megan jessee multigenre midterm ite 404d dr. ellen spitler
TRANSCRIPT
Table of Contents by Section:
1. Top Ten List
What was MOST surprising about the writing process steps/scaffolding support and what was MOST surprising about the actual
composing of your author autobiography? What memories unexpectedly emerged as powerful in some way? How did the
writing process steps/scaffolding support the emergence of those memories?
What moments in the creation process of your self-portrait were unexpected and brought new understandings, insights and
perspectives of your own life?
2. Dialectic Journal
How did the writing of this autobiography, and the creation of this multimodal artifact further develop your understanding of
English/Language Arts instruction and content? [Review your Student Info Reflection to help you make these connections.]
3. How-To Directions
As you were presenting your autobiography and self-portrait, what surprising moments occurred in your thinking and
understanding of yourself?
4. Talking to Myself – A Dialogue
How could this type of work, the autobiography and the multimodal artifact be powerful in your own future classroom? How
could you utilize the project and the writing?
Be sure to carefully and thoughtfully connect your response/s to these prompts to the Task 1 and 2 planning/instruction
commentary questions listed on p. 1.
5. A Journal Article
More generally speaking [not specific to the author autobiography & self-portrait] what readings, engagements, class
discussions, instructional strategies hold significance for you at this halfway point? Why those? How are they supported by
theory?
Be sure to carefully and thoughtfully connect your response/s to these prompts to the Task 1 and 2 planning/instruction
commentary questions listed on p. 1.
6. Comic Strip
As you reflect over the first half of the semester, what do you see as strengths you have brought to the class and to
our discussions? What are areas where you would like to improve or in some way change your involvement?
7. Greeting Card
What are the strengths of this course? What suggestions do you have for us to consider during the second half of our time
together?
Section 1
Top Ten
List
Prompts:
What was MOST surprising about the writing process steps/scaffolding support and what was
MOST surprising about the actual composing of your author autobiography? What memories
unexpectedly emerged as powerful in some way? How did the writing process steps/scaffolding
support the emergence of those memories?
What moments in the creation process of your self-portrait were unexpected and brought new
understandings, insights and perspectives of your own life?
10. Everything Was Significant
Everything was significant down to the details, something I found fairly
interesting. In the one self-portrait, I included at least twelve authoring
experiences, hiding others within the different mediums themselves.
The memories that came forth through the initial explanation of the
assignment and the prewriting were plentiful, and through addressing
things that I had stored in a little box in my head labeled “PAST” I found
some closure through this assignment.
9. It Took Forever
The process took way longer than I expected, and I
ended up writing much more than I would have had I
written a traditional essay. Having been given the
license to take my own direction, I became engrossed
in the process of developing both the multigenre paper
as well as the self-portrait. Still, I was very surprised by
the amount of time I spent on this project.
#9: The Pre-Write Was Actually Helpful
Prewriting process and discussion of “authoring practices” primed my mind with many ideas for
directions in which to go, teased out many memories and got me reflecting on those in a teacher-
oriented kind of way. I chose my six authoring practices over other authoring practices of my life
because I felt that those were the six that will definitely shape what kind of teacher I will be in my
attitudes and approach to teaching as well as to students. I’ve never really liked prewriting, and I used to
view it as a waste of time, but I was surprised by how useful the prewrite for this project was.
8. Learning to Trust in the Process
The auto-bio/self-portrait project seemed ridiculous to me at the beginning
of the project. I didn’t really get into it until halfway through doing the self-
portrait, which I created before I wrote my autobiography. Learning to trust
in the process was really helpful to me. Many times I have found myself not
feeling motivated to do some work or assignment or activity because I
couldn’t see the point of it. Doing an arts and crafts project for a 400 level
college course seemed anything but useful to me until I was well into the
process of writing, yet now I can see how I could adapt this project for use in
my future classroom.
7: Redefining the Term “Authoring Practice” Was a Challenge
The idea that an authoring practice had to be a writing act was so
ingrained in me that I had lots of trouble changing my mind about
this. The six authoring practices I chose for my autobiography and
self-portrait were mainly those regarding a transaction between
myself and written words.
5. The Dialectic Journal Prewrite was strangely helpful for me in
deciding what mediums to use in the self-portrait and how to use
them.
4: It felt safe to take a risk.
