In  reviewing my previous blogs, I found three areas of repeated discussion. (As well as typos and thoughts/comments that could have been expanded on).

In three blogs I mentioned how I incorporated a method, learned from our readings, to strenghten my ability as a reader.  Even though I love reading, and consider myself an intermmediate reader, there has been many instances where I didn’t fully understand the meaning of certain passages or poems. I thought it was just me, and not something that is a common occurrence with students.  I’ve learned how I can expand my narrow, mostly literal, tunnel of thinking.  It started with accepting the difficulty and working through it instead of avoiding it.  The second step was to use annotations on the second read- through.  The third step was to make connections to either the “sketches,” other texts, or my cultural knowledge. I may have been already doing a bit of that on a superficial level, but now that I’m more aware, and therefore more focused, my reading process has been “fine tuned.”

I’ve also flipped-flopped between the roles of teacher and parent.  As a future teacher, I can envision my classroom environment as being more collaborative, and I know how I want to guide the students learning (to a degree), but as a parent I only have limited control over how my children, especially my son, is taught.  So, I put this out there, in part, because of my worry and because I thought that one teacher might have the ability/desire/courage to guide another teacher that either struggles or is uncomfortable with the labeled students. But I don’t know how realistic this possibilty is. (I did appreciate Ginny’s honesty in her one blog where she described that ADHD filled environment she taught in).

The last area covers attempts to discuss critical analysis/theory/concepts that are foreign to me.  Combined with the fact that I’m not currently teaching leaves me feeling that either my blogs are rather shallow compared to others or that I’m asking questions out loud because I don’t really have a feeling one way or the other yet. Much of our topics  has been new to me and that’s when I have to remind myself that this is the reason for my being here.      

I have received a few valuable comments that have provided professional insight or food for thought; thank you.

     Susan