Archive for Teaching

Fair Use

February 6, 2013 Teaching, Technology No comments

Today in my Writing in a Digital Age class, we’ll be talking about fair use in honor of Digital Learning Day. I’ve been reading Renee Hobbs’s Copyright Clarity and am borrowing heavily from a proposed workshop for educators. Since my students are more concerned with their own work, however, I’m using just the first few activities she describes, then trying to complicate our understanding of fair use by viewing a TED talk by Lawrence Lessig.

Here’s a breakdown of my lesson today. I anticipate we’ll move far beyond what I’ve outlined here, however, since my students this semester are engaged with and thoughtful about technology.

Copyright

“What is the purpose of copyright?” (Hobbs, Copyright Clarity 98)

Pair-share: discuss your answer to the question

  • “How many included reference to owners’ rights, making money, or profit?” (Hobbs, Copyright Clarity 98)
  • “How many included references to creativity or the spread of knowledge?” (Hobbs, Copyright Clarity 98)

Purpose of copyright: “to promote creativity, innovation, and the spread of knowledge” (Hobbs, Copyright Clarity 98 summarizing Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution, written in 1787.)

Copyright Law of 1976 defines Fair Use: “for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship or research.”

What did you learn from viewing Renee Hobbs’ slide share? (Their homework assignment was to view the slide share, take notes, and be ready to share what they feel is significant about it)

Transformativeness

Define transformativeness: “Does the new work merely supersede the objects of the original creation, or instead does it add something new, with a further purpose or different character, altering the first with new expression, meaning, or message?” (Hobbs, Copyright Clarity 46).

Use this question to consider your use of other sources in your own work.

Creative Commons

Watch Lawrence Lessig, “Laws that Choke Creativity”

  • How does Lessig complicate ideas about copyright?
  • What is Creative Commons?
  • How can we be informed and careful users of digital content?

Further Resources for Teachers

Digital Millenium Copyright Act of 1998

Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Media Literacy Education

 

Tagging

January 24, 2013 Collaboration, Teaching, Technology, Writing One comment

Last night was the first meeting of my digital writing class. Generally, one of my goals for the first day of a class is to help the students get to know each other. Usually, I just have students introduce themselves–and sometimes I make a game of memorizing each other’s names . . . especially if the class is large and I know it will be challenging for students to get to know each other.

As I planned last night’s class, I remembered something I’d done in a session of NWP one year. The leaders of the session asked us to tag ourselves as if we were a blog post. On post-it notes, we identified important characteristics/passions that we had. And then we all walked around the room talking to each other. I knew this would be a great way for my class to explore the importance of good tags while participating in an icebreaker.

So last night we looked at a couple of blogs and how the writer created tags. We discussed how tags were useful in helping readers find entries relevant to their own interests and needs. When I felt we had explored the concept of tagging enough, I asked students to come up with their own tags, modeling by talking through tags that I might use “foodie,” “traveler,” “teacher.”

For the next 25 minutes, my students engaged in discussions that went deeper than they would have otherwise since they had something specific to talk about related to each other’s interests. I saw some animated conversations and I noticed that students really tried to expand their circles to introduce themselves to class members they didn’t know. This was especially important since there is a core group of students who already knew each other–and I wanted to ensure that a spirit of collaboration and openness characterizes the class. When I asked the class afterward what they had learned about each other, students remembered a great deal, even recalling the three breeds of one self-proclaimed “mother of 3 dogs.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This type of activity reflects the research of James J. Asher using Total Physical Response (TPR) as a way of helping students learn languages. Although his theory focused on second language learning, researchers studying how to develop vocabulary in one’s native language have also identified TPR as one important method. My students are likely familiar with the idea of “tagging,” but this activity was one way to ensure that they will think more deeply when they start to tag their own blog posts.

Note: as I mentioned in a previous post, I’m teaching in a new classroom that turns the traditional arrangement on its head. You can see above, one of four large screens (one for each wall), a moveable small whiteboard (one of many so that small groups can use them), chairs and tables that move which allows for different arrangements depending on what the class will do on a particular day, and large panels with a photograph of campus (since the room doesn’t have windows). I’m really excited to teach in this room which will also allow me to project my iPad (with all its different apps) on the screens. Moreover, each screen can project something different: my computer, my iPad, the document camera. Very cool.

