Due 3/02/07: Final Lit Circle Reflection

In no less than ten (10) sentences, please reflect on your overall literature circle/small group activities. What did you find worked best in your groups? Did you prefer one style of literature circle-based techniques over the others? Do you understand the difference in actual literature circles vs. small group discussions about literature? Now that you've experienced a "full on" lit circle, do you see how it is different than the other ways we've been doing them? How do you think you can use them most effectively in your classrooms? Were you able to adequately explore your YA texts within the LC format? What questions do you still have about literature circles?

Reiteration: to get credit for this assignment, you must write no less than ten (10) sentences by Friday, March 2.

NCTE/IRA Standards for Teaching English Language Arts

Here is a link to the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and International Reading Association's Standards (IRA) for K-12 teaching in the English language arts. I have recently e-mailed you the PDF as an attachment, but if you did not get the e-mail, you can download the standards for FREE at this address:
http://www.ncte.org/store/books/bestsellers/105977.htm

The Standards are an absolute NECESSITY for you. If you can justify your instruction (via lesson planning) in terms of NATIONAL standards such as these, you are well on your way to preparing your students for the complexities of the entire world around them. The standards start on page 19, and each has a justification/rationale/explanation attached to it.

This should be REQUIRED reading before you leave the university or step foot in a classroom. I suggest you familiarize yourself with them as best you can.

For those of you considering doing a thematic unit for your final project, I suggest you focus on these standards in making your lesson plans. You may have noticed that these are the standards that ReadWriteThink.org uses in its lesson plans as well.

Due 2/12/07: Post Your Weblink Review

Please post your weblink reviews here. Make sure they are of proper length by first typing them into your word procesessor program, then copy and paste them into your comments box. Follow the format below:

Review of EN/SANE World

available at http://www.ensaneworld.blogspot.com

EN/SANE World is James Bucky Carter's blog full of resources for the English language arts teacher who might also be interested in comic boks or graphic novels. With links to general English Education resources (the "EN" in "EN/SANE"), adolescent literature resources, and what Carter calls "Sequential Art Narratives in Education" resources ("SANE," basically these links are about teaching comics and graphic novels) it is an ecclectic mix of interest to any English teacher.

Your subsequent paragraphs will go here. Be sure to see your syllabus for the criteria of this assignment. Also, if you can't get your link to hyperlink when you type it, don't worry. Just make sure you type it correctly, and your peers can still just copy and paste it in the toolbar of their web browsers.

Due 2/12/07: Reflect on Your Literature Circle Experience

Now that we've taken on some official Literature Circle roles and used them as the basis for structuring small group reading and discussion (2/7), reflect on the experience. Was it a better group dynamic than when the groups were less structured? Do you think that students would enjoy working in LC's? Do you appreciate their utility? If not, what concerns are you still considering? Will you use them in your classrooms? Why, or why not?