Different Strokes for Different Folks

 

Good Reads list of multicultural books

One of the most exciting things about being an educator is the richness of diversity in today's classrooms. The days of conformity are gone and we routinely celebrate our differences. The document 'Here Comes Everyone' by The Alberta Teachers' Association provides a solid overview of what teachers need to know in order to create an inclusive classroom.  Here Comes Everyone 

Canada is now made up a wide variety of cultures and our reading programs must reflect that so that all students see themselves in the learning. Having a well stocked classroom library is a priority for me. I want all my students to be able to find books that reflect their culture and heritage in my classroom. I also want to provide reading opportunities where students can explore cultures other than their own and learn about world issues. 

 The Breadwinner  

Reading is Fundemental 2012-13 Multicultural Book Winners

Canadian Aboriginal Books  

First Nation Books 




Our classrooms also have students with exceptionalities as we now embrace integration instead of segregating those students to their own schools or even denying them access to an education completely. Despite any exceptionality, every student has the right to learn to the best of their ability. Utilizing technology and manipulatives for reading activities are strategies that can be beneficial for our students with exceptionalities as they may find traditional reading and pencil/paper activities to be challenging. 

Here in Canada, it is particularily important to be aware of the unique learning needs of our First Nation students. Their reverance for the oral tradition of story telling is sacred to their culture and can provide an abundance of rich reading opportunities for any class. Its also important to note that some First Nation students may have had limited access to schools so they may know more than they are able to communicate. I found these resources helpful. 

Reading for Pleasure Amongst Aboriginal Students
Integrating Aboriginal Teaching and Values into the Classroom
Learning Strategies for Aboriginal Students

Diverse classrooms and reading activities provide a wonderful opportunity to build upon our schemas and broaden our horizons. Teachers are the ultimate model for students. If we welcome diversity then our students are more likely to embrace it as well. 

 This clip called 'Reading Takes You Places'  is very inspiring to me. It's amazing to see a class come together and use reading to celebrate differences and teach each other about the various cultures within the school. I love the ideas put forth like a multicultural tea, making books for a 'service reading' project and creating art that reflects the books that have been read. Through the books we read, we can travel the world and connect to places and people  far away.  Books can also help us build connections to our peers sitting at the desk next to us too! Very inspiring indeed!

If You Build It, They Will Come

While there are aspects of my school days that I wish would have been different, there was one area where I consider myself to have been very lucky. I was in a classroom and school that spoke the same language that I did. Being a student is hard enough. There are so many subjects to juggle, figure out and make sense of. Certain subjects (like literacy) I found easier and other subjects I found more difficult (math... I just didn't enjoy it very much). Regardless of how easy or hard I found something, one thing I am so grateful for is that I didn't have the additional struggle of not knowing what was being said around me. 

I can only imagine the frustration and difficulty some English Language Learners face. I've always had the ability to speak up when I didn't understand a lesson and was able to share my ideas. Now as an educator, I have a responsibility to provide my students with ways to communicate their thoughts and to access the reading program that I create for them. They need practical strategies that will help them learn english and become readers as well. It's my job to seek out resources and strategies that will help me to help my ELL students reach their full potential. Between Teacher's College, my AQ's, my teacher friends, my classroom experiences and my own research, I have gained some helpful insight to how to help my ELLs.

Here are some best practice suggestions:  

- be mindful that ELL doesn't mean that a student was born in another country. It could be a student who has spent their whole life in Canada but comes from a home where english is not the first language
- get students talking, the more they participate orally, the more successful they will be
- label items around the classroom and school
- keep instruction simple, pause often
- teach essential first sentences (please repeat, My name is ...., May I go to the washroom)
- correct only once, even if there are multiple mistakes
- encourage the use of the students first language
- use dual language activities/visuals
- pair the students with peers who speak the same language
- use pictures 
- use their prior knowlegde
- avoid the use of expressions or of slang
- use graphic organizers 
- allow students to bring in objects from home

 The following resources have been very  helpful to me in building my knowledge about English Language Learners 

Many Roots
ESL - The Ontario Curriculum
Research Based Best Practices for ELL
Stages of Second Language Acquisition
Ontario - English Language Learners
10 Tips for Teaching ELL students



I also found this clip to be interesting as it contains many important ideas. While it was made in the US, it can be applied to our classrooms here in Canada.

Slugs and Snails and Puppy Dog Tails....

Boys and literacy is an issue I feel very passionately about. I not only take interest from an educator’s point of view, but as a mother as well. This issue is very personal for me as I have one child, a son. From the time he was very young, my son has loved books and reading. It’s a passion we share. One of our most favorite pastimes is to go to Indigo on a Saturday morning and spend a few hours browsing through the latest titles and picking out a few to bring home. I’m very fortunate that I have a boy who likes to read and has a positive relationship with reading. 

Not all parents are as lucky as I am. For some boys, it’s a real struggle to find any positivity in reading. For many, it’s a chore. It’s high time that boys find a place of comfort with reading and I am so over-the-top grateful and delighted to see that the world of education is standing up and doing something about meeting the needs of boys when it comes to reading. Boys do not always learn the same way as girls; boys often require more social interaction to help them process their ideas. They have different interests; boys tend to prefer non-fiction, action stories, books with humour and illustrations. Boys also respond to reading in a different way; they tend to not connect as emotionally with texts as girls do. All of this (and far more than I can fit into this post!) means that we need to meet boys at their level of need and stop expecting them to conform to how we think reading ‘should’ be. 

