Literacy Moves On Ch. 5-10

I thought that the Beanie Baby activity was really interesting. Normally you don't think about how kids are affected by marketing, but they are on a daily basis, and this activity brings that to light. I like how in the next chapter, the students have to critically evaluate their own neighborhoods. Most of the time you don't think about the things that go on around your house. But when you actually take the time to notice, you will find some things that you never thought about before.

In the chapter about Heroes and Villains, I found it really interesting to see the different ways boys and girls viewed castles, and how the colored them, and drew what was inside them. I also think that doing a project like this would be fun for the kids, since it is relevant to their interests (most likely).

Literacy Moves On Ch. 1-5

In Chapter 1, the author talks about multimodal texts, and the importance of using images that represent words. I think that this idea is especially important for younger kids, because pictures can be a big help to those students who aren't sure what they are reading about yet. They can look at a picture of an elephant, and know that the funny-looking word that they can't read, must actually be the word elephant.
I thought that it was interesting how in chapter 2, children were introduced to making videos. I think that this concept is a little advanced for young kids, like the ones who the author mentions. In the 1st grade classroom I am placed in, I cannot see any of them actually figuring out how to create a film, and staying on task long enough to get something out of it. So, I don't think that creating videos/films is best for younger students.


The rest of the chapters mostly focus on how students create their own literacy, through games and movies, books and music. I think that this is really neat, and it shows how varied students' experiences can be.

MGRP Reflection

I thought that the MGRP paper was interesting, because I did find out things that I wasn't aware of before. However, I hate research papers, so that part wasn't exactly fun for me. However, it was fun to come up with the genre pieces. All in all, I did learn something new, but I think that I would have enjoyed it more if I had worked with a partner on all the research and the actual writing of the paper.

Seedfolks, and MGRP Ch. 5 & 7

I really liked the book "Seedfolks". It was a really easy read, but I think that the different stories were all really interesting, and I liked how they all meshed together. I think that the meaning behind "Seedfolks" is very important, and something that needs to be taken into consideration each and every day. My chapter was on Florence. I really liked her view on things. She wasn't able to plant seeds in the garden herself, but in a way, she was the most important character in the story. She watched that lot change from a trash dump that was ugly and smelled bad, into a green garden where people learned to accept other people, even if they were different from themselves.

In chapter 5 of Allen,  I love learning about the different ways we can help to get the students engaged with the characters they are reading about. I think that a lot of times, students will read about a character, but if they don't relate to the character, they are not getting as much out of the story as they might get otherwise.

Chapter 7: I think that incorporating art into their papers is a great idea. I know that when I was younger, I would have LOVED the chance to do a picture that went along with my paper. I think that by allowing the students to do art that is related to their paper, they will have fun, and will also get more out of doing the paper, because sometimes doing art can help you understand what you wrote better.

Chapter 4, and Invitations

I have never really been a huge fan of poetry. However, I love the different examples of ways you could introduce poems, and I think that poetry is something that children do enjoy, at least for a little while. I think that as soon as you put requirements on poetry, it becomes something that children, or just students in general do not enjoy. For example, I hated being given a prompt, and knowing that I had to write a 10 line poem about trees. But, for our "Where I am From" poems yesterday, we were really able to write about whatever we wanted, and it could be as short or as long as we wanted, and that made it so that it wasn't so mundane and stressful. I think that this is something to keep in mind when introducing poetry to our students, and we should not put guidelines on them, at least in the beginning.

With Invitations, I think that they are great ways to learn. One thing that I liked about them was, according to the chapter, "Invitations are also opportunities for students to delve deeper into issues in their live or engage in comparative discussions about their experiences and relationships." I think that this is really important, because the more connection between the classroom and home, the better.

Crafting Writers Ch. 10,11, &12

I like the idea of focusing on strengths at the beginning of a conference, and then kind of "easing" into the things that could be improved. Doing so will make students confident in what they are good at, and will also make them want to get praise for the things that they still need work on, so they will work to make it better, to get that encouragement. 

In chapter 11, I think that having group conferences is a good idea. It would save time, as well as giving students the opportunity to collaborate with their peers, and figure out how to make themselves better writers.  On the other hand, by doing group conferences, you lose that one-on-one time, which can be very valuable. So, group conferences can be useful, but more than likely, students will benefit more from one-on-one conferences.

In chapter 12, rubrics are mentioned. I think that rubrics are very useful tools, and they help students know what to include in their writing to meet all expectations, instead of just writing, and hoping that they are fulfilling the teachers wants. However,  I feel like rubrics can also be stressful on students, in some cases. Students might feel like there is something on the rubric that they don't know how to cover, and it might affect their writing, if they are worried about meeting everything on the rubric.

Crafting Writers Chapters 7,8,9

In Chapter 7, I really like the idea that in order to get something right, you need to practice and experience it, by using "Try-its". I know that a lot of times when I am helping a student, I am tempted to just tell them the correct way of doing whatever it is that they are struggling with, but by trying it themselves, they are able to better understand where they were messing up, and learn from their mistakes.

In Chapter 8, I love the idea of focusing on strengths, instead of pointing out weaknesses. But, if you are always pointing out strengths, where does the pointing out weaknesses come into play? Because those weaknesses do need pointed out, at least at some point, or the student will never fix those problem areas.

And, in Chapter 9, I  definitely think that there are some really helpful ideas to help get kids to understand the things they might be struggling on.