Reflection November 23, 2009

Throughout the semester, I think that my questions and thinking seemed to be centered on students’ and teachers’ positions and identities relative to literacy. It was hard for me not to address the issues relative to positions and identity maybe because these issues are my current areas of interest. Woodside-Jiron’s article in particular enlightened me by addressing how policy documents used language in order to reinforce the ideas centered around neoconservatism and neoliberalism in relative to Language Arts (or maybe general) curriculum. Her work initially helped me think about how students and teachers are positioned in the policy documents and NRP.  I continued considering these issues in relative to each issue that each group addressed – using hip-hop music for literacy class (popular culture), multimodality, critical literacy , and bilingual education. Throughout these issues, I found that broadening our views of literacy and encompassing the unaddressed areas of literacy in the current curriculum can contribute to positioning students and teachers as more active beings who have agency and power over handling literacies in creative, flexible, and strategic ways.

In terms of the ways in which I draw on issues and trends, it was somewhat challenging for me to think about issues and trends based on the readings. I found that there was a gap between what I can understand (or imagine) relative to issues and trends in language arts by reading articles and what actually happens in the field of schools. At times I felt that the gap was a great barrier that made me feel distance from the issues discussed in the articles and sometimes prevented me from giving my opinions on those issues. Whenever I felt so, I tried to think about the issues relative to my Korean school teaching or some relevant issues in Korea, or other articles that I have read. Probably in that reason, I just saw one side of RTI program without thinking critically about this program.

Not to mention our readings (esp. the first article – Woodside-Jiron’s), our classroom discussions also encouraged me to thinking more critically about educational issues in relative to literacy, news articles, and even other books. Not only our classmates’ sharing of their experiences with students in the field, but also their ways of looking at the issues inspired me to approach the issues differently from what I used to do.

Probably in this reason, I tended to start my postings with summary of each article. I tried to summarize each article first in order to make sure what I have understood and what I have noticed. Summarizing article helped me organize the points from the article that spoke to me and my thoughts about the article. It also helped me become clear about what I was wondering or questioning. In the meantime, I was wondering how my posting would have been different if I made postings after our discussion.  Our oral discussions always helped me a lot to understand issues addressed in the articles better because I could learn from our classmates who have different perspectives and rich experiences in school.

Learning to teach and teaching to learn November 12, 2009

Morrell’s study on critical research seminar involving students, teachers, and university researchers highlights the significance of using critical literacy approach in professional teacher education program. The focus of Morrell’s study is on the teachers who are participating in this seminar and the ways in which they were participated in the “community of practice” of critical inquiry. Collaborative and critical inquiry based on their own teaching could allow teachers to position themselves not only as self-regulated professionals but also as ones who pursue social actions through teaching.

In order to describe teachers’ experience in the seminar, Morrell employed the concept of “peripheral participation.” According to this concept, learning as situated activity takes place as practitioners acquire knowledge and skills for participating in the community. In addition, their identities are shaped through their participation. In the critical research seminar, participant teachers are new to critical literacy. Thus, they participate in the seminar as peripheral participants by acquiring knowledge and skills for critical literacy practices. Morrell highlighted four features of teachers’ peripheral participation: 1) teachers’ teaching episodes were important artifact through which they reflect their teaching; 2) teachers collaboratively planned and debriefed sessions in order to modify their teaching while avoiding problematic teaching practices; 3) teachers could have opportunities to watch professional practices, which led conversations “about styles, approaches, and philosophies that are often absent from the culture of teaching (p. 95); and 4) teachers also had extensive opportunity to consider philosophical ideas about teaching by making a connection to their own teaching practice and situation. Morell indicated that peripheral participation allowed teachers to take risk to share their teaching moments and their opinions while they are taking a position as learners. In addition, teachers could also gain agency over teaching practices and shape identities as professionals who are collaborative and flexible to reflect and modify their teaching, yet also have power to avoid what it not right for thier students and to pursue social justice.

One thing that I thought interesting was from one of the teacher fellows, Ramon’s comments. He mentioned that there is no inappropriate topic to talk about with students. I agree with him in that any topic generated from students can be a important moment to lead meaningful discussions with students. In that way, I think that their learning come from their own experiences. Then, how can we strategically and systematically approach students’ wonderings and noticings from their life experiences? How can teachers also prepare to organize the discussions?

In the similar vein, I became also wondering how critical literacy approach can be employed in preservice teacher education program. Even though preservice teachers’ teaching experiences are somewhat constrained by their internship program, they do have teaching experiences not only from their teaching placements, but also from observations of their cooperating teachers’ teaching practices. I wonder in what ways critical literacy practices can be employed in teaching methods class.

Bilingual education and equity in education November 5, 2009

This article led me to think about so many things related to bilingual education, policy, and assessment. According to Palmer and Lynch, bilingual children and their teachers are challenged by the standardized testing and curriculum that stress bilingual children’s acquisition of English and mono-lingual environment. Their struggles and challenges come from the constraints and control from the standardized testing: Teachers could not employ alternative instructions to support bilingual children better; teachers made decision to change instructional language due to transition policy rather than as a pedagogical decision. In fact, it is frustrating to imagine that teachers have to make a decision for students not because of their pedagogical or philosophical intent, but by force.

 I really wonder how transition works. In my mind, I do not understand the basic assumption of transitioning that the policy has. It seems to me that this transition policy does not reflect dynamic changes of the world. As Palmer and Lynch indicate, children who come to US after certain grade level cannot get a primary language support. In addition, even if children could get an institutionalized primary language support, not every child could achieve the same level of language competence at the same time.

 This article led me to think about “aims of education” in terms of purpose of curriculum, purpose of testing, and purpose of policy, and purpose of language choice at school (Noddings, 2003). According to Noddings, our pedagogical choices, purpose of instruction, and what needs to be addressed are depending on our aims for education. She indicates that the aims of education in our current society are focused on equity – more specifically economic equity in children’s future. From this perspective, it seems that acquiring English is important for bilingual children to achieve such equity. In other words, English seems a tool that bilingual children need to gain an access to mainstream values that is recognized and emphasized in school. 

However, it is questionable that such economic equity can be achieved by children’s master of English and assimilation with mainstream culture (Noddings, 2003). It seems that under the name of equity, not only bilingual children but also other children who are underrepresented in society are getting lost of their agency over their knowledge from their experiences, language, and culture. In addition, while struggling with system (e.g. testing), it seems that they lose opportunities to think about they who they are, who they could become, and who they want to be(come).

If we think about why it is important for bilingual children to acquire English and/or to improve both languages, we might be able to consider how we can support these children. Then, it might not be important when they need to transit from their first language to English or whether they need to take test in English or in their first language.  If they really need to learn and acquire English or mainstream language due to either social expectation, I guess that children need more scaffolding to make sense of themselves and make sense of their world that they are experiencing in both languages. At the end of this article, the authors call for policy for bilingual and biliteracy education. I agree with their idea that bilingual/biliteracy policyat least may open an opportunity to revive meaningful and constructive discussions on language policy and education.