Bev your post had me thinking on so many different levels- First, there is a wonderful picture book called How We Are Smart by Nikola-Lisa, published by Lee and Low. That book is written about famous people through Gardner's multiple intelligences. It asks the reader how they are smart-are they smart like Thurgood Marshall (language smart) or Georgia O'Keefe (picture smart). Each biography?includes?a photo,?a short narrative, a poem and a quote.?We purchased the book for each teacher in my school (grades K-8) and will give it out?as a "book of the month". I can't wait to hear the conversations?and how students react to?it.?
As a literacy coach I?struggle with helping my teachers walk through the comprehension strategies with rigor.?I would like to introduce them to Clara's demonstration lessons of asking questions and how children truly need to understand how a particular strategy can help them comprehend?a text. Spending several weeks on a strategy, without jumping around from one to another seems to be?key. ? I am amazed by Clara's ability to stay with Jasmine's silence. I understand the importance of wait time- but at what point does it become uncomfortable for the student or for the rest of the class? Ellin indicates that Clara cannot give the subtle message that Jasmine doesn't?have an?answer. How long is a long silence? Viviane -----Original Message----- From: Beverlee Paul <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [email protected] Sent: Thu, 31 Jul 2008 6:09 pm Subject: [Understand] more thinking about understanding I was jolted into thinking about Maya Angelou this morning as I was trying to think with Jennifer and I remembered another of my favorite Maya Angelou quotes: "There's a world of difference between truth and facts. Facts can obscure the truth." I keep being amazed by her gifts. But this time, I think I came to a new understanding of this quote. And it really proves the point of what we've been discussing the last few days. When I say that we all need schema to deeply understand, this is a perfect example. WHAT I BRING TO THE PAGE of Maya's quote is different today than it was even days ago, largely because of the thinking I've done which was kick-started by Jennifer's initial question about main idea instruction. At the risk of being too trite, I again have a favorite quote for this phenomenon: "Noone ever steps in the same river twice." Have any of you ever known even a single person who hasn't finished reading To Understand by saying, "Now I'm ready to read it again"? I haven't. And that brings me to something else I've been thinking about this summer. And a breakthrough understanding about Gardner's "It's not about how smart you are; it's about how you are smart." Ellin's To Understand made me think about living the intellectual life and our own perceptions of whether we are smart or not. I had a class with several of my favorite teachers and I wanted to see what they thought about themselves. So we wrote a response over a two-week period based on the statement: "When I First Realized I Was Smart." Needless to say, we had wonderful responses and most people published them to share. Wonderful but unexpected - at first blush. Without exception, each person realized they were "smart" not after they'd received great grades, not after they received awards and accolades, not after class rank, not after high scores on standardized tests (which these particular people all had) -- but at some point in their university experience or teaching experience, and they were univer sally being smart about teaching!!! And, honestly, I proposed the question highly value-free and did not tie the response into teaching at all. I actually expected that most people would answer that by saying they were smart by comparing themselves to something--grades, tests, etc. And NOT ONE DID. They all defined their breakthrough understanding of themselves as "smart" during their undergraduate or graduate education classes or during their teaching experience. And they ALWAYS involved an "respected other," which is a powerful understanding as well. And that experience, for each of them, became the catalyst, I believe, to strive for understanding. They had to think they were smart before they saw themselves as capable intellects who could push themselves toward greater, deeper, more important understanding. They're all about the struggle. I hate to throw out Angelou again, but she's just one of my sheroes! "A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song." I believe each of these teachers became, at the moment they understood they were smart, a person capable of struggling for understanding who took intense pleasure not only in the coming to know, but in the puzzle and struggle to get there. And I believe that affects their teaching every day in every way. They were transformed. And we remember again the brilliance of Ellin' mind, and maybe just as important, Jamika's. It's all about the struggle. And, if we never find the one true main idea -- well, we've been intensely happy on our journey to get there. And finally, I'm coming to the reason I wanted to post these thoughts. If any of you are still listening, though, I'd be amazed after all my talk. I realized the last day of class and all those papers were shared: these teachers, these friends, these folk so worthy of respect, had one universal: it really wasn't about how smart they were; it was all about how they were smart. These particular folk were very, very, very smart - hig hly gifted - in teaching and learning. And from that moment forward, they were hooked. They saw themselves as capable learners who wanted to basically spend their life continuing to learn--and they came to the right place to do so. Education. WOW. Who'd a thunk it? Now comes the place where I can hit it out of the ballpark! Each of these people, teased into thinking about these issues by Jamika and Ellin, began behaving as a "smart person" at that moment they understood they were smart. BUT NONE OF THEM KNEW IT UNTIL THEY WERE ASKED TO IDENTIFY A MOMENT, sometimes many, many years later, in our class thinking about Ellin's thinking. They didn't articulate it, they didn't even realize it. In our discussion, they said that it was only now that they realized when or how it was they came to know/accept that they were smart, and that it had taken a great deal of introspective musing. But the lack of naming it hadn't diminished their understanding of it in this case. What made the difference was their perception of themselves as bright. And only in retrospect could they even determine or guess how that perception came to be. But...their life as a learner took on a whole new depth, along with the quest to come to understand, in some way largely because they started living life as a Smart Person. And, fortunately for the dozens of children they lived among after that, they were smart, maybe not every day in every way, but smart. And it truly wasn't how smart these teachers were; it was how they were smart. They were smart teachers!!! Wow. And I was saddened by the two people in the class who never shared. To me, that was a clue that they, in their heart of hearts, still hadn't found a moment they felt smart. And that we still had some work to do. And I'm so jealous of Ellin and all her friends at the PEBC. And I feel so cheated that my years have all passed without a vehicle to think with the support of others. And of all the late afternoons of washing out paintbrushe s, and unjamming pencil sharpeners, and making book orders, and filling out forms, and putting up bulletin boards for God's sake!! I've been cheated by being on autopilot because of the sheer volume of "stuff" we are getting bogged down doing. And what is the main idea and supporting details of this post, do you suppose? You know what? Even I don't know. Bev _________________________________________________________________ Stay in touch when you're away with Windows Live Messenger. http://www.windowslive.com/messenger/overview.html?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_messenger2_072008 _______________________________________________ Understand mailing list [email protected] http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/listinfo/understand_literacyworkshop.org _______________________________________________ Understand mailing list [email protected] http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/listinfo/understand_literacyworkshop.org
