October 14, 2005 by

My first afternoon session is on popular culture. The info in the program mentions using CSI/forensics, so it may be a useful idea for a lesson.

Lisa and I came to the session together. Before the session starts, the eight young women in front of us (I suspect all pre-service teachers) are comparing engagement rings and the stories of when he popped the question. I feel so sick. Lisa showed me her engagement ring, so I didn’t feel so left out. I’ve missed that entire rite of passage. But self-pity has yielded as I have decided that I am glad not to have ever looked so silly in pursuit of my MRS degree. They were all young. and cute. And shiny. And sickening. And the one directly in front of me has long curly dark hair. Very pretty really. But if that young co-ed flips her hair over this laptop screen about one more time, she’s getting a haircut (or worse).

Unfortunately, I think we just got off to a wrong start. I just don’t like the demeanor of the presenter. She’s treating us too much like a class of high school students, beginning the session by loudly telling us that she “always begins and ends on time.” Good for you chickie. And why does she have a black ribbon tied around her wrist with a big bow?

Next the usual standards suck routine. She tells us that she like to refer to the state standards as “the ss” because they are so problematic. I’m not amused. I’m troubled. The comparison she’s making isn’t acceptable. Maybe she wasn’t at Bob Probst’s session.

Back to the session. The presenter is talking about the difficulty of finding resources for popular culture. So many of the resources are so recent that it’s challenging to find and use them. She’s pointing to Amazon, which allows you to search texts online and provides many other tools for teachers. :-/ She’s provided us a list of discographies from Amazon (citations and annotations) to help us find lyrics and song info.

She tells us, “You can’t really use the reviews on Amazon for models for students because anyone can write a review. Because you can vote on whether they are useful, you can use the system to identify reviews that have mattered to readers.” She’s using these Amazon examples to talk through the characteristics of book reviews, and how to use the resources on the site (search the book, toc, etc.) to identify and evaluate materials for the classroom. Additionally materials are online and available to “everyone.” [Because everyone has a computer and Internet access after all.]

She shared these tips for use with any program that will make it easier:

  • Use Crtl+F on various Web sites to find material on a page!
  • Also F7 is spellcheck and thesaurus!
  • F8 allows block select! [she didn’t name it, just says it’s for convenient copying when you want to take an entire review from Amazon and prepare for class] Combine with arrows!!! “(Works on Word, but not everything)”
  • Print Screen is invaluable! She doesn’t like having to look at the directory of a disk, so she has students pull up A:\ drive and take a screen shot for an inventory of what’s on the disk!!!!!! Though it’s really “copy screen” not print screen.

o_O

Various lesson ideas and what not she mentions:

One of the new issues for students to deal with is filtering information. The problem is no longer finding enough information, but separating the nuggets of truth from the trash. [I really disagree with this assertion. There was always a lot of information out there. Teachers, librarians, and libraries provided filters for them. As research becomes more student-centered on the Internet, they must learn to create their own filters.]

  • Assignment: Give each student a bag, and ask students to fill it with case info found in a room where the character has been. Can begin with making a list of things that would be in the file. Putting together the file is better than just writing the list, though she doesn’t say why. Jackdaw company puts together simulation kits that she uses such as primary source replications of the Holocaust for Night. Examples included requistion for cannisters for gas for the gas chambers. A hard copy of something that is real and more “concrete”, more “in the moment” than just a list.
  • Night. You are an inspector in the prison camps. Your job is to investigate for inhumane conditions and submit a report in memo format to the Geneva Convention. Use quotations from the book as examples. Then can move to formal lit if desired. They will already have the quotations from the book located.
  • Exploring search engines. Do an search for search engines. Do same search in small groups with different engines. Then ask students to compare the results and how they differ to evaluate the +/- of the engines.
  • Organization. Yellow foods. How many foods are yellow? Name them. Get list on the board. Groups look at the sheet, and divide foods into 3 categories. Every food must fit in one, but can’t fit in two. To teach classification and creativity. Yellow foods that can be kicked 10 feet. Yellow foods that would hurt if you stepped on them in the dark. Yellow foods that squish through your fingers. Alternately, brainstorm a list of TV shows and do same project.
  • Analysis. Pull out case file students have assembled or the Jackdaw simulation. What can you deduce from the information included in it? What info is there? What does it look like? and so forth. Focus on detailing.
  • Synthesis. Make a comment on a character in a play. Is character evil? forced to do what was done? motivated by selfishness? Ask students to figure it out and prove it to the jury. Must open with statement of intent: ladies and gentlemen of the jury, i will prove to you that…. provide details in the argument… end with conclusion: you have seen [whatever was argued] and then the provide a summary of the evidence that has been presented.
  • Groups in the classroom. Always put no more than 4 in a group. Roles: presenter, recorder, encourager, manager (who keeps the group on task). Form groups with 4 roles, and evaluate each person on scale of 1 to 5. Can’t give everyone a 5. “They know the system and can use math to be sure they get an A. Unless you have someone who is sluffing off.” [Why is this a good thing? Why is it okay to manipulate the system? Why is it okay for assessment to rely on tricks?]

We have to count off and form groups. I am a one. I hate this woman. I don’t want to do this. Topic is to go through the materials and formulate one activity you are trying to obtain in your English classroom. (Using the Star Wars books).

She uses Performance Learning Techniques management, and some of the assignments came from there. She interrupts our disscussion to demo this model.

o_O

The class, er, I mean conference attendees share examples. I am apparently a very bad student. One of our group members tells me so. I so hate this kind of stuff. I just wanted to gather ideas, not to have to move around into groups and share and blah blah blah.

She ends, with “you should find something that you are passionate about and teach what you love. Whatever it is. Use it as a springboard to whatever you want to accomplish. You should never teach a book you hate.” [Umm. No. What matters is students’ interests if we’re going to foreground something. And what often has to be foregrounded is neither. There are tests, expectations, requirements that mean we sometimes teach things that we aren’t thrilled with. This is life. And why should we ever deny students a text because we don’t like it anyway?]

Good grief. She ended the session by saying we can come up and look at the books and stuff she has spread all over the room and then said, “And now I’m that I’m done with it, I’m selling all this on ebay.” What a way to undercut the whole thing. Oh well…There were good ideas here. They just need drawn out a bit.


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