Home, Sweet Home – Making Our House Into a Home

As a high school student, I sat in a typical English classroom.  Most of my teachers lectured, showed transparencies on the projector, assigned papers, and analyzed novels.  We read and read and read.  We learned a little bit of grammar.  We completed the (now becoming arachaic) research project on an author of choice complete with a bibliography.  Very little of what I learned in those English classes transferred into other courses or professions.  I use those strategies now only because I teach English. 

When I first began to teach, I taught using the same methods.  My classes grew increasingly bored, restless, and disruptive as did I.  I felt like I was teaching material that was useless.  I sought out other methods thinking “Surely there has to be a way.”

After attending a summer course offered by Kylene Beers, I began to realize there IS another way.  As a teacher, it was hard for me lose the notion that students should pay attention to me and learn just because I’m here.  On more than one occasion I have used the line “Coming to school is the only thing you (the students) are required by law to day.  All else is extracurricular.”  I began to understand that if I were to reach my students I would have to reach them where they are as they are.  And where are they?  What are they doing on a daily basis.  After surveying my current students I found out the following:

• 84% text message HOURLY (if not by the minute).
  • 62% text during school hours
  • 42% prefer to text their friends than rather call them
• 73% are members of a social networking site (Myspace, Facebook, etc) with 67% of these students logging in to these sites daily.
• 85% participate in Instant Messaging (AIM, Yahoo, etc)
• 38% blog either own a blog hosting site (WordPress, Blogger) or through a social networking site.

So what does this mean for me?  It means that if Bobby Joe refuses to turn in his essay, it doesn’t mean he can’t write.  I can assume that he texts and write material on the internet.  If he writes there, why not for me?  The answer (at least for me) is that he’s uninterested.  My wonderful activity of rewriting a scene from To Kill a Mockingbird as a reporter seems forced and unoriginal to him.  Analyzing Ernest Hemingway’s writing style seems pointless.  While the skills necessary to complete these tasks are vital to Bobby Joe, the strategy and the media are outdated and irrelevant.  Tasks must seem relevant and realistic to him. 

I know that means that I must think completely outside the box.  I know it means hours of preparation and forethought for each course.  But if these kids learn to read, respond to each other, and acquire a literacy that will prepare them for a bright future, isn’t it worth it?