Its a Wonderful Day In The Neighborhood

Lisa McHenry EDT 436 A Dr. Schwartz 10/29/09

Or Is It?

Field 1 Assignment: Lincoln Elementary AKA Wilson Middle School (8th grade only), Hamilton, Ohio

The 8th graders that will be educated By the Wilson staff for the next two Years will be housed in Lincoln. The bright side, after two years They will move into a brand new building. The dark side, its two years in a 100-year-old building.

First day of Field, Fall-2009 My first full-fledged field experience and I actually get to teach. Im excited and nervous all at the same time. I wonder, Will the students like me? Will they think it is really weird to have a college student that is in her 40s? All I know, is I am determined to have a classroom of my own someday. I want to make a difference in someones education. Mourning Announcements: Pledge of Allegiance

Words of Wisdom from the principal:

The Turkish culture has an ancient belief that says, it is more important who you are than where you live. Students, do you know what that means? It means your actions speak more about who you are, than where you may live. Its important to always show good character, because no one can ever take that away from you. You may live in a nice home now, but you may have to move to a different home that may not be as nice. You need to remember what the Turkish wisdom says. It is more important who you are than where you live. Moment of silent reflection

Scene: Students are arriving one by one to a resource room in an 8th grade only building. The building is 100- years- old with beautiful architecture, but the technology available is on a limited basis. The district is in the process of building a new middle school, but the teachers will have to operate out of this building for the next two years.

Ethnocentrism: the tendency to favor ones own ethnic group over other groups. (Santrock.p.526)

Operant conditioning: a form of learning in which the consequences of behavior change the probability of the behaviors occurrence; also called instrumental conditioning (Santrock. p. 205)

Journal Entry: Student Get real. Who does she think she is! That b%#$^ thinks she can just smile and make my life all better. If she only knew, I took it easy on her. She is nice to me. I wanted to tell her, do your neighbors keep you up all night? Can you walk around the block and not worry about getting beat up by someone? Did you get up and have time to eat breakfast? I wish I had someone to make them be quiet, tell me to go to bed, and wake me up early so I can get everything I need for school ready. Life SUCKS and then you die, thats what my dad tells me. She goes to college; she just thinks she is better than me. Or even worse, somehow she is going to fix me! LOL Go back to where you came from, because you aint gonna stay here for long anyway. No one does.

Consciousness: awareness of external events and internal sensations, including awareness of the self and thoughts about ones experiences. (Santrock. p.160)

INDEPENDENT Scene: Students are silently reading, followed by quick write summary in their SSR journals. Student: How do you spell independent? Teacher: I-N-D you know like the song, Independent. I know you that song. I-N-D-E-P-EN-D-E-N-T, do you know what I mean! (Teacher does a poor rendition, but gets results) Student: smiles and writes down the word. Chorus: (from Independent)
I-N-D-E-P-E-N-D-E-N-T do you know what that mean? [Repeat 2x] She got her own house She got her own car Two jobs work hard you a bad broad If you ain't on sit down [Repeat 4x]

Edgewood Middle School- Observation Field 2 Scene: Students are working on daily language practice sheet. After working independently, the teacher does a whole class review. Question #1: Choose the correct spelling of the word that means freedom. __independence ___independance

Teacher asks, How many of you picked the one with an e? Raise your hand. All but 3 students raise their hands. She follows with, How many pick the a? Well it is the e, sorry. Do you want to know a trick I use to remember? Independence has all es.

Motivation: give behavior, thoughts, and feelings a purpose and makes behavior energized, directed, and sustained. (Santrock. p. 315)

MOTIVATION AND REWARD Excerpt from The life of a Young Teacher in the 21st Century Classroom
Friday Field Notes November 14, 2008 It is finally Friday! This week has been exhausting, but very productive. The students are wearing black and red today for spirit points. I took a tally of all the students wearing spirit gear during homeroom and handed out raffle tickets for Ms. R. At the end of the quarter they win a HD TV if their name is drawn from the raffle pot. I think is good motivation to improve school spirit.