I don’t go around telling people all about the sob story that was my
life before I was reborn at Windward Community College. Exploring
my darker issues seemed like a huge risk to take, especially in a
class such as this one. While I would never share my “Emo” days
with students in the classroom, I felt like it was appropriate to
share in this class because of the learnings that I gained from that
perio d of my life. For about five years I authored my life in a way
that was unhealthy, but was never the less powerful. The sharing
of one of the self-portraits before we begun on our own projects
made me feel as though I could share about this. As I stated in
class, when it comes to self-injury, he worst thing you can do is
nothing, so I felt that it was important to share this side of me with
the class because I wanted to advocate awareness. While I’m not
sure if I was successful in this, I’m glad that I did, and I’m thankful
that I was given the license to share something so personal with
others. This experience, though I doubted myself all the way
through the process and for some time after, has been hugely
beneficial for helping me find closure and silver linings to the dark
cloud that hung over my head for over a decade.
3. The visual self-portrait was much more
powerful for me than the written autobiography.
I think of myself as a writer. I am always putting
pen to paper for some thing or another, so at the
onset of the project, I was looking forward to the
writing much more than the arts and crafts. But
as I worked on the project, I found myself much
more engrossed in the visual artifact than I had
thought. I mean, when I finally finished it and
looked at the final project, I felt as though I had
truly represented myse lf on paper. As I noted
earlier, I incorporated many more authoring
aspects of my life into the artifact than the six I
chose to talk about, and because of that, I felt
like this artifact was a true representation of me
on paper. It was actually a little creepy for me.
2. I didn’t want to keep it.
Now this was me on paper, and yet I got rid of the thing as
quickly as I could. Why? Well frankly, the artifact was geared
towards my past. Eyes facing upwards, I’m looking towards the
future and all of the new directions I’d like to go, but I am also
turning my eyes away from the pain of my past. I didn’t want to
keep it, or look at it (although I do wish I had taken a picture of
it). It surp rised me how badly I wanted to get rid of it, maybe
because it made me uncomfortable, because it made me think,
and because it brought up memories that I had long buried. Having addressed these and having done
the project, I feel like it’s helped to get me past some of that pain (on multiple levels of the artifact), but
because it felt like a crutch, I needed to get rid of it.
1. I Would Adapt This Project for My Own Use
Once I became engrossed in the process, I began to
envision many adaptations for use in my own future
classroom. I’ve always hated doing arts and crafts
projects for school, and this project was no exception
to that rule. Yet once I learned to trust in the process,
and began to see its value, I began to think of many
different ways I could incorporate this project into my
own future classroom.
Section 2
Dialectic Journal
Prompt:
How did the writing of this autobiography, and the creation of this multimodal artifact further
develop your understanding of English/Language Arts instruction and content? [Review your
Student Info Reflection to help you make these connections:]
Notes Reflection
I dream of being able to teach resume writing, short story writing, and academic writing. I also dream of being able to teach a variety of literature, ranging from short stories, to poetry, to classic literature, to non-western and modern works. I believe that high school English classes should offer a buffet of literary and writing options. Multigenre reflection p. 7
Looking back, I think that an extremely important thing that students need to learn is how to be reflective learners. What I really learned from the self-portrait/multi genre autobiography as well as everything in 404 leading up to this point is that the content takes second place to the approach to teaching. While in my reflection I had been thinking about all of the stuff I wanted to teach, now I’m thinking more about How I want to teach this stuff. Instead of just thinking about all of the content I want to /have to cover, now I’m thinking about how to develop the best methods for getting students really engaged in the process, and how to incorporate collaboration into every lesson.
I don’t generally use any reading strategies. At most I make a very basic outline of what I’m reading, particularly when reading a text book. Multigenre reflection p. 9
Oh my, everything leading up to this point in time as well as the creation of my self-portrait have really changed my perception of how I use reading strategies. Because a part of my self-portrait regarded how I authored my life through reading, I really began to reflect on what that my own personal reading processes were. Because I had begun to think of myself as a rather naïve reader, when I read Buehl recently, I found myself realizing that I had all these unconscious processes going on in my head as I read that I hadn’t been aware of. Now that the unconscious has been made conscious, I see how it is important for students to be aware of their own processes as they read so they can become aware of them and work to improve on certain areas.