Now, what tags should I use for this post?

Digital Writing and Collaboration

December 8, 2012 Collaboration, Teaching, Technology 2 comments

Next semester, I’ll be teaching a course I’ve called “Writing in a Digital Age.” I’ve selected a couple of books to read, Howard Rheingold’s Net Smart and Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One  (neither of which I’ve read, so I’ve got some work to do over the break). I’ve also been thinking about the kinds of writing I want my students to do (blogging, tweeting, podcasting, fan fiction) and the concepts I want my students to understand (curation, passionate affinity spaces). Nevertheless, my planning for the class has a long way to go.

One of the things I’m most excited about in relation to the class is that I’ll be teaching in a new collaborative classroom on campus. Here’s a description of what the space will have:

  • Capacity for 54 students and 1 instructor
  • The majority of the seats will be around rectangular tables-seating six students each.
  • There will be few “café” style tables seating three students each. These tables will be taller than typical tables.
  • There will be four monitors and one “main” screen.
  • There will be an HD projector.
  • There will be a set of write-on boards and few movable easel boards.
  • Most tables and all chairs will fold.
  • While there will be an instructor station, there will not be a traditional podium, desk, or lectern.

I really love curriculum design and am excited to plan a class that will take advantage of this learning space.

 

Structures for Processing Text

November 29, 2012 Teacher Preparation, Teaching No comments
Last summer, I worked with a local teacher, the wonderful Kristie Leyba, during a summer institute for teachers. One of the things that I found to be really impressive about Kristie was the myriad ways she had of helping participants engage with reading assignments. I wish I had taken notes about each one, because frequently when I’m planning for class I’m trying to remember what Kristie did. At the beginning of the semester, I asked my students to read an excerpt of Paolo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed and an article about critical English education by Ernest Morrell. Both assignments employ academic and theoretical language that can be challenging to students. I’ve taught Freire frequently, but this was my first time using Morrell–and since there were so many interesting intersections between the two articles, I wanted my students to synthesize them. After all, Morrell’s work in critical literacy is an evolution of Freire’s critique of the banking concept of education and his pioneering work in problem-posing/liberation pedagogy. Thinking of Kristie’s work teaching reading, I created a four square activity where partners had to gather information from the article about what “knowledge” meant in the two approaches to education and then what the teacher’s role was in each approach. I asked them to look at the articles closely, identify passages, and also paraphrase. This enabled us to have a rich discussion in class about the articles as I took notes, asked follow-up questions, and worked to push their thinking.

Educational Reform

October 22, 2012 Teacher Preparation, Teaching No comments

I’ve been in Norway for the last few days, attending this year’s American Studies Association of Norway conference. There were many good presentations, but two in particular that I want to blog about. This first post will address the research of Thomas Hatch, professor at Columbia’s Teachers College and co-director of the National Center for Restructuring Education, Schools, and Teaching. Tom was on Fulbright a year ago in Norway and presented his research comparing Norwegian and American school systems.

Norway and the United States are similar in both student performance on the PISA assessment and the amount of money they spend on education. However, there are some crucial differences that illustrate cultural difference and allow both countries to consider a different approach to school reform.

Ultimately, Tom makes the argument that both school systems would be better served by a balance between two approaches to reform: accountability/answerability (US) and responsibility (Norway). One of the most provocative points he made was that “promoting accountability involves helping people develop the means to act responsibly, making sure they have the resources, support, and skills to do the jobs they are being asked to do and to reach the goals they’ve been asked to reach.” 

In this short statement, he pointed towards a number of problems with American schools. In my work, I see how teachers feel that the onus of responsibility for student success is placed on them, yet their attempts to act responsibly are undercut by administrative policies that take teacher autonomy out of the equation. In the Fresno area, these policies include the use of scripted curriculum which transforms the teacher into a delivery person without any control over content or methods. Other problematic policies include top down structures that remove the teacher from decision making or problem solving in both schools and districts. These kinds of policies have resulted in passive teachers who don’t see themselves as able to act professionally and responsibly. Thus, teacher morale has plummeted and many excellent teachers have either already left the profession or are considering doing so.

