Reply to Patrick:
I, too, have struggled mightily with what works/helps/teaches best. This
summer I am reading Richard Allington's "What really matters for struggling
readers". He spends much of the book going over what the research in
reading shows. It has been very helpful in clarifying what I should be
spending the day doing with the students. I hope you get a chance to read
it. This is a never ending journey of discovery; welcome aboard!
Chris
Message: 1
Date: Mon, 6 Aug 2007 13:53:24 EDT
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: [MOSAIC] Question from future teacher-Patrick
To: [email protected]
Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
Here is my Question For Mosaic Listserv Group. Thank you very sincerely.
-Patrick J. Monette
When I was a kid, I had very little interest in reading and making rich
contextual connections, but now I love to read and I don't know why this
happened. Though I'm mostly ignorant of the reasons behind this outcome,
I'm almost
certain that what happened was in virtual absence of most of the inscribed
methodologies - in their calculated form - presented in Mosaic. My
question,
thus, is, How do we discard things that we might consider to be antiquated
or
outdated methods of instruction when they clearly worked for so many in
the
past? For example, reading groups that were divided by different reading
ability levels. I was part of many a lower reading level in my day and I
feel like
I came out of these mostly unscathed. Further, I don't think that my
self-esteem suffered all that much, but it's my opinion that self-esteem is
immensely
overrated anyway. Some of most terrible and evil tyrants in history,
including Hitler and Mussolini, and some of the most notorious mob bosses
and gang
leaders, had - each of them - VERY high levels of self-esteem. I believe
that
one's values are a much greater determinant of one's character and
goodness,
and should anything be given higher precedents than these? Also, if my
self-esteem did take a hit, who's to say that this didn't benefit me in any
way? -
that it didn't give me thicker skin, make me stronger, build character in
me,
etc.? But back to the regularly scheduled program? Although I?m not sure if
I enjoyed looking up vocabulary words in the dictionary and writing down
their definitions when I was a young bucking bronco, I?m not quite ready
to
dismiss this method of instruction as unprofitable because I think that
much of
the learning that was impressed on us in our younger days did so in such
subtle
ways that it would be impossible - indeed, unprofitable and maybe even
harmful - to say, simply, that this and other methods are either great or
worthless. Further, I don?t think that they necessarily have to be one or
the other.
Each alone may just serve as another piece of the puzzle that, combined
with
the many other pieces, contributes to the mosaic, but by no means
completes
it. That being said, in all its presumptive vigor, I love what I've read
of
Mosaic thus far ;).
_________________________________________________________________
Messenger Café open for fun 24/7. Hot games, cool activities served daily.
Visit now. http://cafemessenger.com?ocid=TXT_TAGHM_AugHMtagline
_______________________________________________
Mosaic mailing list
[email protected]
To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to
http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org.
Search the MOSAIC archives at http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive.