A teacher should Get to know her students better Challenge her students to think Beyond the box Multigenre reflection p. 11
This idea was really pounded into by head during the self-portrait/autobiography process. In order to be an effective teacher, I really need to take the time to get to know my students. If I know what makes them tick, get to know about their lives, and give them a chance to show me their method of representing their ideas, I’ll be better equipped to help them develop the skills and abilities that they will need to be successful in the classroom and beyond.
I think that a multigenre paper can be used to help students: Think beyond the box Get engaged in their learning Become more accountable students Reflect and take ownership of their work. Multigenre reflection p. 11
I feel now that English class shouldn’t just be about having students represent themselves and their ideas through writing. There should be many multimodal opportunities with which students can represent themselves. We are living in an increasingly image based society, and English Language Arts teachers need to take this fact into account. I think that giving students the opportunity to work with and beyond the print-based will help with getting kids engaged in the learning, and will help with getting themselves to take ownership of their learning. I think that in order for students to take ownership for their learning, they need to be given a choice of how they wish to represent their ideas, whether they are doing a multi genre/multi modal project, or adapting a reader-response strategy to fit their own individual needs, teachers need to respect this. So a student comes back with notes that don’t look like the work sheet you gave them to complete, and perhaps you as the teacher do not even understand their organizational method. As long as they know what’s going on and explain it to you, then that’s fine. As long as they know where to draw the line, and are able to conform to guidelines for summative assessments, I think students should have the creative license to find what works for them as the rest of us do in the world beyond high school.
Section 3
How-To Directions
Prompt:
As you were presenting your autobiography and self-portrait, what surprising moments
occurred in your thinking and understanding of yourself?
Step 1
Choose to go first, for the following reasons: the person who goes first is normally graded with the
benefit of the doubt. The bar has not been set by any other classmates; in going first, the hope is that
people will have forgotten your presentation by the time the last person presents; Last: you won’t have
to be anxiously awaiting and fretting over your presentation as other classmates go, and thus will be
able to be relaxed and engaged in what others are saying.
Step 2
Feel completely humiliated as you share your “artwork” with the rest of the class, knowing that yours is
probably the ugliest and least well done as everyone else’s. Be sure to beat yourself up profusely over
this.
Step 3
Be completely surprised at the positive response of your classmates. They actually like this? You will
wonder incredulously. Remain filled with self-doubt during the duration of the initial reveal.
Step 4
Begin to talk. Talk about the easiest things first, like the fact that you have been a naïve reader most of
your life. You will be very nervous, so make sure to make lots of little jokes and incorporate humor. You
want them to like and accept you.
Step 5
Talk about your writing, and begin to wonder why you haven’t just done it already. Wonder why it is so
hard to talk about yourself in front of your peers. Focus in on the teacher as a coping mechanism.
Realize that you need to avoid doing this during your first observed lesson. Try to keep track of time.
Step 6
As you get closer to the end of your presentation, second-guess yourself. Think about something you
could talk about instead of that little dark secret hidden behind your woolen hair. Fear over-sharing.
Worry that you will be seen as that person. Feel isolated, but do not, by any means, let this show.
Step 7
Reach the crossroads at which you will need to make a decision. Glance around the room and gauge the
people in the class. What will they think? Agonize for what feels like an hour but in reality takes only a
few seconds.
Step 8
Remember what you wrote in your short essay to Dr. Moniz just a few weeks ago. You had written it in
bold letters, and centered it on the page in a large gap between two paragraphs:
I believe in taking risks. I believe in leaps of faith.
Step 9
Take that leap.
Step 10
Choose not to share everything. Do not tell everyone that you were abused throughout your childhood.
Do not tell them that you were suicidal. Do not tell them what your ex-boyfriend did to you. Draw a line,
but focus on the present. Share your understanding. Share yourself. Become a spokesperson for
Mederma.
Step 11
Don’t look at others when you finish. Worry that you’ve shared too much. Wonder why you did in the
first place. Listen as others speak. Listen as Ross speaks. Realize that you aren’t the only one. Realize
that it’s okay.
Step 12
Get three letters from peers once everyone has shared. Wait a week and a half to read them. Realize
that you made the right choice. Realize much later that the most important way in which you author
your life is through your treatment of others. Realize that everything you’ve gone through has made you
into a better person than you thought you were.
