Monthly Archives: March 2015

Videos Now Available: Experts Speaking about Teacher Education

academics, Conferences, Teacher education, , ,

Last year I (Clare) received a grant for the project: Rethinking Literacy Teacher Education for the Digital Era: Teacher Educators, Literacy Educators, and Digital Technology Experts Working Together. One of the main activities of the project was to bring together 16 experts from three fields and 4 countries (Canada, US, UK, and Australia) to address the following questions.
• How is our understanding of literacy evolving in light of the new ways we communicate?
• How can literacy/English teacher educators (LTEs) prepare student teachers to develop and implement literacy programs that capitalize on digital technology (DT)?
• What teacher education curriculum changes are required to better prepare future teachers to integrate technology in their own teaching?
• What professional learning support do LTEs need to develop courses that will integrate and make greater use of DT?

We held a Symposium in London England in June. Click on the link https://literacyteaching.net/connection-grant/ for more info on the Symposium and for some photos.

At the Symposium we interviewed the participants which we video taped. These videos are now available. They are incredibly interesting, informative, and short. Teacher educators can use these in their courses/presentations. Click on  https://literacyteaching.net/IMG_2599 (the box to the right of this post). I want to bring your attention to the first video which is of Bethan Marshall from King’s College London. She addresses:

First video: A key insight she has had about education

Second video: Recommendation to improve teacher education

Enjoy!

Heather Has Two Mommies

critical literacy, literacy, Social Justice, Teacher education

Heather Has Two Mommies, Lesléa Newman’s trailblazing picture book is celebrating a 25-year milestone. Many years ago advice from an acquaintance motivated Newman to write the book. She explained, “an acquaintance, who happened to be a lesbian mom, had stopped me on the street and as we were talking she said, ‘There are no books that show a family like ours. You should write one.’ ” Newman recalled. “I decided to take it seriously. I knew how those kids felt. When I grew up in the 1950s there were no books about a Jewish girl eating matzoh ball soup with her bubbe on Shabbat. I definitely felt like an outsider. It struck a chord with me.” Publisher Candlewick is celebrating by publishing an all-new illustrated edition of the book. See the link below to read more about how the book was initially received and some of the controversy surrounding the picture book: http://www.publishersweekly.com

Heather

Henry Giroux Named 1st Paulo Freire Chair at McMaster University

academics, critical literacy, education, Social Justice, university, , ,

mcmaster

Henry Giroux was recently named the first Paulo Freire Chair in Critical Pedagogy at McMaster University. The McMaster Institute for Innovation and Excellence in Teaching and Learning established the chair position to honour scholars who have made a significant advancements in studies of education.

The McMaster website describes Giroux’s work:

Giroux has been a celebrated scholar, author and cultural critic for more than three decades. He currently holds the McMaster University Chair for Scholarship in the Public Interest, and is a professor in the Department of English and Cultural Studies.

His life’s work has been central to the development of critical pedagogy as a field — exploring intersections between the role of education in schools and universities, the role of educators and academics as public intellectuals, as well as topics related to public pedagogy and the educational force of the wider culture.

(http://dailynews.mcmaster.ca/article/henry-giroux-named-paulo-freire-chair-in-critical-pedagogy/#sthash.Qen0HP02.dpuf)

Giroux speaks about his recent appointment. He answers questions such as:

  • What does critical pedagogy have to say about education?
  • Why is critical pedagogy significant to the important work of teaching and learning centres?

Watch the video here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUAGZEMl9rg

The strikes in Toronto continue: Common struggles across university employees

graduate students, university,

Last week Clare wrote about the strikes happening in 2 Toronto based Universities.

The Next Generation of Academics: An Uncertain Future

Teaching Assistants and Course Instructors are still on strike.  The issues are complex and go beyond pay increase.  Pay amount, pay structure, working conditions and job security are pieces of the intolerable job structure. The situation of poor, unstable working conditions for graduate students and non-tenured faculty continues to be a continent-wide misfortune.  I recently read an article about the experiences of an adjunct-professor in Washington, DC.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/03/06/i-was-a-professor-at-four-universities-i-still-couldnt-make-ends-meet/

The author writes about her experience:

There were things about the work I loved. One student wrote an excellent research paper on creative arts therapy as a healing tool for depression sufferers; the paper landed her a fellowship working with cancer patients. When I saw students nodding their heads during lessons on essay structure or avoiding wordiness, I felt reenergized. In fact, engaging students was a challenge I loved. The working conditions were what drained me completely.

