Learning Processes

I found the "literacy event analysis" critique interesting. As I stated in class, my analysis would have been different had I had Jonathon’s paper during the interview. When I read his paper I immediately remembered our class discussion about students being able to relate text to text, text to personal experience, and text to world. Jonathon’s paper accomplished all three of these critical thinking skills. He cited two books about how African American men were forced to join the armed forces or go to jail. He related how his grandfather was forced to join the army, and that Mohammad Ali, the boxer, had to pay money to the government to stay out of the service, while “white” boxers did not. He also stated that today young people have to register for selective service or face a huge fine and possible jail time. He tied all of this information to a song of a singer he likes, who addresses these issues. The content of the paper was rich with ideas and connections, and it will be interesting to see how he develops as a writer.

I learned a lot by my observation experience and by listening to other students’ experiences. What came to mind throughout this observation, discussions in this class, and discussions in other classes, is that as teachers we do not discuss the term literacy. We should explain to students that as they learn they are developing various skills in various literacies. Jonathon, my interviewee, demonstrated critical literacy, rhetorical literacy, digital literacy, and workplace literacy. Geoff Bull and Michele Anstey state in their book Teaching and Learning Multiliteracies: Changing Times, Changing Literacies that engaging students in conversation about their everyday literacies has become a vital component of teaching, because “A multiliterate person must be aware of his or her social and literate practices, or literacy identity, in order to be strategic and flexible in a changing world” (24).

Literacy

Over the last few weeks we have discussed how a person’s literacies are influenced by one’s history, culture, ethnicity, and socio-economic background. This was never so apparent than in my class last night as we listened to three teachers from various high school communities in the U. S.
One school resides in an affluent community, with access to high end educational programs and tools to help students succeed. Many of the students are taking AP courses, and ninety-percent of the students are college bound.
Another school resides in a working middle class community and has restricted access to additional educational programs. A few students are in AP courses, and seventy-percent of the students will seek further education.
The last school resides in a very rural, very poor community, where getting desks for the students is an issue. None of the students are in AP courses, and most failed the state literacy test.
Each teacher discussed their classroom environment and how they adjusted their lessons to accommodate the students. As you can imagine the vast differences in learning environments is amazing. The first two classrooms are deciphering complicated texts in a variety of methods. The expectations of the teachers are comparable and the students strive for excellence in their work. These students are inquisitive, and ask thought provoking questions. The teacher in the middle class community did say that he had to push his students to get to this point but by the middle of the year they are asking more in depth questions and making deeper connections between text to text and text to world experiences.
The classroom in the rural community is a struggle for the teacher. He has a hard time getting students to engage in reading let alone articulate what they have read. Most of the students read at a sixth grade level and have no interest in reading canonical texts. The students’ home lives do not support reading as important to their education. He said they consume erotica novels by the author Zane. He is struggling to get them to engage in texts required by the state. Added to this frustrating situation there are random breaks in the day, like an announcement by the principal for everyone to go to the gym. He said sometimes they are there for several hours.
Kristen talked about how some schools don’t have access to digital technologies, which I can understand, but I struggle with classrooms that don’t even have enough desks for their students, after all we are in the 21st century. President Busch and others were shouting “no child left behind”—these students aren’t even on the radar.