Section 4
Talking to Myself
A Dialogue
Prompts:
How could this type of work, the autobiography and the multimodal artifact be powerful in your
own future classroom? How could you utilize the project and the writing?
Be sure to carefully and thoughtfully connect your response/s to these prompts to the Task 1
and 2 planning/instruction commentary questions listed on p. 1.
M.J. is me
J.R. is the cooler, smarter version of me.
MJ: So I have to answer this question about how this type of work, the autobiography and self-portrait
could be powerful in my own future classroom, and how could I utilize this project and the writing.
JR: Well what did you think about the project? I know you were on the fence about it before, but what
do you feel about it now?
MJ: Well I feel like it could be very powerful, but I’m concerned about students sharing too much, and
I’m concerned that it could take too much time away.
JR What about developing a unit around the self-portrait/autobiography? Have you thought about that?
MJ: Well how would I design a unit around this?
JR: Well, I’d recommend doing this project towards the beginning of the year, as a way to establish a
closer-knit classroom community. By giving students such an open ended project, you can be sure
that they will complete it in a way that works best for them. In this way you might be able to get a
better idea of how individual students in your class learn best through the modalities they choose to
represent the project.
MJ Good point. But how will I connect this project to a greater unit?
JR Well what is important to you as a teacher?
MJ Getting kids to think outside the box and beyond school. I really think that making personal
connections to text and English class skills are important. Having done this project myself, I feel like
a key takeaway from the whole process is showing students that everyone has their own story.
JR Then design the unit in a way that will develop a collaborative environment in the classroom for the
facilitation of discussion and debate of literature.
MJ but could I connect this to a specific piece of literature as a before reading mini-unit?
JR I don’t see why not. Any work of literature that you would teach following this project could be
incorporated into the unit by having students view the protagonist through the lenses of authoring
practices, or even looking at the author’s choices! There are many ways you can adapt this project
to help students gain a better understanding of a work. First, you would have students reflect on
their own authoring practices, which would tease out memories of students and get them thinking
about how they navigate through their own life. Then as they read say Catcher in the Rye or The
Great Gatsby to name a couple, have them actively reflecting on what they believe the authoring
practices of the main character are. As a summative assessment for whatever students read
following the project, have students create a self-portrait/autobiography of the main or some major
character, which would require them to argue what they believe the main authoring practices of
that character are and support these choices with textual evidence. As they do this, they will be
reflecting on their own self portrait, as well as the ideas leading up to it in developing one for the
character they choose to analyze.
MJ But how will I make sure that all types of students get the most out of his process? How will I address
the heterogeneity of skill, ability, and motivation level of all my students?
JR: The project itself is multi-modal, yes? A key factor in providing differentiation for students is to allow
them to choose the ways which will best work with how they as individuals learn. Some students
who struggle with writing might choose to develop some of their ideas through song, performance,
dance, or visuals.
MJ: But won’t that be downplaying the importance of writing? I need to spend as much time as I can
strengthening their reading and writing skills. I will only have them for a year!
JR: It might seem like you’re downplaying writing, but trust me, you aren’t. By placing this unit towards
the beginning of the year, in addition to creating a more inclusive and safe classroom environment,
you as the teacher will be able to see where students’ strengths are, and where they struggle.
Through this type of project you will really get to know your students as writers and as people. They
are going to tell you all about themselves, and then they are going to show you how they interpret a
major player in a piece of writing. You are going to learn a lot about how each of your students learn
and interpret through how they represent this main character, and through this, you will be able to
figure out what direction to take to best help your kids learn and grow as writers and people
throughout the rest of the year.
MJ: and by having the students connect what they themselves have done for their own self portrait
project, I am framing them to really analyze and connect to major characters, which is what, a text-
to-self connection (Buehl, 2014, p. 14)?
JR: Exactly. And once they’ve finished with their second self-portrait project, then they’ll be able to see
how others represented the same character, or another character, and be able to reflect on their
own learning process through this.
MJ: So this self-portrait and autobiography project really be used to make the text that follows more
meaningful and memorable, especially since they will be representing their learning through
multiple modalities, and sharing their learning with others.
JR. Yep! Good talk.
Section 5
News Article
More generally speaking [not specific to the author autobiography & self-portrait] what readings,
engagements, class discussions, instructional strategies hold significance for you at this halfway point?
Why those? How are they supported by theory?
