"I ain't all bad"

 The Deficit Ideology

"As a simple but representative example, most of us have taken a paper-and-pencil test in our schooling, one on which the teacher marks answers wrong with an X and then calculates our grade at the top of our papers- as in '100-30=70.'" -P.L. Thomas

Thomas discusses how this is the deficit ideology, where it focuses on the weaknesses rather than strengths. Although the specific term is new to me, this idea takes up half of my heart. I once watched a Ted talk "Every Kid Needs a Champion" by Rita Pierson and it came to my mind as soon as I began reading about these different ideologies. Pierson makes a similar remark to her audience, "I gave a quiz, 20 questions. Student missed 18. I put a +2 on his paper and a big smiley face." At first I laughed at this idea... because how can a plus two actually be taken seriously? I certainly wouldn't take that serious. I'd be like "UGH. I failed..... WTF!" However, her attitude towards it was positive, "you ain't all that bad" and a simple 😊 on the top of the paper can keep the students confidence going. Focusing on what the student has already learned and understood can also help you as the teacher to work on the areas that still need progress. In order to help the student work to get a better grade, it is important to keep their levels of confidence and motivation at a high.

Just because I think every one who will ever encounter a child should watch this video, here's the link! https://youtu.be/SFnMTHhKdkw

Literacy

Reading. Spelling. Grammar. Full Sentences. Run ons. Punctuation. Writing.
Is that all there is to Literacy?
That's what I thought until my last SED 445 class.

 I quickly realized during this class that I had been so closed minded the the definition of the word literacy. I'm assuming this is because of my love and interest in reading and writing, or maybe I was just never taught? I guess I don't really know. Do you know how full the word literacy is?

Karen Cordeiro-Kaplan discusses the  different Literacy Ideologies in the schools and society. A new literacy that I learned about in particular is Cultural Literacy. This literacy focuses on the teaching of culture, beliefs, values and the classic books. I learned that making connections between your own life and the society around you with the text read is an example of a cultural ideology. Not only is the reading and writing involved in this ideology, but also a component of discussion. The students can then create a network of knowledge and see the relations between the texts and the different cultures in society.



Practicing Writing

 Often when thinking about past writing assignments, I can see that the assignment was more-so for the teacher to verify I completed the reading assignment and evaluate understanding.There are so many other types of writing, not only reflective papers.

 The NCTE discusses that writing grows out of many different purposes, not only an evaluation of knowledge. Different writing assignments that are important, for example, are notes, resumes and cover letters, business reports, interpretive statements, lab reports, etc. Learning these different types of writing is not only important for the students education to prepare them for future classes and careers, but to prepare them for effective social networking, improving society and getting to know who they are as a person.


"The future of the world is in my classroom today." -Ivan Welton Fitzwater

Ongoing learners

 "Resist teaching so that students acquire fixed content and instead foster students as ongoing learners."-P. L. Thomas, EdD

Students should be taught more than one citation in secondary schools. Were you exposed to more than one way of thinking? More than one way to write? More than one way to cite your work? I know in high school I was taught MLA. MLA only.

 

In the library there was one version of MLA, probably about 5 years old. Don't quote me on this, but MLA changes almost every year and a new version is released. This led the entire student body to be falling behind. As mentioned by Gallagher in Chapter 1, I was often told to practice using MLA but never formally taught it. Student's should be taught the material they need to learn more, rather than having them practice without instruction. Too many times I was told "Go to the Library, there's a form with examples and instructions".

 "Recently one of my teacher candidates attended a course in which fellow English teachers were adamant they needed students to learn to cite using MLA by memory."-P. L. Thomas, EdD

In addition to the constant changing of format, there are also many different types of citations. For example: APA, Turabian and Chicago. Only being subjected to one version of citation limits the knowledge that should be being taught for the future. 

 Because of this lack of knowledge, I went into my first college science, looked at the syllabus and thought to myself, I'm screwed. All of my lab reports and papers were to be in APA format. At that point I had to teach myself how to do it... believe me, when you teach yourself how to do something, it doesn't come out very well.

Teachers need to start teaching the material students need to succeed in order to expand the students' growth of knowledge.