I have been a pluralist most of my life because I enjoy being distracted (probably because it’s so hard for me to become distracted in the first place).  While I have adopted certain stances on spirituality to philosophy, I tend to remain behind the idea that most everything people get emotional about is a social construct, and when I go that route it tends to expose (as well as erase) the human emotional nonsense.  Gold is worthless on Mars, an American holiday is meaningless to a dolphin, if you take a monkey into the Empire State Building he or she doesn’t know who built it, where it’s at, or who he or she is standing next to.  Monday is imaginary and so is the idea of politics.  It intertwines into personal interests and labels that result from a specific combination of letters existing within a certain language, and it’s all made up.  If the human race was wiped out, the animals and birds and insects would go about their business (and they’d probably breathe better and multiply without interference such as a country scalping these glorious beasts for the selfish desire of some fancy soup at a fancy restaurant).  And even the notion of fancy is a social construct.

And so at some point in time someone decided to train teachers.  They put together a school for it based on the needs of the community.  Over time things worsened in public education and certain people in charge have certain belief systems that influence how they approach life, social theory, etc., along with how they go about blaming.

An education course at Purdue changed my life.  The professor’s name was Bob Yagelski and he asked the class, “Why teach Shakespeare?”  And because of his radical stance, it influenced my radical stance in the classroom.  I hope that I have done the same with my classes.  To make a generalization about any school being weak or strong is impossible and is as ridiculous as a paragraph lauding a university in US News and World Report.  The truth is you would have to sit inside every single class in every university offering education courses.  And one day as our class was spellbound by Mr. Yagelski’s radical tactics, we asked, “Why aren’t you teaching high school?”  And he answered, “I can do more damage influencing prospective teachers than I can inside a high school.  I will ultimately reach thousands of more children this way.”

Managing and reaching students is really tough work.  Teaching how meter works in poetry is really tough work. Teaching students to understand sarcasm is really tough work.  Teaching students how to build a bookshelf can be tough as well. Understanding how meter works in poetry or how sarcasm works is really easy for me.  I learned that in all of my undergrad English courses.  But I have no idea how to translate that knowledge to a group of 30 restless adolescents.  And so I need practice, I need to have theoretical learning, articles written by other teachers, ideas written by folks studying education, just simple options, and not all of it is status quo!  Many researchers want to eliminate the same things and they have different political stances.   If you want to eliminate the schools that offer this practice (schools of education), I truly have no problem predicting that public education will finally implode. I know groups of students that would make some of the smartest people I know, people that graduated at the top of their class in English, quit on the very first day if they walked into that classroom without any student teaching or undergrad field experience, or teachers like me shouting, “Don’t text your students!”  ETC.

I believe what is happening now with all the schools closing is a natural progression to the sickness within public education and it SHOULD happen.  And I believe there is no school of thought or political source behind it or that can save it; rather, I believe it is a result of the paradigm shift currently happening in our culture.  Print is dying.  It’s okay, let it.  Let the shift happen.  It’s a necessity.  It’s time to learn new things.  It’s time for something other than advertising, oil, fast food, Republicans, Democrats, three hour commutes, etc.  Otherwise in my opinion it’s ALL going to implode.  Future schools of education could be a direct source for establishing a new order in regard to American schooling and possibly saving it.  And again, it all comes down to the interests of our clients, and the paradigm shift has directly influenced these interests, and the irony is most schools block these interests.  I would have no problem aligning social study standards with a lesson in constructing a Facebook page for an American president, or aligning standards in art or English to a lesson on constructing imaginary blogs that might contain the voices of past great artists or writers.  One could even create a Facebook or Google community for artistic movements from the past, or even emerging ones.  I could do even more with Youtube.  But right now all the schools in this area block these websites, yet students still find a way to access them within schools!  Interesting note on their interests!