Be sure to carefully and thoughtfully connect your response/s to these prompts to the Task 1 and 2
planning/instruction commentary questions listed on p. 1.
The J.R. Times
Volume 1, Issue 2 17 October 2014
Into the Construction Zone – The Modern learner
RESONATING WELL
Focusing on Ideas that Work
Education is about the art of diversity.
The cultural back-grounds, types of
learners, and ability levels of students
must be taken into account. Instructional
strategies in many classrooms often do
not meet the needs of such diversity, yet
there are many approaches to such
diversity that are often overlooked. These
strategies focus in on a number of key
ideas that are important to keep in mind.
Here are a few significant ideas to note:
Constructivism in the Classroom
Many classrooms are structured in the
antiquated scheme of transmission
learning (Smagorinsky, 2008, p. 7).
Learners, if you can call them that, are
passive in absorbing the information of
the all-knowing teacher. But this does not
engage students, and rarely leads to
meaningful learning. The constructivist
approach is a far more engaging model,
which draws on each student’s prior
knowledge, their codes for reading, their
attribuitions and cultural backgrounds
(Smagorinsky, 2008, pp. 8-9).
Bell to Bell Engagement
To maximize learning, students must be
engaged from bell to bell. What this
means is that everything the students do
works toward and reflects the standard
of the day. Keeping students engaged in
working towards the objective is critical
to improving student outcomes. Keeping
students engaged from bell to bell is not
the same thing as opening up a scripted
curriculum workbook or having students
follow a daily routine that may be
interesting but is nevertheless not
reflected in the daily objective.
Everything students do in class must help
them achieve a greater understanding
of some instructional goal. But how does
one do this? It’s easier said than done.
Vary Instructional Activities
No one said that work needs to feel like
work. Using a variety of student centered
learning engagements will keep students
on task without boring them to death. A
variety of learning strategies that can be
modified to fit any instructional agenda
are available to teachers to modify at
will. Strategies like Dialectic journals, fact
pyramids, reading logs, and concept
maps can get students engaged in and
reflective upon their learning processes.
The role of a teacher isn’t to teach – it’s
to give students the tools they need to
make their own meaning, and thereby
teach themselves. The most profiecient
learners are the ones who find their own
answers to the tough questions and use
strategies that fit the occasion. And this
doesn’t happen in a vaccum.
Collaborative Engagement
The student voice is disturbingly absent
in many modern classroom, yet the
evidence suggests that student voices
should fill the room at least fifty percent
of the time, up to seventy-five percent
of the time according to some.
Therefore the key is to use instructional
strategies that engage students in
strategies that are collaboratie in
nature. In life, meaning is made through
frequent interactions between
individuals – life happens in a group
setting. Classroom life should reflect this.
Section 7
Greeting Card
Prompt:
As you reflect over the first half of the semester, what do you see as strengths you have brought to the class and to our discussions? What are areas where you would like to improve or in some way change your involvement?
What are the strengths of this course? What suggestions do you have for us to consider during
the second half of our time together?
17 October 2014
Dear Dr. Spitler,
ITE 404 has been the most challenging and relevant class (though I know now that this is
not just some class) I’ve ever taken towards my degree. I think I am okay contributor in the
class; I should probably work on speaking less in class. I am learning to see the role of a
teacher as something much more than just an educator. Through the modeling of
instructional strategies and classroom management tactics, I am gaining a real sense of
how strategies may be incorporated in the classroom. I like that you expose us to many
different instructional strategies – it’s opening my eyes to all of the possibilities in the
classroom. I really liked how you created this safe and open community in the classroom,
and always reach out to ease our anxiety. I definitely think I need to work on lowering my
anxiety.
I would like to have more opportunities to work with different types of strategies, and
would love to have better resources for the ITE field practicum guide. My biggest gripe is
not with the class itself, but with this guide – the resources are simply not up to par and
aren’t explained in my opinion. I have been retyping the PDFs into a word document so
that I can fill them out electronically, and I would be happy to send them to you for your
own use (or as replacements for those on the website). I don’t feel like there is enough
information on the site to help me, and I would like to have some things from the site
explained or at least touched on in class.
Anyway, I’ve really grown a lot as a person and future educator during this first half of the
semester and am looking forward to growing much more in the weeks to come.
Sincerely,
Megan Jessee