So one of my biggest challenges in switching from my home of four years, San Lorenzo High School, to my new home, Redwood High School, is that I will now be in charge of planning my own curriculum. I used to do that, but when I moved to SLz, everything was planned collaboratively. It taught me a lot about scaffolding and structure, and I am SO thankful that I learned so much while I worked there.
But Redwood isn't just asking me to plan my own curriculum - they want me to plan curriculum for three different upper-division electives (for 11th-12th graders) at a college level. Seriously. Last night, I brought some of the texts I'm using over to my church home group, and everyone said something like, "That's for high school students? I didn't read that until nearly the end of college!"
One of the biggest challenges is a class called Essay and Exposition. It's not quite an AP class, but it's still the "best and brightest" in the school who sign up.
That being said, I was reading a fantastic article by Mike Fisher, called Snapshot of a Modern Learner. If you haven't read it, you should.
The basic premise of the essay is that the modern learner approaches learning differently than school offers it.
That got me thinking...what if I had students read the article and then write a portrait of themselves as a learner in the style of Fisher's essay?
It serves myriad purposes:
It also ties in nicely with my White Blank Page project and the goals of a flipped class. I think part of why I'm freaking out about this year is because I want to have something planned out fully and I don't. But I also know that personalisation is a major factor in my flipped class, and without knowing the students, I don't know what they need. Those two competing forces have made my head a really unpleasant place the last few weeks (and I'm sorry to my friends who've had to hear verbalise the neurotic personality inside my head).
In fact, Crystal Kirch, Karl Lindgren-Streicher and I were talking about planning for the year last night on Twitter.
But Redwood isn't just asking me to plan my own curriculum - they want me to plan curriculum for three different upper-division electives (for 11th-12th graders) at a college level. Seriously. Last night, I brought some of the texts I'm using over to my church home group, and everyone said something like, "That's for high school students? I didn't read that until nearly the end of college!"
One of the biggest challenges is a class called Essay and Exposition. It's not quite an AP class, but it's still the "best and brightest" in the school who sign up.
That being said, I was reading a fantastic article by Mike Fisher, called Snapshot of a Modern Learner. If you haven't read it, you should.
The basic premise of the essay is that the modern learner approaches learning differently than school offers it.
That got me thinking...what if I had students read the article and then write a portrait of themselves as a learner in the style of Fisher's essay?
It serves myriad purposes:
- working on style imitation, which is a goal of the class
- it tells me about them and their own learning context
- it leads into the unit on definition essays
It also ties in nicely with my White Blank Page project and the goals of a flipped class. I think part of why I'm freaking out about this year is because I want to have something planned out fully and I don't. But I also know that personalisation is a major factor in my flipped class, and without knowing the students, I don't know what they need. Those two competing forces have made my head a really unpleasant place the last few weeks (and I'm sorry to my friends who've had to hear verbalise the neurotic personality inside my head).
In fact, Crystal Kirch, Karl Lindgren-Streicher and I were talking about planning for the year last night on Twitter.
@guster4lovers @kls4711 @thomasson_engl lol. I want to get a big piece of poster paper and take over my kitchen table to map it all out. :)
— Crystal Kirch (@crystalkirch) July 7, 2012
Planning for a flipped class is really, really hard. And even more so in English. I mean, I can prepare content (see: Thomasson and Morris Instruction), but I can't prepare for what they know and what they will need to know. That is only compounded by the fact that I have a very vague sense of Redwood's school culture and student makeup.
******
I'm not sure how this post descended into my own insecurities. It probably has to do with the fact that, as a learner, I always feel like I should know more than I do. I always feel like I am so far behind everyone else that I'll never catch up. There are reasons for that (none are relevant for the purposes of this post), but it certainly impacts how I teach.
I think I need to write my own "Snapshot of a Modern Learner" essay first.
******
I'm not sure how this post descended into my own insecurities. It probably has to do with the fact that, as a learner, I always feel like I should know more than I do. I always feel like I am so far behind everyone else that I'll never catch up. There are reasons for that (none are relevant for the purposes of this post), but it certainly impacts how I teach.
I think I need to write my own "Snapshot of a Modern Learner" essay first.
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