Learning Letter

            It is hard to choose where to begin explaining the growth as a student and a future educator that I went through in this course. Throughout the quarter, the idea of having purpose and reasoning for everything we do as teachers was brought up often and I feel that everything we did in this course had a clear purpose and a good reason for doing it. We were able to experience creating and teaching curriculum first hand and that experience is invaluable. When the quarter started I chose to read I Read It, But I Don’t Get It by Chris Tovani first and looking back, I would not have done it any differently. Reading this book first gave me a certain excitement for reading throughout the quarter and the books that we read in this class were excellent for helping me grow as a future educator. I was extremely excited to use the teaching methods and lesson ideas from the informational texts that we read throughout this quarter and I started right away by using those ideas in most of the lessons that I had in my unit plan. I used the ideas from Readicide by Kelly Gallagher very often in my unit plan. He recommends augmenting class texts with supporting texts and that was an idea that caught my interest. I used that teaching idea throughout the whole second week of my unit plan. Overall, I tried to use ideas from most of the informational texts that we read in this course in my unit plan and it seemed to work out pretty well.

            Something that helped my understanding of the texts covered in this course was the blog posts and class discussions that we participated in throughout the quarter. Most class discussion heavy courses that I have been in are not usually that lively. Every discussion we had was active and contributed to my growth. I learned a lot from both discussions and blog posts. The idea of using blog posts to express your thoughts on a certain text was helpful. It was a way for me to recognize what I had learned from a certain text and also to display that learning in a comfortable and relaxed setting.

Along with the texts chosen for this course I was able to read a couple of books for the various assignments we had to do, starting with the book talk. I never thought that I would get the chance to use The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien in a classroom setting, but that was the book that I chose for the book talk. Through that I was able to discover the value that The Hobbit could have in a classroom setting. In the mini-lesson assignment, I used The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian as my lesson text. This was the perfect book for the mini-lesson because I was able to incorporate a supporting local news article for the lesson since the book’s setting is in our area. The best part of the mini-lesson assignment was the feedback that I was able to receive from my peers. That is something that I have not experienced in most classes, but it has helped me learn more about the things that I can improve on. The greatest learning experience that I encountered throughout this quarter was the unit plan assignment. It was also the most challenging assignment in this course. Before this course, I had only made one lesson plan for a mini-lesson in a previous class. The unit plan really turned that up a notch for me since I had to make 15 lesson plans for the unit. It took some time to complete, but the finished product gave me a sense of pride and confidence in my abilities as a teacher.

My participation in this course has completely changed the way I look at myself as a teacher. Before this course I knew that I wanted to be a teacher but had never truly tested that out. The idea of wanting to become a teacher is tested when you actually have to teach, and that is exactly what we did in this course. I found my confidence and clarity with my decision to become a teacher in this course and that is something that I did not expect to find when I signed up for this class. The course challenged me, helped me grow and gave me confidence with my career path.

“Frankenstein” Graphic Novel

This adaptation of Frankenstein shows something that we do not often see in modern portrayals of Frankenstein. It shows the emotional side of the creature created by Frankenstein. It shows how the creature is intelligent, eloquent, and philosophical but it is greatly misunderstood. I find it interesting that one of the things that this portrayal and the original story points out is how the creature is misunderstood, yet we still look at Frankenstein as a monster in our modern interpretation. Was the Mary Shelley trying to tell her audience to not judge someone by their appearances when she wrote Frankenstein? Was she trying to make the point that even someone that looks like Frankenstein’s creating can be an intelligent and sensitive being? IF this is the point that she was trying to get across with Frankenstein I would sadly have to say that it has failed considering that kids dress up as Frankenstein the monster for Halloween and movie portray Frankenstein as a horrible monster. Maybe it is just a more interesting and intense story that way. The problem with that portrayal of the story is that there is no lesson from it. In the original story of Frankenstein and in this particular adaptation we see that judging someone by their appearance can be harmful to that person and to the people around them. In a way, Frankenstein’s creature is a product of the prejudice, judgment, and misunderstanding that he faces in his life. People all call him a monster and do not give him a chance to show his true colors and in the end, he actually becomes a monster. He was told that he was a monster so often that he believed it and he lived that out in his life. This graphic novel adaptation does a good job of briefly showing the changes that Frankenstein’s creation goes through as people continue to judge and fear him.

