies consisted of making connections, questioning, inferring, evaluating, analyzing, recalling, and self-monitoring. Looking at that list, every single one of those abilities is needed and utilized in mathematics. At this point in the semester I recognized that literacy was indeed a part of mathematics, the question now was would I ignore it or lean into discovering how to teach it in my classroom.

I feel like all through the semester I was searching for how to use helpful texts within the classroom while also teaching students how to engage with them using strategies I had also learned in this course. I believe that the biggest and most practical answer that I got to this question was through the strategy lessons that we taught the class in groups. I feel like those presentations and my own presentation gave me a clearer picture of what it looked like to intentionally bring literacy instruction into the classroom while teaching another content area. The largest benefit to this was that I got to see a lot of the lessons presented in person along with still having access to them all and examples of them through our textbook.

In my EMAT class this semester we discussed what it looks like to not only help students in learning math but to also encourage them in their ability to think mathematically smart. To show all of our students that they have the ability to succeed even though some students may have different strengths and abilities than other students. I mention this because I feel like seeing the need behind teaching literacy in my classroom has not only allowed me to see a broader content, I should be teaching but also other strengths that I had yet to consider that students can possess. For instance, skills in making connections and questioning are literacy strategies and are simultaneously so helpful and prove to be such an asset to students in math. I feel like this course allowed me to see the benefit of teaching my students literacy in math and also provided me with tools and language to applaud them and encourage them in their individual ways of mathematically thinking and being an asset to our classroom learning environment.

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Single Member Journal Club- Focal Area Content

Journal: Teachers and Content Area Reading: Attitudes, Belief, and Change 

Summary: This article addresses the issue of teaching literacy and reading across content areas and the attitudes that pre-service and in-service teachers bring to the table regarding this issue. Moreover, it is a summation and analysis of many different studies on the same issue and provides some possible conclusions as to why certain teachers have negative or positive attitudes about teaching literacy and reading in their classrooms.

Making Connections: I believe that the biggest and easiest connection that I made with this article was the fact that I can relate with what the article brings up about pre-service teachers. As a pre-service teacher myself I can relate to the idea that my only reference for literacy in the classroom is through what I grew up with and have tangibly experienced myself. I think it is hard to fully believe that my opinions or ideas about teaching literacy in the classroom would change so drastically after my first few years in the classroom, but I do understand that actually being in the classroom can bring up so many realizations that aren’t possible until you experience the actual act of teaching students on a day-to-day basis.

Critique: Overall, I really enjoyed reading this article. I believe that it brought up some really thoughtful points about how to encourage and equip teachers. Some of the things that were mentioned concerned placing pre-service teachers into in-service environments. This would allow them to experiment with ideas about how to incorporate literacy into the classroom. They also brought up that along with this, teachers should be provided with an environment to debrief and volunteer creative ideas for improvement. I think that I generally agree with all of this, even with the critiques that were made concerning how educators are currently instructed concerning this topic. I do think my biggest critique with this article has more to do with the limitations of it. It was nice to see an article that compiled the ideas and conclusions from many different sources, but there wasn’t a definite answer attached with any of the conclusions that the author was stating. While this make sense, I would have liked to see these conclusions put into practice and then analyzed as well.

Importance: I believe that majority of the importance of this article lies in the conclusions that it draws from the studies the author has researched. This article mentions many things about why pre-service teachers have such an aversion to teaching literacy in their classrooms or the lack of confidence they have in their ability to teach literacy. I believe that there are very important things to draw from this information. For instance, it provides suggestions for how to remedy this problem and fill educators with more desire and confidence to bring literacy into the classroom. 

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FOCAL AREA Podcast: See You in the Classroom: Recording 1

This is our podcast! Hope you enjoy!

Resource Blog #5 (Cross-Curricular)

Website: https://theideaofamerica.org/

The website that I found for my final resource blog is called “The Idea of America”. This website can be used for teachers or students, but right off from the start I did notice that it does cost money for users. This is an instant drawback for current teachers and for a future teacher like me, but it only cost $99 for a year subscription and the possibility of sharing between co-teachers or teachers within close grade levels takes some of the burden of the expense away. Being that I believe this resource would be really helpful, I decided to share it and write about the benefits I believe that it could have for the literacy in the social studies classroom. This website specifically aims to get students talking and intentionally participating in the “great American debates” that have been around since the formation of our country. A huge highlight of resource is the fact that it includes so many different mediums and text for students to get engaged with and connect with as they gain more information to back up their points of view and develop their opinions. I believe that this is what makes this resource so unique and great for middle schoolers. The website also talks about the 21^st century forward nature of their texts and resources, which makes me even more inclined to use this site as I teach.

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Synthesis Blog 5

As we’ve read through Subjects Matter this semester, we have seen many ways that students can engage with text, improve literacy, and how we, as teachers, can aid all of these. As we transition in class to starting our own book clubs, it has been very helpful to read the chapter in Subjects Matter about book clubs and all the ways they accomplish certain literary goals, and we’ve also been able to see pitfalls that could occur as our classroom takes on book clubs. I believe this helps us learn what it looks like to organize these types of activities and groups, but because we are participating in a book club, we can see first hand how ideas in Subjects Matter are valid and true.

I believe, as the book discusses, roles should be assigned to students for book clubs. Still being a student myself, the idea of group members pulling all the weight or slacking off is all too familiar. As Subjects Matter says, “these structured discussion groups combine two powerful educational ideas: collaborative learning and independent reading” (page 243).  I believe reading groups help to bring in skills that are unique to this specific learning task/tool, and they provide a format for students to truly learn about ideas discussed in a text because they are analyzing the text individually, with a group, and then being assessed through creative assignments.

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Resource Blog #4 (Cross-Curricular)

The resource that I found this week is titled iCivics. This resource is an interactive website that has story-type games and simulations. Obvious by its title, it takes students through topics such as the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and the branches of government. From what I can tell by playing several of the learning games, this site is engaging for students because of its story telling component and ability for students to choose the story’s direction for themselves. Another reason I would recommend Social Studies teachers using this site is because it doesn’t just give students hard facts; this site allows students to think critically about how people during each time period would respond to certain challenges or governmental decisions. I believe this allows students to connect decisions that the government makes or the structure of government to its affect on its citizens. I think it is a very beneficial skill for students because it can make connecting history to real-life situations much easier. Teaching students history through the lens of the people involved in specific events helps them to feel more real and significant to students. This also really helps with engagement in the classroom. The last and one of the greatest positive things about this site is that it is free! This always makes resources an even better find!

Website: https://www.icivics.org/ 

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Strategy Lesson Reflection

I feel like presenting for our strategy lesson went very well. I think that we were able to communicate our ideas well with the class, and majority of the feedback that we received agreed with this. There were a few things that happened that I felt like were really good. For one, as a group we really understood what would be helpful in an actual classroom, and we were able to implement that into our lesson and communicate that to our peers. I think that assigning students to groups ahead of time really showed that we were thinking about and aware of behavior management strategies within our lesson. I also believe that our concept can be practically used in a math classroom and, when used well, could be a real asset to the teacher and the students. One of the “grows” that we got most consistently was saying that we should walk around to make sure the students are on task or either so that we can pick up some of the interesting or helpful things that students are saying in their groups. I think that this advice is so helpful and would be very good to implement in the classroom. Overall, I think that our presentation went very well, and I enjoyed hearing what everyone had to say!

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