Ch. 4 The Subject Matters
I never really knew all of the debates and different sides of the academic subjects we teach today. It keeps showing how political education is and who is making these decisions for education. Why are they making these decisions for education? Who should be making these decisions?
One issue I agree with is the balanced approach to literacy. It is not getting rid of any certain approach like conventional spelling for example, but is balancing the skills and knowledge about literacy and learning. Even if views of reading change through the different cycles of literacy education, a balanced approach will still be beneficial because we are using multiple approaches in a balanced way. Benji Chang, the first grade teacher, showed a great example of balance in his story about using the basal and tying in multicultural literature. The balanced literacy approach also ties in the importance of home/school connection with literacy to provide more opportunities to build on home languages and cultures. I feel I use a balanced approach the most in my classroom setting-a variety is the best option for me.
Blog Reponses | Comments (2)Pedagogy of the Absurd
I agree that we need to respect teachers as professionals and allow teachers to examine research and theory and build their own pedagogy for teaching. We do expect to be respected for our choices and not have to explain and fight for the ways we are teaching-it should be a given we are making the best choices for our students. I then also see the side where there may be teachers that are in the teaching field with no experience and are there just to be there –with no passion, experience or the want for life-long learning. These teachers may need more guidance and not have the skills to build their own pedagogy. This is where teacher mentors play an important role for our future teachers.
I think there could be positives pulled out from a variety of approaches in literacy and we can use all of them if we need to. It comes down to being able to make our own decisions and choices that would best suit our students. I remember hearing our literacy coach saying how disappointed she was because she was walking into teachers’ rooms and everyone was teaching differently and reading workshop looked differently and there was no consistency. We are all individuals even if we are teachers. We need to have the freedom to be individuals in our classrooms as well. If the students saw the same approaches and instruction in every room in every grade level what would happen to that student’s excitement and motivation for school. This should not be a reading war, we should be using the best literacy approaches to help students make sense of print.
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