If we expect teachers to be accountable, we must allow them to build supportive learning communities–which involves giving time on the job to work together on curriculum, staying current on new disciplinary ideas and approaches, and otherwise exploring the work of teaching. Administrators need to trust teachers, to give them room to make well informed decisions about their classrooms and students. However, since teacher autonomy has deteriorated over the last few years, I can see how this will require great efforts to recast the relationship of each contributor to the educational process (teachers, administrators, staff, parents, and students). Moreover, schools and districts will need to provide meaningful, thoughtful, and well informed resources and support for their teachers–and by this, I don’t mean packaged curriculum, text book company designed PD which is often transmitted by people who have become disconnected from the realities of schools.

Tom’s presentation challenged me to look at an even broader context for school reform in that he argued that we are all responsible for the success of our schools: “funding, facilities, technology, textbooks, teacher education, leadership preparation, researchers, policy makers, social networks, community organizations, political support, public support.” That is a striking list. Our reform efforts have been short sighted; if we want to succeed at improving schools, we need to look at the many different aspects of reform that will support and nurture student learning.

As a teacher educator and leader of a professional development organization for teachers, I need to do some hard thinking about what I can do to promote educational reform.

Thank a Teacher

May 8, 2012 Teacher Preparation, Teaching No comments

Earlier today, a former student tweeted at me in honor of #ThankaTeacher day: “Thanks to @cakeypal for changing my life. More than once.” I understand at least part of what she means here; when she was an undergrad, I suggested she apply to be a tutor at our campus writing center. Before that point, she was steadily progressing towards a goal to become a secondary English teacher. But the job she got as a result of my suggestion changed her, leading to a decision to get an M.A. in composition theory, a job teaching first year writing as a grad student, and now a tenure track job at a community college.

Her tweet made me think about a teacher who changed my life: Mrs. Clark. I remember very little of her 9th grade English class. In fact, what I do recall is doing skill and drill exercises in a grammar book. Her class bored me silly–but I was shy and quiet, responsible about school, and not about to complain or act out. Somehow, Mrs. Clark saw my boredom. Instead of being offended or threatened by it, she recommended that I be moved to a more advanced English class where we studied literature and wrote and discussed ideas. I was still shy, and I sometimes felt less intelligent than my classmates who had been in these types of classes for months if not years. But in this class and those that followed it, I began to consider that my voracious reading might lead to a different future than the one I had imagined up to that point.

I’m grateful to Mrs. Clark for her willingness to intervene on my behalf. And today, as I reflect on her influence on my life, I think about how what we do as teachers isn’t just about content (although I believe that content matters a great deal). Teachers can choose to imagine the futures of their students, and find ways to help students discover, dream, and shape a life that engages with their academic and artistic passions.

I’m sure Mrs. Clark didn’t realize where her suggestion would lead, just as I had no idea how excited Andrea would become about composition theory. But today, I’m proud to stand with both Mrs. Clark and Andrea in the ranks of teachers who change lives.

Thank you Mrs. Clark and the visionaries who came after you: Mrs. Pat Stoddard, Dr. Roy Bird, Dr. Del Kehl, Dr. Judith Sensibar, and Dr. Cordelia Candelaria. Each of you influenced the trajectory of my professional life.

Sandra Cisneros and Arizona

February 3, 2012 Life, Literature Instruction, Teaching No comments

Many, many years ago (in the early 90′s), I attended a reading in Mesa, Arizona that featured a number of artists, including Sandra Cisneros. In a group of really wonderful writers and performers, Sandra stood out. She was feisty and strong, so passionate about the world and her beliefs. It was a memorable night. Since then, I’ve taught her work in Arizona, Texas, California, and Norway. I’ve seen students all over the map, from all kinds of backgrounds, respond to her work. They’ve seen themselves in her stories, connecting with so many of her characters and themes. They’ve understood that we all experience pain, conflict, joy, friendship, love–and that we all have dreams that we hope to accomplish.

