Journal

Audio Listening Practices: Exploring Personal Experiences with Audio Texts

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Just finished writing and proofreading a new 9-12 lesson plan that asks students to explore the ways that audio texts play a role in their lives. Students keep a daily diary that records how and when they listen to audio texts, such as radio, streaming media, songs on MP3 players, and podcasts. Students then analyze the details and compare their results to published reports on American radio listeners. They conclude by reflecting on their findings and writing a final statement on their audio literacy practices and interests.


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NCTE Inbox

Successful Strategies for Writer’s Notebooks and Journals

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Another Tuesday, another Inbox. The Ideas section for this week’s Inbox focuses on the journals and notebooks that are such an important part of a writing class. The topic seemed like a useful back-to-school issue to consider. The ways that we introduce and structure writer’s notebooks or journals for students at the beginning of the term has repercussions that echo through the rest of the term or school year. The interesting thing about the resources this week is that many will work across grade levels. The ideas in the “Priming the Pump” article in the issue of School Talk that is included, for instance, could be used K to college. You’d just get different responses.


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Journal

August 15 Content Report

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We turn in content reports for ReadWriteThink on the 1st and the 15th of each month, so today I did the last-minute work to get the report turned in. The report lists the lesson plans that were published since the 1st of the month and the never-ending pile of broken links. In addition, I finished editing the September calendar, and we added two sites to the Web Resources Gallery:

Revising Himself : Walt Whitman and Leaves of Grass

http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/whitman-home.html
This Library of Congress exhibition traces this evolution of Leaves of Grass and Walt Whitman’s life, tapping a range of editions and drafts of the famous work. A wealth of interesting biographical material on Whitman, his friends and associates, his work as a teacher, tending the wounded during the Civil War, and for the federal government, also appears in the exhibit.

Say it Plain: A Century of Great African American Speeches

http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/sayitplain/index.html
This rich site includes a audio files and texts of speeches by Booker T. Washington, Dick Gregory, and Stokeley Carmichael. The site includes the only known recordings of Marcus Garvey as well as Barbara Jordan’s defense of the US Constitution during the impeachment hearings of President Richard Nixon.


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