Lexi Teaches Literature: A Blog

It's been a while since I've read any works from Edgar Allan Poe and from what I can remember, I've only read Poe's poetry. Therefore, I decided to read some of the short stories in the anthology. I read "A Descent Into the Maelstrom" and "The Premature Burial." I chose these particular stories for two reasons: I'd never heard of them, and the titles intrigued me (pretty simple and straight-forward). Both short stories are each approximately ten pages long, so they were fairly quick reads. The first story, "A Descent Into the Maelstrom," was not what I expected but I ended up liking it quite a bit. I wasn't entirely sure what the title meant or hinted at so far as the contents of the story were concerned - I just knew that I liked the word "maelstrom" (yes, I'm basically a child). Instead, what expectations I did have came from my small knowledge of the author. I vaguely knew that Poe was celebrated as a writer of go...

While reading Tovani's book, I came across a number of anecdotes from students that had me smiling - either because they reminded me of some of my own experiences, or because I was in classrooms with fellow students who made the same complaints or had the same questions. I've definitely done some "fake reading" as a student, and Tovani had me questioning myself on why that was. Sure, there have been some times when I was strapped for time, because I procrastinated until the last night before a project was due - but I think there have also been some times when I "fake read" a book or article in a class because I realized I didn't understand, and I didn't want to take the time to figure out why. Even her own experiences in her book club were incredibly relatable to me. There have been many times, especially in philosophy classes, where the text we read felt so incredibly confusing that I simply sat quietly in the back of class, thinking myself not capa...

I had some mixed reactions to the edTPA " Making Good Choices " document. This isn't the first time I've looked at this document; I gave it a look prior to my decision to move forward with pursuing a teaching certificate. When I looked at it the first time, I almost decided to cancel the whole thing. Looking at it a second time, I found myself feeling the same anxieties and fears that I had experienced during my first reading. There were some positive things that came out of the reading however, so I will focus on those first. One of the things that has been most difficult for me when planning out my literature unit has been knowing (or not knowing, really) how to handle the assessment portion. The only education class I've taken prior to this one was Intro to Education, and that was well over six years ago. I've never taken a class that taught me how to assess student learning. So for me, "Making Good Choices" helped a little in that it provided a...

The term "social justice" is thrown around often in conversations and media, and admittedly I think that has made me forget what the term really means (as opposed to it conjuring up general feelings or attitudes). For my reading this week, I chose to review the National Education Association's (NEA) description of it in the "Teaching Strategies" section of their website. The article in question is titled " Diversity Toolkit: Social Justice ." The article is rather short, but its concise and to the point, which I appreciated. In the very first paragraph or two, the NEA article summarizes what social justice means to them: it "refers to a concept in which equity or justice is achieved in every aspect of society rather than in only some aspects or for some people." Essentially what they are saying is that regardless of class, or race, or sex, etc., everyone should have an equal and proportionate amount of the advantages within a society and,...

I agree with the premise of this reading, that using popular culture and critical media for literacy and learning is an excellent idea. No matter where we go, whether we are at school or not, we are surrounded by some for of media or another. This makes it a convenient and approachable medium through which to learn, and also demonstrates just how it important it is for students to be able to look at media with a critical eye. Being able to think critically about information presented to them is a vital skill for people of all ages, and students not planning on going to college may not learn these skills elsewhere if we do not teach them in the secondary classroom (I know I certainly didn't feel like I could think critically until college).  I spent a lot of time looking over the student-generated recommendations to teachers, because I think its important to receive student input regarding curriculum and what they wish to learn. My main concern here is the ability of a teacher to...

Freire's "banking concept" of education reminded of William Butler Yeats' quote, "Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire." Its a quote you often find in the offices of teachers or education programs, and it is quite appropriate for this topic. In this instance, the banking concept is the equivalent of the "filling of a pail" - the idea that students are vessels in which teachers deposit information. The "lighting of a fire" is the direction that education should be aiming for, according to Freire. He calls it "problem-posing education." I certainly agree - to an extent. I agree with Freire that yes, education should serve to engage students in "acts of cognition," teaching them to think critically about their world rather than "adapt" to it as Freire calls it. And, as he said, teaching shouldn't be a one-sided affair; ideally, teachers should be learning from their students as ...

This week I read Spokane Public Schools' " Secondary Standards-Based Grading and Reporting Handbook " and the thirteenth chapter of Teaching Literature to Adolescents , titled "Assessing and Evaluating Students' Learning." Spokane Public Schools Handbook The first few pages of the handbook that Spokane Public Schools provides for parents felt pretty straightforward, and was pretty non-controversial. I appreciated the idea that grading is meant to communicate a student's progress, and that standards-based grading and reporting (SBGR) is designed to make these grades more accurate, consistent, and meaningful. That being said, as I moved further through the paper, it started to become clear to me why there was any need for "parent's guide" in the first place. After giving the reader (in this instance, parents are the target audience) an explanation of what SBGR is and why it is being used, the handbook then shows an example of how par...

The "Assignment Template" reading this week had a lot of good, well thought-out ideas on guiding students through the reading and writing process. As with a lot of the readings I've done for class thus far, my initial response was one of hesitation and skepticism. Having now read it in its entirety, I believe this is definitely a great tool to use in practice in the classroom. A lot of my initial skepticism towards this particular reading came from memories of my own high school experiences. I remember teachers (usually in English, often History as well) instructing us to take notes in a particular fashion, directing us to make brainstorming diagrams, etc. This did not jive with me as a student - my thoughts and ideas didn't manifest in my brain in a structured way, so I certainly didn't want to try to put them on paper structurally either. Teachers would instruct us to make first drafts, without doing any revisions or editing along the way, telling us that we s...