Jacqueline Woodson:
Jacqueline Woodson was very inspiring. I really appreciated her enthusiasm for writing. Just listening to her made me want to write. That made me think about myself as a teacher, and how important it is to have enthusiasm. If I bring that enthusiasm to the classroom, I think it will rub off on my students. Enthusiasm changes the whole atmosphere in the room. I think that is powerful.
She made me think a lot about my teaching career, and how my actions will affect my students. I don’t want the “candle [to go] out” for my students. I want to help light that fire and encourage it to burn. I am going to take her advice about writing and incorporate it into my teaching. I’m going to try not to criticize students in their early stages of writing. I’m going to be careful to be sensitive to my students’ writing.
Jacqueline Woodson also made me think about my writing. I really liked her “Elbowesqe” ideas on writing. I think it is cool that she doesn’t know what the story is going to be about until she is about half way through her draft. She said something like, “I want to get my characters walking, talking, and doing stuff first.” That just really struck me. I never really think about my characters as alive. You can tell she really does. I think if I can do that, then my writing will sound a lot more authentic and alive. I really enjoyed listening to her. She made me want to read her books!
Introducing a Twenty First Century Curriculum:
I finally learned what a wiki was! Honestly, I did not know that anyone can write in Wikipedia. That’s kind of embarrassing. It made me realize that I really need to keep up on technology. My students could have been using Wikipedia, and I wouldn’t have known that it isn’t a reliable source.
The presenters talked about setting up a wiki for a class. This is an interesting idea. I still need to research a little more about wikis. I still don’t have a full understanding of them, but I want to learn more. They also talked about how we can use IM language, Wiki and Myspace codes, and e-mail language to help teach students Standard American English. This is a cool idea. I just wrote a paper about using AAE with AAE speakers to help them learn SAE. I never thought about using this technological language to do the same. That is a pretty cool idea. I think it would take a lot of research though.
They also talked about using Youtube in the classroom. We can teach kids a lot through Youtube. One thing they talked about was using Youtube to teach kids about biases, perspectives, voice, and motives for writing. I think kids could have fun with this. I liked this presentation. It had a lot of information packed in.
Acing the Interview:
“ ‘Everyone loves kids, did well in school, and would love to work for us. What makes YOU unique and someone we need to hire?’ ” This is a questions the presenters asked us to answer. I need to find a good answer to that question. I think if I can answer that question honestly then the rest should be fairly easy. I need to really figure out what I’m all about as a teacher. I’m in the process of discovering, but I still have a lot to learn.
The presenters talked about how we need to sell ourselves like a product. That is an interesting way of talking about interviewing. I think it is a good way to look at it, but I also think that this advice could hurt you. I think if you try too hard to sell yourself, then you may become less genuine, and I think that would do more harm than good. They did give us a lot to think about, but I feel like a lot of it was stuff that I’ve heard before, but it is always good for a refresher!
Final Thoughts:
I’m glad I went. I really enjoyed Jacqueline Woodson. She was definitely the highlight for me. I think this conference is a good learning opportunity.
One Sweet World 