For the past few days, Sandra has been in Fresno doing a number of events. Yesterday, she talked with teachers and shared her own story about when she taught at an alternative high school. She was so supportive of teachers and the difficult jobs they have to do today. She also talked about how while she was teaching she was also writing The House on Mango Street–it was a way for her to transcend her anger about students who had been so ill prepared by society, so ill served by a system that should have nurtured them.

The woman I’ve seen over the last few days is centered, spiritual, and generous. She’s someone I want to emulate in her ability to advocate for causes she believes in from a place of hope.

This afternoon, Sandra talked briefly about the ban of books like hers in Tucson schools. One thing she said really stuck with me. She said she wished she could just sit down and eat lunch with those who are making these policies. She said that she just wants to tell them stories–because stories have the power to provoke change. She said she wanted to make them laugh, to remind them of their humanity.

I believe in her ability to tell the right story, the story that would change their hearts. And I have to say that after listening to Sandra speak over the last two days, I suddenly believe in our ability to tell the right story, as well. Those of us who care about Ethnic Studies/Chican@ literature, those of us who have been changed by what we’ve read–we need to keep telling our stories in ways that will appeal to the humanity of those who oppose our views.

Stories have the power to transform. We have to keep believing in that.

Digital Learning Day

February 1, 2012 Teacher Preparation, Teaching, Technology 2 comments

Today was the first of what I hope will be an annual event: Digital Learning Day. The Alliance for Excellent Education suggested that teachers try one new thing, one new technology in their classes today. It was kind of a no-brainer for me since I’ve already used wikis, google sites, and blogs; I decided to have my students take part in a Twitter chat (using #FresnoDLD).

On the first day of class, I asked my students to set up a Twitter account–they were not excited, in fact some of them complained immediately. I talked with them about how Twitter allows teachers to take part in powerful learning networks and about how we need to stay open to new experiences (especially since that’s what we expect of our students). They grudgingly complied with my request (although I knew that was more about the power dynamics of teacher-student rather than because I was so convincing).

Today, I spent time talking about the benefits of Twitter–one thing that really helped was that in response to a tweet I made last night, a professor across the country had blogged about the topic I’d chosen for the Twitter chat: transactional theory (I owe Greg Mcverry bigtime. Please go to his blog and comment!). After my pep talk, I then modeled different aspects of Twitter (trying to keep it pretty simple). I asked students to do a test tweet–there were a number of things we had to problem solve before everyone’s tweets worked.

The next thing I asked students to do was to post something they thought was interesting about Louise Rosenblatt’s essay, “The Aesthetic Transaction.” Since I had already modeled how to reply to tweets, they also started to do that. A teacher I know who tweets (the wonderful @kimmin121) chimed in and before I knew it there was energy in the room: the clicking of keyboards and focused attention on computer screens. When I had thought about how things would go last night, I really expected the class to fail. I thought we’d last about 20 minutes and that then I’d need to switch gears. That didn’t happen. Students shared quotes they liked from the essay, they started to talk about activities they could do in class connecting literature and technology, they made witty comments. It helped that my friend and colleague @johncbeynon egged them on, talking about how Hamlet would have been addicted to Facebook, friending and unfriending people as his perception of them changed. Another student started pointing out haikus in Rosenblatt’s essay. Students asked each other questions and clarified concepts.

Towards the end of class, I asked the students to go to a Google document to enter in what they had learned from the Rosenblatt essay. This gave them the chance to use more than 140 characters and it gave me something to check to see how well they had understood the article. The combination of the Twitter chat and the Google document provided a nice balance to our discussion (though having everyone on the Google doc at once proved a little chaotic).

Because the class had gone by so quickly, we only had about 5 minutes to debrief. My students made some good observations–we talked about how the chat probably hadn’t been the best forum to talk about a complex article. Next time, I would probably focus on practice, instead. We also talked about how it wasn’t the most efficient way to have a discussion amongst a bunch of people in the same room. I’d still do this the first time I had students chat via Twitter, though, as they needed me to be there to help.

I’m really glad I tried this–and so relieved it went pretty well. I liked that the Twitter chat allowed students to play with ideas a little, that it created such an electricity in the classroom in spite of the quiet. I don’t know that all my students will keep their Twitter accounts, but I’m glad they were willing to participate this once and hope that they will be more open to using technology in their careers as teachers. I also hope that I’ve modeled for them the ways that teachers need to be fearless in trying new strategies. I think I would perish as a teacher if I wasn’t able to keep learning and growing–and adding to my teaching repertoire.