Night by Elie Wiesel

There are certain events in history that are talked about and covered in school lessons so often that we can sometimes overlook and lose sight of the human element that those events have in them. I would argue that the Holocaust is one of those events. Many people are given countless lessons on the Holocaust and have an understanding of the tragedies that people went through in that time, but do they truly understand on a deep emotional level the human feelings that people must have felt in that time? This is not to say that we forget about what those people have gone through and the challenges that they faced, but the emotional connection to certain historical events is sometimes drowned in the endless context. Elie Wiesel’s Night has given me an emotional punch to the gut and truly brought to light, the human emotions that someone in that situation might have felt. It reminded me of how the people in those historical events were real people, not just historical characters. It is sickening to think about these terrible events on an emotional level, but I believe Wiesel intended for his audience to feel that way and that is the beauty of his book. It allows its reader to dive deep into the emotional turmoil that Jews had to face at the Auschwitz concentration camp. Elie Wiesel takes us through his story from his unfortunate capture and transport to the concentration camps, to life inside the camp where any day could be his last, to his eventual escape which seemed too late considering he had already lost everything. This story is astounding and essential for readers to have a deeper emotional understanding of what those people had to go through and why something like the Holocaust can never happen again.

Edgar Allen Poe Complete Tales and Poems

There are two poems for our class in particular that caught my attention and didn’t let go. The “Cask of Amontillado” and “The Black Cat” had me on the edge of my seat and that was simply because both of them were twisted and thrilling much like a suspense show you would see on TV. The “Cask of Amontillado” was interesting because it was a revenge story that ended up working out really well for the narrator. Sometimes revenge can be a two headed snake which afflicts harm on both parties, but this story seemed to only harm Fortunado to character that gets trapped in the end. The narrator has a well thought out plan and performs it perfectly and in a very evil way. The twisted part of this story that had me very interested in how it would all end is the fact that the narrator just enclosed Fortunado alive and left him there. It was not a happy ending as you might expect from Poe’s writing because Fortunado had never been discovered even fifty years later.

Now for “The Black Cat,” this story seemed like it was straight out of a horror movie. The narrator is most definitely crazy and the reader gets an idea of that right from the start, considering he is telling the story the day before his death penalty. When the narrator explains how he wants to tell his story and set the record straight, I was expecting a story of how he was innocent, but as the narrator tells the story, he seems more and more insane. One insane deed led to the next with the narrator which starts with him getting drunk and cutting one of his cat’s eyes out, which he follows up with hanging the cat and killing it. The suspense enters the story when he finds an impression of the hung cat on a wall. Things only get weirder with this story because he finds another black cat with a white spot on it that ends up turning into the form of the GALLOWS! The narrator goes crazy and tries to kill the cat, but ends up killing his wife with no remorse at all. The cat though, ends up leading to the narrator’s demise and gives him away to the police by making noise in the spot where the narrator hid his wife’s body and the cat. This narrator has major issues in this story and his explanation of how he ended up where he is ends up being very dark and of an evil nature. Both these stories were filled with suspense which made it easy to get hooked on them from start to finish.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian TPA Lesson Plan and Link to The Spokesman-Review Article (Found in Lesson Connections section)

TPA Lesson Plan

Course: English

1. Teacher Candidate	Austin Upmeyer	Date Taught	11/8/2017
2. Subject	The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
3. Lesson Title/Focus	Real-World Connections to The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian	5. Length of Lesson	20 minutes
4. Grade Level	11th

6. Academic & Content Standards (Common Core/National)	CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.7 Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in different media or formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively) as well as in words in order to address a question or solve a problem.
7. Learning Objective(s)	Students will display that they can connect multiple sources of information that are given to them to express an overall understanding of how the educational disadvantages that Junior faced in The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian are being addressed in the real world.
8. Academic Language demands (vocabulary, function, syntax, discourse)	Vocabulary: Every Student Succeeds Act, culture, educational disadvantages/opportunities. Function: Having an understanding of these terms is essential for students to make the connection between Junior’s educational experiences and how they are addressed in this Spokesman-Review article. Syntax: Students will use their understanding of these terms as background knowledge to use in assessments for this book when necessary. Discourse: Students will apply these terms when participating in classroom discussion as a way to elaborate on their ideas about the opportunities/disadvantages presented in both texts that we are using.