There are similar stories here in Toronto and across Ontario. The stories are grim and unfortunate. I (yiola) look forward to posts where I can write about changes to the status of non-tenured faculty, teaching assistants and the ever so needed university staff members.

 

‘Shadiowing’ through Critical Reflection

academics, critical literacy, education, Events, journals, literacy, Reflections, Social Justice, teaching, university, , , , , , ,

I (Cathy) am currently working my way through a book on critical reflection.  ‘Working’ is the operative word, as this book, What Our Stories Teach Us, is set up as a guide to take us ( the teacher, professor, etc.) through an active critical analysis of our lives as educators using storying and  critical incidence.  The author, Linda Shadiow, loves to share stories herself.  Below is one of her favourites.  Apparently she has told it often and she uses it in her  book to illustrate how our stories can impact our lives.

A graduate student is attending a lecture being given by one of her intellectual heroes, the Brazilian educator and theorist Paulo Freire. She takes notes furiously, trying to capture as many of his words as possible. Seeing that she is keenly interested in what Freire had to say, his translator asks if she would like to meet him. Of course! She is introduced and he begins by inquiring about her work. Then he graciously agrees to respond to a set of questions she and her colleagues hoped they would get the chance to ask him. She is impressed beyond belief, but time prevents her from asking one last, difficult question. They meet accidentally once more at the event and he wonders if she asked all her questions? No, there is one more. “Given your work, we want to know ‘where is the hope’?” Without hesitating he moves toward her, takes her face in his hands, looks into her eyes, and replies, “You tell them, ‘you are the hope, because theory needs to be reinvented, not replicated … it is a guide. We make history as we move through it and that is the hope.”

(Taken from  http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/teaching-professor-blog/reflections-on-teaching-learning-from-our-stories/ )

The graduate student is, of course, Shadiow.  She explains in her book that her experience with Freire never left her.  It energized and motivated her.  She had to “give back “.  She invites us as both reader and participant to rediscover our incidences of profound learning and let them move us.

shadoiw_

Features of a “Good” Blog

literacy, , , , ,

I (Clare) was doing some reading about blogs. I believe that blogging is a different genre of writing. A blog of 200 words with a graphic and a hyperlink requires a different skill set than writing a 2,000 word essay. As blogs become more commonplace there is a growing number of resources on writing effective blogs. For example on the site How To Make My Blog http://howtomakemyblog.com/10-elements-of-style-of-blog-post-writing/ 10 characteristics of effective blogs are identified:

* work from a suitable design;
* use paragraphs;
* revise and rewrite;
* omit needless words;
* use definite specific concrete language;
* be clear;
* use orthodox spelling;
* avoid fancy words;
* and do not take shortcuts at the cost of clarity.

This list reveals that blogging requires particular literacy skills. For me, one of the key features of blogging is that it encourages writers to think carefully about their audience. What do they want to express and why is it important to them? This level of introspection requires reflection and careful writing. Since readers may be from anywhere in the world our writing extends far beyond the classroom teacher or fellow students. This makes blogging far more authentic and powerful than the traditional essay read only by the teacher.

Lessons from Educational Research in 2014

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AERA 2015 is just around the corner! Each year the American Educational Research Association publishes a list of its 10 most-read articles. NPR’s educational blog reviewed these articles and summarized what the 5 major lessons from educational research were in 2014. Below are the 5 major lessons plus excerpts from NPR’s findings.

aera2014

1. What’s The Best Way To Teach Math To Struggling First-Graders? The Old-Fashioned Way

In “Which Instructional Practices Most Help First-Grade Students With and Without Mathematics Difficulties?” the researchers found that plain, old-fashioned practice and drills — directed by the teacher — were far more effective than “creative” methods such as music, math toys and student-directed learning

2. The Effectiveness Of Alignment

When a teacher’s curriculum is perfectly aligned with a set of standards, meaning they’re teaching exactly what they’re told to, will students’ test scores rise? That’s the question a group of researchers set out to answer in “Instructional Alignment as a Measure of Teaching Quality.”… The results did not show a meaningful relationship between the two. Meaning, perfectly aligned curriculum is no more likely to be associated with gains in tests scores than perfectly unaligned curriculum.

3./4.On The Higher-Ed Front

Two of the most-read education research articles of 2014 were focused on different aspects of community college… It’s no surprise that the researchers found that those with associate degrees and long-term certificates were more likely to be employed and had higher earnings compared with a group that attended community college but didn’t obtain a credential. We know that the more education you obtain, the better off you’ll be… Community college students hoping to increase their earnings further likely require a bachelor’s degree. But the path from community college to a four-year school is filled with “choke points.”