#DLDay

Inquiry-Based Curriculum

July 17, 2011 Collaboration, Teaching No comments

In January, I co-wrote a grant with two local teachers, Esther Koers-Hansen and Cate Dossetti. We proposed a two year partnership between the San Joaquin Valley Writing Project and Fresno High, focusing specifically on inquiry-based curriculum. Since our project received funding, a group of teachers met about a month ago to read Jim Burke’s What’s the Big Idea? and to start thinking about how to transform their curriculum to inspire student inquiry.

One of the teachers in our Summer Institute did a demonstration lesson that fits really well into the inquiry model. Susan Jensen is an instructor at the agricultural campus of College of the Sequoias. In her class, she asks students to engage in inquiry about food production. Her students read selections from Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma and local writer David Mas Masumoto’s Epitaph for a Peach: Four Seasons on My Family’s Farm. Susan encourages her students to brainstorm about the different topics they could research for an essay.

One of the innovative methods she uses is to ask each student to share the initial research question on a big piece of poster paper. Then, Susan’s class does a gallery walk where everyone wanders about the classroom reading each other’s topics on the posters and writing down questions. In the Summer Institute we tried this with possible research topics–participants asked me questions that ended up causing me to change my topic to something that actually was more interesting to me. And we all discovered lines of research that we should do if we were to move forward on this essay.

Moreover, on one section of the poster paper, we suggested possible sources if we knew anything about the topic. We also categorized the questions our peers posed as a way to start thinking about sections of an essay or types of information we needed to find.

I really want to try this activity next semester. I think it will create a more collaborative classroom where students develop interest in each other’s topics–and try to help each other when they can. I also like that it will encourage students to go in directions that they might not have anticipated at the beginning of the process. It seems like the resulting research essay might be deeper and more well developed, especially if I think of ways to repeat this activity as the semester moves on (I’m envisioning using this for a term paper).

I really want to help my students become more curious about the world, and this is one class activity that I think might help.

Process: Not Another Formula

March 23, 2011 Teaching, Writing 2 comments

In my Methods class, we’ve started to explore how to teach writing. For Monday’s class, my students read an article by Arthur Applebee and Judith Langer, “What’s New in the Teaching of Writing.” The authors summarize research over the last 30 or so years connected to writing instruction. One of the most interesting points they make is that writing scores on the NAEP have basically stayed the same during the time studied.

When I read this, I thought about the hysteria that seems to break out every once in awhile–that students can no longer write and that something must be done to bring writing levels back to some (imagined) better place. However, one of my students had a different reaction. He felt that these results indicated that process pedagogy doesn’t work. His comment made me think.

I do believe in teaching the writing process; I’m convinced that it can make visible for novice writers what kinds of thinking they need to do in order to create a polished, well developed, organized piece of writing (if that’s the goal).

However, I also believe that too many teachers either don’t teach the writing process or they are reductive in their approach. For example, too often, teachers move rigidly from one “step” to the next, not understanding that cognitive research tells us that writers intermingle the strategies of “planning, translating, and reviewing,” to use the labels developed by Linda Flowers and John Hayes. Too often, teachers require students merely to produce drafts instead of asking students to do new thinking to expand, develop, and revise their work. Too often, process pedagogy has become just a routine, a series of hoops that we have students jump through before they turn in a final draft.

Although I see problems in the ways that teachers employ process pedagogy in their classes, on some level I also agree with my student. Process isn’t enough–and that’s why so many theorists build on, but add to, the idea of process. The two ways of looking at writing that make the most sense to me right now are writing as strategy and genre theory. Both approaches ask students to develop knowledge about the ways that texts are produced and the ways they function–and then to use that knowledge to produce their own writing.

Today in class, we read about formulaic writing. When we simplify process into steps, we just create another formulaic approach to writing. We should be pushing students to think and explore ideas, to create structures that support their thinking, and to revise in order to use language that best encapsulates the concepts they are trying to communicate.

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