9. Assessment

Formative Assessment: Formal Assessment: I will provide questions to the class and the students will write their answers to these questions on a worksheet handout to be graded. Students will answer three questions while they read their section of the article. These questions will address the learning objective which is to measure if the student can “connect multiple sources of information that are given to them to express an overall understanding of how the educational disadvantages that Junior faced in The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian are being addressed in the real world.” These three questions will be as follows: ·         What are a few ways that this section of the article connects/relates to The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian? Use specifics from the text. ·         Does your section of the article address any specific disadvantages that Junior faced with his education? If so, how are these issues addressed or possibly even fixed? ·         Junior leaves Wellpinit for Rearden because of the quality of education he can receive at a white school versus a reservation school. Do you think that Junior still would have left Wellpinit if the opportunities and changes presented in this article were available to him while he was in school? Would you have left? These journal entries will be graded on a scale of 1-5 assessing whether or not the student has met the learning objective. 5 is the highest score and means that the student has shown that they understand the connections between the two texts and 1 is the lowest score showing that the student does not understand any of the connections between the two texts. Informal Assessment: The class will be split up into four groups (one group for each section of the article). Each member of the group will read their section of the article and write down their answers to the questions individually. Then they will meet with other students that worked on the same section for a small group discussion. They will share what they wrote down for their answers and also come up with a way to summarize the main points of their section for the class. After the four groups discuss their section of the article together, the class will come together and discuss the article as a whole. Each group will summarize their section to the class, briefly sharing the main points, and share a few of their answers as well. The informal assessment will be based off of the small group discussion and the class discussion. I will observe students sharing with their small group partners—listening for elaboration and expansion of thoughts on how the article connects to The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. I will also listen for the students’ article summaries and what they share about their thoughts on the article with the rest of the class. At the end of class I will ask for students to consider one final question for homework which will be discussed on the next day. This will also be informally assessed and the question will be as follows: ·         Now that you have an “understanding of how the educational disadvantages that Junior faced in The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian are being addressed in the real world,” does it seem like we, as a society are doing enough for Native American students?

10. Lesson Connections

Research/Theory: -I will be using an article posted by the Spokesman-Review that was written in 2016. It addresses the need for Native American students to have better opportunities and a chance for success in their education. This directly correlates to Junior’s experiences in school and the disadvantages that he faced at Wellpinit as well as the opportunities that he had once he transferred to Reardan. Fifield, Jen. “More states, including Washington, focusing on giving Native American students better chance of success.” The Spokesman-Review, September 11, 2016. Accessed October 23, 2017. http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2016/sep/11/more-states-including-washington-focusing-on-givin/. -In Kelly Gallagher’s book Readicide, he suggests to “Augment books instead of flogging them.” He states that “It is imperative that we augment every novel our students read with real-world text that shows them that the book they are reading offers valuable insight into living productive lives.” This is the approach that I am taking with this lesson. I am augmenting the Alexie text with a real-world article that was published in the local newspaper. This makes the book more relevant for the students and shows how it can connect to life outside of the classroom. Gallagher, Kelly. Readicide. Portland, Maine: Stenhouse Publishers, 2009 (pg. 79-81)

Prior Knowledge: Students have read The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie and have an understanding of how the main character’s life was affected by the education system that he was in. The students have an understanding of how Junior, the main character, grew up with many disadvantages and they are aware of the cultural and educational differences that are presented in the text. This lesson will expand on that prior knowledge by augmenting the text with a real-world article that addresses those disadvantages that Junior faced in his community and what is being done about it today.

Skills: -Students need to be able to: ·         Make connections between the Alexie text and the Spokesman-Review article. ·         Read and comprehend their section of the article well enough to teach the main points of their section with the class. ·         Engage in meaningful discussion about the text. ·         Give insightful and clear responses to the worksheet questions that I provide.

Culture: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian presents cultural topics that some students may not be familiar with. By showing them a local news article that talks about this culture, I will be showing students that those cultural differences may be closer to them than they think. The Alexie text and the Spokesman-Review article both provide important cultural insight to the lives of Spokane Indians.