Excerpt from The Life of a Young Teacher in 100year-old School Building. What Century is this anyway?
Friday Field Notes October 16, 2008

It is finally Friday. Its school spirit week, the students can earn an extra 5 homework points if they participate. The teacher writes all the days on the board. Monday - Mismatch day Tuesday - Hat day Wednesday - Twin Day Thursday - Blue and Gold Day Friday College Day

Mondays tally for first four periods 0, Tuesday 2, Wednesday 1, Thursday 1, and finally Friday 2. The host teacher brings in three of her own sweatshirts for students. They asked her to bring them one since they dont have any to wear. Only one student comes to the classroom to pick up a sweatshirt.

I noticed hanging in the office, a blue and yellow tye-dyed t-shirt that reads, Anything less than the best is a felony. Students can earn one of these by not having any violations and having good grades for the semester. I havent seen any students wearing them.

TALK IS CHEAP
I Like Positive People Day! Auctioneer: Okay, lets get out our scissors and start looking in the newspaper for positive people. Student shows teacher a front page article on local mother who claims gang style burial when she discarded her child in the trash. Teacher: Remember what positive people do, they help others through their actions. If you remember, R.J. did such a good job the last time he was here, I posted it on the wall. If you do a really good job at telling how the person helped and why you think that was a good thing then I might hang yours on the wall. This is R.J.s first day back to school, he and his mother are expected to go to jail the next day. He isnt participating at all. The host teacher counts the days he has been in the classroom all year, it is easier than counting his absences. 12 days, he is fifteen and one half years old in the eighth grade. Little to no chance of ever achieving a high school diploma. Teacher: Before you start writing let me see who you have pick for your positive person. Remember you have to tell me why you think they are showing good character and being positive for their community, not just what they did and that it was good. I want more details; I know you can do this. Bethany, why did you pick that article? Bethany: Teacher: I dont know. What do you mean you dont know? You picked it, why? How is playing golf being positive? Long pause, I dont know. Well then, how will you write about it? I dont know I know you can do better, are you choosing to get a zero instead of doing your work? I... Do not say, I dont know. It is a yes or no question.

Bethany: Teacher: Bethany: Teacher:

Bethany: Teacher:

Bethany: yes Teacher: (frowns) That is a poor choice. Auctioneer: SOLD!!! One Bad Attitude and you better hurry folks they are going quick. Also, included free of charge, No Chance for Success, and a You Cant Make Me Learn t-shirt.

Edgewood Middle School Main Entrance Lobby

ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER THAN WORDS

Learned Helplessness: A response to prolonged stress over which the individual has no control; apathy and helplessness may lead to depression. (Santrock. p.415)

Journal Entry: Observation Student I really like the 8th graders at this building, a lot more than I thought I would. The environment is quite different, but it seems, kids are kids everywhere. The only aspects that may change are externally in the way they may speak, dress, or behave. The struggle with adolesances is a timeless. I said something really dumb today. I didnt mean to, but in my effort to put a smile or at least half a grin on a young mans face, I had a very enlightening moment. Simply put, I said, Oh, its a wonderful day in the neighborhood. He was not amused and quickly replied, It depends what neighborhood you live in. I was speechless for a moment; my mind was trying to come up with a response. The only problem, I wasnt sure which avenue I wanted to take. Do I sympathize? Or try to put some kind of positive spin on the situation? I opted for the later, although now, I think if I were his real teacher I would have asked if there was anything I could help to make his day a little brighter. My host teacher said she had never seen so much learned helplessness in one group. She felt many of them just believed they had nowhere to go so why even try. I imagine it must be difficult to be surround by negativity and try to remain a positive image for the students to model their own behavior after.

