"A list for improving literacy with focus on middle grades." <[email protected]> on Sunday, September 10, 2006 at 8:31 am -0500 wrote: >For example, the personality unit sounds like a very relevant one for >middle schoolers. Yet, how do you guide them to the point where they >are choosing themes like this? Do you choose some and then give them >choices, or do you use a completely different process? I am fascinated >and would love to hear more about this.
Hi! The way I did it last year, I simply had them write down a minimum of 15 questions they would be interested in learning about. I cut-and-pasted them all into a rather large (!) document. They then worked in small groups over a couple of days to group questions together. They were asked to give a title to each group of questions that expressed what the questions had in common (i.e, a theme). We looked at everyone's ideas together, and settled on a final grouping. They then voted on which themes they wanted to study. This year, I got the idea from James Beane's book "A Reason to Teach" to give them some focusing questions before they start - "What do I want to know about myself?" and "What do I want to know about the world?" We'll go through the questioning, grouping, theming process pretty much as we did last year. This year, I'm adding in two twists. One is that I am requiring certain "areas of inquiry" such as history or world cultures, and they will need to make sure they have units which fit those areas of inquiry. This is ensure they understand that despite the amount of control they have over what they learn, they also understand they are learning things in traditional fields (many worry they won't be prepared for eighth grade since "everyone else is learning real stuff."). Secondly, I am requiring they work in different genres, and we will have discussions to match genres to units - e.g. if they choose to do a unit on the fall elections, they could do a persuasive speech as a culminating activity. That's the thumbnail version. I hope it's clear! Take care, Bill Ivey Stoneleigh-Burnham _______________________________________________ The Literacy Workshop ListServ http://www.literacyworkshop.org To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/lit_literacyworkshop.org.