11. Instructional Strategies/Learning Tasks to Support Learning
Learning Tasks and Strategies Sequenced Instruction
Teacher’s Role Introduction (<1 minute): 1.    I will start the class by informing the students that we will be augmenting The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian with a real-world article from The Spokesman-Review that addresses many of the educational issues that Junior had to face throughout the book. I will tell them that we are doing this in order to discover the connections between the two texts and how those connections from the book offer valuable insights into real-world situations. Learning Tasks (18 minutes): 2.    I will instruct students to access the article through my blog at austinsreadingvoice.blogspot.com (which I will have the link to up on my PowerPoint presentation). If some students are unable to access the article online, I have brought extra hard copies to hand out to them if need be. 3.    As they are accessing the article, I will break the class up into four groups, and hand out the article worksheet. Each group will read a certain part of the article. I will assign sections to each group as follows: ·         Group 1: Intro and New Laws ·         Group 2: Biggest Disparities ·         Group 3: Cultural Programs Can Increase Success ·         Group 4: States Making Changes 4.    I will tell the students to take 5 minutes to read their section of the article and write down their answers to the questions on their worksheets. These questions will be: ·         What are a few ways that this section of the article connects/relates to The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian? Use specifics from the text. ·         Does your section of the article address any specific disadvantages that Junior faced with his education? If so, how are these issues addressed or possibly even fixed? ·         Junior leaves Wellpinit for Rearden because of the quality of education he can receive at a white school versus a reservation school. Do you think that Junior still would have left Wellpinit if the opportunities and changes presented in this article were available to him while he was in school? Would you have left? As they are reading, I will write each section title on the white board so that I can write their responses for each section during class discussion. 5.    Once the students finish their reading and answer the questions, I will have them meet with other students that worked on the same section for a small group discussion which I will walk around the classroom and observe. In these group discussions, they need to do two things: ·         Share a few of their responses to the worksheet questions. ·         Come up with a way to briefly summarize the main points of their section so that the class can be exposed to the whole article, not just their own section. If they have not quite finished answering the questions within the 5 minutes, they will have the opportunity to consult with their group members to finish their worksheet during this group discussion. 6.    When small group discussions are done, I will begin the class discussion by having group 1 summarize the main points of their section and then share a few examples of their worksheet answers. I will then have groups 2-4 go through this same process of summarizing and sharing answers. 7.    As each group is sharing their worksheet answers, I will be writing them on the board for the class to refer back to. Closure (1 minute): 8.    Once each group has summarized their section and shared their worksheet answers, I will end the discussion by asking the class to consider one final question for homework which will be discussed on the next day: ·         Now that you have an “understanding of how the educational disadvantages that Junior faced in The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian are being addressed in the real world,” does it seem like we, as a society are doing enough for Native American students? 9.    I will end class by having the students hand in their worksheets and telling them that they can read through the whole article at home if they so choose.	Students’ Role/Student Voice  2. Students will get on their laptops and access The Spokesman-Review article through my blog. 3. Students will break up into four groups and each group will focus on one section of the article. 4. Students will take 5 minutes to read their section of the article and write down their answers to the questions I have provided in their journals.  5. Students will discuss how they want to summarize the main points of their section and also share their answers with the other group members for 5 minutes before discussing the article as a class. 6. Groups 1-4 will go in order for summarizing the main points of their section and sharing some of their worksheet answers.  8. Student will write down or memorize the exit question to consider for class discussion on the next day. 9. Students will hand in their worksheets to be assessed.
Student Voice: Student voice can be found in the worksheets that students will fill out for this lesson as well as in the discussions that they will participate in throughout the lesson. In the worksheet, students are answering questions that specifically address the learning objective which is to “connect multiple sources of information that are given to them to express an overall understanding of how the educational disadvantages that Junior faced in The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian are being addressed in the real world.” In their class discussion, students will have the opportunity to voice their ideas and expand on them as well. They will share responses with classmates and also discuss the connections they made between the Alexie text and the Spokesman-Review article.

12. Differentiated Instruction

-Because some students may not be able to read and answer the worksheet questions as fast as other students and within the 5 minutes they are given to do so, they will have the opportunity to consult with other group members to finish their worksheet during group discussion. By doing this they will also be able to make connections by using fellow students as an extra source of information to meet the learning objective. This allows for the struggling students to ask for help if they need it. - For my struggling students who do not have prior skills to complete this lesson I will provide extra support for them while they fill out their worksheet. I will frequently check on them to give them extra assistance when needed. -I will print out enough extra copies of the article so that students who do not have access to the article online can still participate in the lesson. I will make sure to provide enough resources for each student to fully participate.

13. Resources and Materials

Idea for the lesson (References): ·         Gallagher, Kelly. Readicide. Portland, Maine: Stenhouse Publishers, 2009 (pg. 79-81) ·         Fifield, Jen. “More states, including Washington, focusing on giving Native American students better chance of success.” The Spokesman-Review, September 11, 2016. Accessed October 23, 2017. http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2016/sep/11/more-states-including-washington-focusing-on-givin/.

