Matt+C.+Page+for+September+11th

media type="youtube" key="3yEjyuw42YY&hl=en&fs=1" height="344" width="425" Welcome to my page everyone!! I wanted to start off with a little video that I have found on YouTube. It works well with the Gee argument that children are able to learn systems, such as in video games more easily than most are able to do from the classroom. Here are my quotes from the week! Comment and Discuss and, by the way, read for this week! (-: __From Shannon__:  -  “When left to their own devices, teachers often assimilated new ideas, methods, and materials into their existing teaching habits. Consequently, teachers retained the notion that the purpose of learning to read was to bring ideological unity among a disparate group in order that individuals would fit productively into the status quo of their communities. In effect, the task of teaching others to read had a civilizing function, which required neither consent nor interest among a teacher’s charges. The goal was to transfer the right thoughts into the heads of the young.” (p.11)    -  “(Regarding teacher manuals) The directions to teachers, then, were offered as scientific facts to be followed regardless of the social context of the instruction or the abilities and attitudes of students or teachers. It was assumed that if all teachers would use the textbooks and supplementary materials according to the directions in the guidebooks, then all students would learn to read efficiently and effectively.” (p.34) __From Larson and Marsh__: - “If literacies are always situated in social, cultural, historical and political relationships, and are embedded in structures of power, then teachers need to get a clear understanding of both their literacy practices and the practices of the local community, including those of their students and families.” (p.24) __From Gee__: - “We face, then, a new challenge: how to get all children -rich and poor- to be successful in school, but to ensure that all children –rich and poor- are able to learn, think, and act in new ways fit for out new high-tech global world. (p. 2) - “So what is it about school that manages to transform children who are good at learning (witness Pokemon), regardless of their economic and cultural differences, into children who are not good at learning, if they are poor or members of certain minority groups?” (p. 10) __Discussion__: The quotes that have been selected explore the function of academic literacy and its relation to the socio-political and economic situations of students. As a teacher at a private school, I have seen the diversity of the student body grow. From a mostly white and affluent composition, many non-white students have not just come in from poorer areas, but also from different countries and cultures. With these different groups coming together, the face of how literacy needs to be taught has changed in the school. As educators may still need to teach literacy sufficiently enough to complete standardized testing, there have been many different programs implemented in the school to address language and culture issues. With this, teachers have had to come up with whether to adjust their methods to accommodate these students or to still address the class as has been traditionally taught. __Questions for Discussion__: 1. Larson and Marsh and Gee believe that literacies are imbedded in the cultural and social environment of the student. As Gee argues that not all learners are built to learn a native language well; but not everyone is built to learn physics (p. 11). Hearing this and using the readings and personal experiences do the social, economic, and political statuses affect literacy? Shannon argues that traditionally teachers hold the purpose of implementing all students to read effectively, and Larson and Marsh believe that teachers need to clearly understand the literacy practices of the learner and his or her community. What does that tell us about how teachers should teach literacy with a diverse student population? What should be done by teachers to obtain some sort of standard with such a population?