Books 4 Boys website

John Scieszka is a popular author in my home. His website Guys Read is something my son and I frequent fairly often. I appreciate the information he provides to me as an educator and my son appreciates the section ‘Let’s Get to the Books,’ which provides a fantastic list of boy friendly books. Listen to Scieszka talk briefly about boys and reading.

One of the things that thrills me the most (and worries me a little, but I will get to that later) is the use of graphic novels in our schools. As a teacher, I have seen how they have opened up a whole new world to boys who previously dreaded reading. I have seen my students run to the class library when they see there are new graphic novels on the shelf. They finally connect to reading through material that is relevant to them. As a mother, I love what graphic novels have done for my son. While he has always been a strong reader, the use of illustrations has made him appreciate books so much more. From the time my son was old enough to hold a crayon, drawing has been his greatest passion. From the very start, he has always wanted to be a cartoonist/author and animator. I literally have Rubbermaid bin upon bin filled with my son’s original graphic novels, drawings and stories and I watch him spend hours every week illustrating his beloved characters that he hopes to one day turn into a series. 

My son’s life changed when ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid’ came out. The two things he loved most, drawing and stories were now blended into one format. As much as my son has always enjoyed reading, graphic novels finally gave him a format where he feels ‘at home’ when it comes to literature and that truly speaks to him in a way that is relevant to his life and interests.  Thank you Jeff Kinney! You have rock star status in my house! See this cut out of the Wimpy Kid with my son? Indigo gave it to him as they know how much he loves the series.

There is one concern I do have about these new literacies in our classrooms. In my teaching practicums I have seen many boys who refuse to read any other genre other than graphic novels or magazines, etc. As much as I want boys to embrace these new genres, I don’t want them to solely focus on them and reject all other forms of literacy. I would be lying if I denied that I do worry that over time, these new literacies will mean the death of  traditional books and the classics in our classroom. To me, that would be just as bad as keeping things the way they have traditionally been and forcing boys to conform. Relying on one form of literacy too much and ignoring others is not good for anyone. There needs to be balance so our students become well rounded readers and can discuss more than just their first choice interest. 

Despite my concerns, I move happily forward and embrace these new literacies with gratitude and support. I have come across some wonderful graphic novels that will allow my students to access literature in a way that works for them. 

Hamlet - graphic novel

Hamlet in Manga
(A graphic novel of Hamlet! I am so excited to make use of this in my reading program one day!)

Tom Sawyer - Graphic Novel

Graphic novels for kids

PBS Best books for boys

Graphic novels

Graphic Novel Reporter

You Say Potato, I Say Potato

When I think back on my elementary school days, I can’t help but let that green monster called envy come to mind. I’m jealous of our students today. While they might be dealing with a more complex curriculum that includes new literacies and topics we didn’t have to deal with, there is one vital change that makes me quite jealous; differentiation. We now know that people learn in different ways and more importantly we respect those differences and work with them.

 

Looking back on my own school days, I remember having some wonderful teachers who were encouraging and supportive (and a few who were not, but that’s a whole other issue) however there was one thing that remained the same no matter what teacher I had. There was one lesson in front of the whole class, one way he or she was teaching it and you either got it or you didn’t. Granted, I did have some teachers who would take the time to explain it again if we didn’t get it, however it was explained exactly the same way it was the first time. My teachers didn’t have the awareness of or the push towards differentiation that we now have today. 

I’m a big fan of the theory of Multiple Intelligences. While Howard Gardner first put forth his theory of Multiple Intelligences in 1983 with his work ‘Frames of Mind,’ it didn’t catch on soon enough for me to  benefit from it in my school days. It’s really only in the last decade (and even less with some school boards) that we now see our classrooms reflect the idea that students naturally lean towards certain styles of learning and that what works for one student may not work for another.

Twenty years ago, reading was about breaking down sounds, learning them and then reading stories and answering questions to check comprehension. Oh, how many sheets of questions did I fill out! Year after year, there was worksheet after worksheet, with some class discussion thrown in along the way. I’m sure my teachers thought they were doing what was best at the time; however it unfortunately resulted in making the weaker readers feel inadequate as they struggled to keep up and boring the stronger ones. It was a time where ‘doing’ was the focus and there was plenty of busy work to achieve that. I was rarely asked to think about reading and never asked what strategy or approach worked for me. 

                                                                            

 

As a parent, I am grateful that my artsy son goes to school during a time where we value and respect the different personalities, interests and strengths of students and how they impact the way they learn. As a teacher, I am excited to be able to create an atmosphere that encompasses all of the Multiple Intelligences so my students can learn in a way that reflects their strengths instead of forcing them to conform to one style of teaching.

During my practicums, I embraced the use of technology, reader’s theatre, drama and role play, traditional essay writing, tableaux, class discussion, visuals and manipulatives and my student’s interests to create a dynamic reading program that reached every student in a way that worked for them. I will admit that it took a fair amount of observation and planning, however the rewards were well worth it.  I did my best to make reading connect with each of my students using the style and methods that made sense to them, instead of forcing the conformity that I experienced as student.