And now back to pluralism.  When I taught high school in the mid-90s, I loved challenging students’ comfort zones; let’s just say I brought in a lot of Marilyn Manson and other cultural icons that made small communities uncomfortable.  After all, how can students learn if I’m just rapping out my thoughts, my ways, my beliefs?  I want students to challenge my way of thinking.  And so I welcomed TG’s posts for multiple reasons, many mentioned above, but also to show students how some of their future administrators might be thinking, (or even future students!) or perhaps just to offer my students an idea where people like Mitch Romney are coming from.  It’s easy to fight the war in comment sections in newspapers, but nobody really understands the source for the fighting, and perhaps TG’s venting will offer new thought.  Either way, not deleting TG’s comments offers TG a direct contradiction to what he believes is wrong with schools of education:  this professor wants diverse dialogue to enhance the learning in his classroom.   Other professors are welcome to debate TG, and students should feel free to ask questions.  This is what learning is all about.   I also believe in freedom of speech.  But I also believe in audience, and so there is a thin line here, but it’s an education blog, and TG IS a teacher.  Students:  You would have to use certain discretion based on your audience, especially in public education.

Now if I could get TG to discuss his work with clubs in public education, that would be awesome, because he’s done some great things…

I would like each group to come to agreement on five questions to ask current teachers and/or administrators.   I’ve decided to make our “guest speaker night” completely virtual.  Now that our blog is open, I’m going to invite administrators and current teachers to come to our blog, read your questions, and respond.

Again, identify each group by listing names, but only one person from each group has to type the questions.  Try and be as honest as you can and be sure to check out other group questions so that we can keep as many queries unique as possible.

Due on or before:  April 12

Hello.  I’ve posted your groups that you will be working with the rest of the semester in Oncourse/Announcements.  For this specific journal entry I would like each group to submit their proposal for the final video project.  I have copied that portion of the assignment below.  The entire assignment can be found in Oncourse/Assignments.

Part One:  Proposal and Permissions
1.    Identify a topic that was explored in one of your education classes (i.e. texting, text speak, the Internet, video games, social networking sites, the media, etc.)

2.    Create a one-paragraph proposal that provides a narrative overview of your inquiry project. This form will be due before you can move forward.  This is your opportunity to ask questions and I can respond with some ideas for your project.  In the proposal, you should discuss the topic you will be researching, thoroughly define your topic, and tell why you feel your topic is worth researching.

3.  If your group is interested in interviewing a student(s) for the video project, I have uploaded the appropriate permission forms into Oncourse/Assignments.

DUE  on or before April 1st.

Be sure to identify each group by including all the names of the people and whether or not you are in the Tuesday or Thursday class.  Only one person from the group has to submit the proposal via this journal entry.

You will be using your text, Improving Adolescent Literacy, for this journal’s assignment.

Directions:

1)  Choose one of the following five chapters from your text and discuss/analyze a situation that you are currently observing that can be directly associated with at least one section or part of the chapter.

2) Be sure to directly reference (page number, paraphrase, or quotations) the part of the chapter you are discussing within your post.

3)  Each person should include his or her full name somewhere within the post.

4)  Due:  3/12/10

Chapter 1:  Ensuring All Students Read, Write, and Think

Chapter 2:  Conversations:  Classroom and School Structures That Support Adolescent Literacy Development

Chapter 4:  Word for Word:  Vocabulary Development Across The Curriculum

Chapter 9:  Powerful Pens:  Writing to Learn With Adolescents

Chapter 10:  Taking Stock:  Standards, Assessment, and High-Stakes Testing

If you find yourself with downtime and work with a mentor that allows you to engage with a class or even a small group of students, go ahead and take a leadership role and present the information found at the following link.  If possible, you may want to plan ahead and gather the appropriate supplies before presenting (have your mentor offer suggestions).

http://www.google.com/doodle4google/index.html

“Welcome to Doodle 4 Google, a competition where we invite K-12 students to work their artistic will upon our homepage logo. At Google we believe in thinking big and dreaming big, so this year we’re inviting U.S. kids to exercise their creative imaginations around the theme, “If I Could Do Anything, I Would …”"

Choose one of the themes below (ahead of time) and begin observing the social interactions at GWCS that are applicable to the theme.  You can discuss something you witnessed related to the theme that surprised, intrigued, or educated you.

Due February 25.

Theme One:  Managing the social structure in the classroom

Theme Two:  Teacher-to-student interaction

Theme Three:  Student-to-student interaction

What is your overall impression of GWCS and what are some things going through your minds as your begin the field experience process?

This blog has been designed so that each week you can reflect on your experience at GWCS by answering questions posed by your professor.