Reaction to Article and Podcast
In Dr. Moje’s article and podcast states that the way in which educators teach literacy to students has to change. She states that teachers with content areas such as math or science do not believe that they are responsible for a students’ literacy success. Unfortunately, the way education is set up today, the focus is on test scores for each tested subject. Math teachers, for example, do not feel, and perhaps rightly so, that they have the time to teach or should even be concerned about a student’s literacy education when they have to prepare students for their own standardized tests.
About Me
My name is Nathan Parsh and I teach Physical Education at Pimlico Elementary and Middle School in Baltimore City. This is my fourth year teaching and I love what I do. I am originally from Michigan and attend the University of Michigan. While we may be down right now, I love Detroit sports, especially the Tigers, Red Wings and Wolverines. I am currently finishing up my masters at Towson University and will be completely done in the fall.
As a physical education teacher, literacy doesn’t always play a huge role in my classes. Instead of being just a “resource teacher”, I want to help my students academically as much as possible. My hope is that through this course I will have a better understanding of how to do so.
I thought your comment about math teachers was interesting. It seems to me, in the math classes I have sat in on, that math teachers do focus on literacy education through the teaching and evaluation process of BCR's. The students also have to be fluent enough to read and understand word problems so they can correctly apply their knowledge to the task.
ReplyDeleteIt is certainly a difficult thing to strike a balance between content instruction (whatever it is that we teach), and the teaching of metacognitive tools that we could perceive as outside the scope of our course content, even expertise as teachers. The one thing that could be encouraging is that the teaching of these strategies actually inform and complement what it is that we teach in our content areas.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with you viewpoint on Dr. Moje article and podcast. I also feel that the focus is on standardized testings and not the actual learning process for students to obtain more knowledge in every subject matter.
ReplyDeleteThere is a need for all educators to include literacy in their content area. In my observation of the many math classes that I have visited there were lots of written words posted throughout the classroom, on white-boards with objectives written, and drills to complete, as well as key terms to know. Some teacher even had students copy definitions in their notebook. There are word-problems in math that reqiures students to read and to solve. Students are required to answer BCR's during standardize test. So, literacy is important for all teachers to use in the classroom. I believe that it is not recognited as a essential task in certain courses like math and science.
ReplyDeleteI can appreciate you concern for teachers having to concentrate more on preparing students for standardized tests rather than literacy focus in the classroom. The issue or question rather as an educator is, when do we take the power of the classroom back and get back to teaching the fundamentals. If we concentrate on standardized test how do we prepare our students to read something, really read something to stop and review, digest, synthesize and connect information? If our concern isn’t literacy in the classroom across content areas how do we expect them to pass standardized test?
ReplyDeleteMikehil13 response: It is true that math and sciences teachers feel that they should not provide the necessary literacy instruction, such instruction is still needed,(many teachers of math and sciences assume that students have already received the required prerequisites to take more complex courses in those particular content areas).
ReplyDeleteI would agree with you that the math teacher in some cases believes that reading and writing skills are reserved for other subject matters. All classroom instruction should provide more opportunities for reading instruction and the incorporation of the BCR is always good enough to improve student learning across all content areas. The BCR is not always used in the same manner as the essay, in that the entire class is not taking time to correct it for errors and content. It is used more so as a tool so that the student will be able to produce it for the test and that’s unfortunate when the BCR could be used in instruction for so much more.
ReplyDeleteLast month my principal at Charles Herbert Flowers High School gave accolades to our Physical Education Department for implementing reading and writing assignments concerning following stats, reading reviews of athletes, and responding to news articles. I am exited for your students that you intend to incorporate similar activates in your department. I am sure that it will be rewarding for all stakeholders involved.
ReplyDeleteI would have to disagree with the comment about math teachers. Math has it's own language that needs to be understood in order for a child to be successful.
ReplyDeleteI think your comment was on point in regards to teaching to the test. Yeah, math teachers use math talk and do BCRs, but they are only realy worried about their content and how to get the most points out of the BCR. We arent necessarily constructing the best educated students, but they will know how to do BCRs in every class.
ReplyDeleteWhen we look at math as its own language, I think the picture can be explained much better with a caption. In placing a literacy component to math we need to make sure the student read the captions. As a former Engineer, the captions helped me to futher my understanding; sometimes more than the actual application of knowledge.
ReplyDeleteReducing our lecture time will help most of our students who are prone to "tuning out" from doing so. With that said, however, teachers need to use great care when choosing the learning activities that their students will experience. For some teachers, a difficult aspect of implementing some of the strategies that the text offers will be incorporating a measurable element to the activity. There must be a measurable outcome for which we are working.
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