Teacher Materials: ·         Computer and internet access ·         Projector and PowerPoint presentation ·         Copies of the worksheet, article, and lesson plan ·         White board and markers

Student Materials: ·         Laptop and internet access (students will access the article through my blog) ·         Article worksheet ·         Pen or pencil ·         The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

14. Management and Safety Issues

-Students might get lost when trying to find the article on my blog. I will show them step by step how to get to the blog and open up the article so that they can participate in the class activities. -Students might get distracted when they are having small group discussion about their article worksheet since I have allowed them to speak with their fellow classmates to work on the questions. If they get distracted, I will remind them to focus on the questions on the worksheet before we have a whole class discussion.

15. Parent & Community Connections

I am connecting this lesson to the community by using a local newspaper article from The Spokesman-Review to augment the Alexie text that students have already read.

Formative Assessment

Name: ___________________

The Spokesman-Review Article Worksheet

Question 1:  What are a few ways that your section of the article connects/relates to The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian? Use specifics from the text.

Question 2:  Does your section of the article address any specific disadvantages that Junior faced with his education? If so, how are these issues addressed or possibly even fixed?

Question 3:  Junior leaves Wellpinit for Rearden because of the quality of education he can receive at a white school versus a reservation school. Do you think that Junior still would have left Wellpinit if the opportunities and changes presented in this article were available to him while he was in school? Would you have left?

Readicide- Kelley Gallagher

When reading this book you can tell that Gallagher has put lot of thought into the topic of reading. You can instantly tell that he is concerned about our youth’s ability to become lifelong readers and he concerns the reader about this topic by opening up the book with some pretty scary reading statistics. One statistic in particular was that “27 percent of adults in this country did not read a single book in 2007” (Gallagher, pg. 3). This is way too much. I completely support Gallagher in his endeavor to make students become lifelong readers, and I have felt the effects of being pushed away from my interest in reading just like he talks about in his book. Gallagher goes into depth in this book with ways that students lose interest in reading and it is a sad thought when I think about how many situations I have seen in my life where this loss of passion for reading is displayed. One of the biggest road blocks for my own personal interest in reading throughout high school was what Gallagher calls the “Chop-Chop Curriculum.” In this method of teaching literature, the book is broken up into bits and pieces and then even more bits and pieces until it isn’t a book anymore, but rather a series of small readings that you have to try and follow along with. By the end of the chop-chop method, most students are tired of the book and don’t even know what they read. I was definitely one of those students that resented this method of reading. I truly enjoy what Gallagher calls getting into the “reading flow” and that is nearly impossible to do when a book is being over-analyzed and chopped up into a million different pieces. Gallagher tackles many reading issues in our school such as the chop-chop method and better yet, he even offers ways to fix those teaching issues with different teaching methods. Just like Tovani’s I Read It, But I Don’t Get It, this will be one of those books that I will hold on to in my classroom throughout my teaching career.

I Read It, But I Don’t Get It – Chris Tovani

This book is meant for teachers as a tool for teaching adolescents how read and comprehend what they are reading. Even though it is meant for teachers, I found myself reading the book as a student as well. This book was the first book that I read at the start of this quarter and I did that for a reason…the title. I thought about how I have read a lot of things that I did not get and could not fully comprehend. I thought that this book could be really useful in setting me up with better reading strategies for the rest of the quarter’s readings. I was right. I was never a bad reader by any means, but since I read Tovani’s work, I have completed several other books and have felt a noticeable improvement in my comprehension and understanding of the books I read. There are so many great strategies in Tovani’s work that can be used to teach and to learn how to read more effectively. As you can probably tell already, reading about the comprehension strategies in this book really made me contemplate my own reading skills and how there have been times throughout school when I have been lacking in that area. I don’t remember a time in high school when my teachers would focus on teaching good reading strategies to me. I would just be assigned the reading and not understand why I was reading it or the benefits that could come from good reading strategies. I lacked purpose for reading throughout most of high school and that is one of the first things that Tovani covers in her book. Having a purpose for reading is extremely helpful for gaining understanding from the text. That is only the first reading strategy that Tovani talks about, but the book is organized in a way that makes it easy to refer back to any of the strategies. This is one of those books that I see myself holding on to and using throughout my teaching career.