5. What SEL-Based Curriculum May And May Not Be Able To Do

 When teachers spend time focusing and emphasizing social-emotional learning, or SEL, some may worry it may be at the expense of time spent on other subjects and that students’ performance in those subjects may suffer. The findings from “Efficacy of the Responsive Classroom Approach: Results from a 3-Year, Longitudinal Randomized Controlled Trial,” which looked at 276 classrooms in 24 schools, suggest otherwise… a subset of students with teachers using the curriculum exactly the way researchers designed it saw substantial gains in math and reading. This could be evidence that a curriculum approach based on SEL can have high returns, but only when teachers are trained extensively. Or, it could just be that teachers who are well-trained and follow directions are better teachers.

To read NPR’s entire summary, click here:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/ed/2015/02/26/387471969/5-lessons-education-research-taught-us-in-2014

How educators understand poverty: One teacher’s perspective

classroom teachers, education, schooling, Social Justice, Teacher education, teaching

More and more,  poverty awareness is coming up in my teacher education classes. Perhaps this is because I (Yiola) am gaining more confidence about how to frame, discuss, and process the issues associated with teaching poverty awareness.  Or perhaps it is because students are seeing issues of poverty play out in their placements and are comfortable to raise questions in our class.  Whatever the cause for the awareness I am glad this discourse has made its way into my classes.

Ultimately the questions lead to, what can teachers do? I teach two levels of teacher education courses this year: I teach at the Masters level and I am also teaching a first year undergraduate teacher education course.  I can safely say that most student teachers care about poverty awareness and I can also safely say most student teachers do not know what to do about it.

Then a student in my Masters level course shared this link with us:

The video is of one teacher beautifully expressing the trials and tribulations of one student in her class. It is a very sad story. It is depressing. But it is much more than that. The narrative presents a perspecitve that all teachers must have; an understanding that poverty makes life hard… BUT… this is not the fault of the child. The teacher’s acknowledgement that her student is smart and capable and kind is central to this discourse. Many scholars acknowledge that teachers must hold affirming views of their students. And, I sense that most students teachers shrug this concept off as “yah yah, of course. That is obvious. Of course I will like all my students.”  but to move beyond the circumstances and consequences of poverty to see that a child who is experiencing that plight IS capable, smart and kind is not so obvious.
When we viewed the video in class many of us were near tears.  I questioned whether this was a good thing or not. It is important to raise awareness but such awareness cannot  just hang out there in agony and leave students feeling despair. Awareness must move beyond understanding to the “what can I do? As a teacher what am I going to do?”.  Here the video stops short but our discussions continued.  Student teachers began to blend theory with their placement practice to try to make sense of how they could possible make “carrying the one” manageable so students living in poverty can make gains in their learning and their lives.  This is no easy feat. We set out some steps for our work as teachers: The first step is teacher awareness, the next step is having students know they are cared for and believed in, and the step after that to critically assess our own practices so our methods are accessible, manageable, and achievable so students feel success.  Each of these steps require intense reflection, listening, thinking, studying and experience.  I haven’t touched on levels of community or institutional activism and that is with intention. In my experience, student teachers need to understand that work for themselves first.
To have student teachers think and teach in these ways is activism.  Some student teachers are there in their understanding and are leaders… most are not. My goal is to support student teachers’ learning and further their understandings of the social determinants of educational success so they have the knowledge and skills to deal with issues in their classroom.
The video I share above is powerful. There are thoughtful, powerful descriptions in her narrative about her student(s), their families, and schooling that help illustrate just what it means to be a student living in poverty.

The Next Generation of Academics: An Uncertain Future

academics, graduate students, university, , , , , , , ,

The Teaching Assistants in Toronto’s two largest universities are on strike. The issue is not simply one of money. I (Clare) read with interest an article about the strike in the Globe and Mail today. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/for-10000-of-canadas-young-academics-on-the-picket-lines-theres-a-lot-more-at-stake-than-42-an-hour/article23346532/

One of their major concerns is future employment. The article by Simona Chiose provides some startling statistics re: supply and demand. In 2012 there were 6,393 PhD graduates yet between 2008-2011 there were only 3,030 new full-time faculty positions. Graduates are being hired to limited term or part-time positions, not full-time tenure stream positions. And those of us in universities know that more and more courses are being taught by part-time faculty and that trying to survive on a salary of course stipends (which tend to be abysmally low) is nearly impossible. The Teaching Assistants with whom I have worked over the years have been hard-working, smart, keen, and committed yet their future is dim. The life of a grad student is hard. Let’s try to make their future more secure.