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Albert Einstein

Summary

I began this multigenre research paper with the excitement of a teenager taking their first drive on their newly acquired drivers license. This non-traditional form of writing seemed to fit like a glove on this non-traditional student. I started this paper with the thinking I wanted to delve into the effects of socioeconomic status on learning. However, just as Dr. Romano described, sometimes your purpose changes during the process of developing your content. I cannot explain why, but as we held our classroom discussion with Dr. Romano I had my second Ahaa! moment. My first moment of course, was during my field observation, which was at the beginning of this assignment. This first Ahaa! moment is described through the genre of journal entries. I presented this event from different points of view. These were my host, the student, and myself as the observation student. I had this interaction with the student on my second day of observation and thus the title of my multigenre paper. It was through the contrasting perspectives that I decided to continue with a comparison theme throughout the piece. This leads me to my second moment, when someone in the classroom mentioned the term learned helplessness. This same term was expressed by my mentor teacher in the field. She said, and I am paraphrasing, there is so much learned helplessness around here I amazed we get anything accomplished. At the time, I thought how sad, but while I was sitting in the classroom that day listening to Dr. Romano. He repeated the term, twice, or possible three times and that was when I heard something in the tone of his voice. It was then I had my own epiphany, sitting right there in the middle of the class. I wanted to jump up and shout, Now, I know how exactly how you felt when you had to write on the back of that napkin! There was just one problem, I had to leave and go to my next class, no time to scribble down all my thoughts. Then off to work, I would not get a chance to write down my new epiphany for five or six hours. Therefore, I guess you are wondering, what is this great philosophical moment? I can simplify this into a definition I had heard once about insanity. I had forgotten it was Albert Einstein. He defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. With this additional comparison, my whole thought process started to shift. I questioned myself, are these attitudes intrinsically or extrinsically created? If this is learned helplessness, then apparently Einstein got it all wrong with his definition of insanity. I began to see this research paper as a peek into the difference in peoples perceptions of the same event or concept.

Another, separate inspiration came in the form of a T-shirt; a picture of this is located in the introduction of my paper. I could understood trying to form a positive relationship from the negative word felony, but this oxymoron really seemed moronic from my perspective. With this, I built off this criminal connotation and used the alias acronym of AKA to describe Wilson Middle Schools temporary location. My section titled INDEPENDENT, supports Caswells rational for the use of popular music in the classroom, he states: With over 125 references to music, The Pearl almost cries for popular music as part of its instructional delivery. The teaching of popular music within the classroom responds too many of todays accepted practices: reader response, writing instruction, humanities exploration, multiliteracy, multiple intelligences, and environmental control. Within five minutes, a musical selection can involve students in any one of these effective practices. Who among us does not have five minutes, once or twice a week, to provide emotion, engagement, and comprehension for students? This research supports my first mentors approach, but it amazed me, how with every twist and turn I was introduced with new comparisons in perspectives. It was during my second field visit that I unexpectedly had such a literal example of the different teaching approaches for spelling an almost identical word, independence. I also included a picture of the Cougar mural located in the main hallway of the Edgewood Middle School. Visitors and students are greeted by this huge symbol of school pride upon entering the school. The art teacher and his father completed the piece during the summer of 2009. I chose the definitions that are included as a way of showing how we each define these terms to justify our personal perspective of anothers behavior. I continued this look at perspectives with the clichs. I used the font Broadway as a creative expression. It shows how these clichs are like giant signs flashing for all to see, but who will pay the price of admission? It seems everyone wants to answer the question, but no one seems to want to implement a change. Lee and Ready explain, States often justified the new requirements by citing the notion of opportunity to learnstudents cannot learn academic material to which they have not been exposed. I hope that as an educator I will use many different filters to see others perspectives and not judge them, just understand. I agree with Steinbeck, As educators, we must provide opportunities for all students to engage in text. My auctioneer genre came from an actual occurrence in my first field. My host did have an I like Positive People Day. I would like to model this same kind of lesson

in my classroom someday. Even though my host was surrounded by what she felt was negativity or lack of will power, she kept teaching and looking for those positive outcomes, which reinforces the reason many of us dream of becoming educators. The reality, it is all about perspectives. The parents, students, faculty, administration, community, and Board of Education members all have their beliefs of what education means to them. Sometimes they go together like peas and carrots other times, like oil and water. What does this mean? As educators, we cannot force learning; we can only empower the desire to learn.

References Caswell, R. (2005). A musical journey through john Steinbecks "the pearl": Emotion, engagement, and comprehension. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, p. 62-67.

Lloyd, S. L. (2004). Using comprehension strategies as a springboard for student talk. Journal of adolescent and adult literacy, p.114-124.

Williams, B. T. (2004). Are we having fun yet? students, social class, and the pleasures of literacy. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, p. 338-342.

Santrock, John W., Psychology Essentials, 2nd edition. The McGraw-Hill Companies