How to get our students involved

The thing that students, from elementary to the university level, seem to dread more than any other teacher practice is the lecture. I'm sure you can all think of a teacher who used a lecture-only (or lecture primary) method for conveying information to their students, and I bet most of you can think of a time when you could barely keep your eyes  open, bored half to death,  and prayed for someone to put you out of your misery (figuratively, of course). Lecturing, and other teacher-led methods of instruction and discussion, allow for little to no interaction from students and allow for few to zero alternate opinions, other than the instructor’s. This type of education is overtly prescriptive, assuming the teacher is the key-holder to all the information to be learned, and is not something I want to implement (or at least, something I would like to avoid as much as possible) in my classroom. But many of the methods discussed in the third chapter of Teaching English by Design may be difficult to implement, require a great deal of front loading, and assume the preparedness of an entire class (which as any teacher I have met can attest to, is almost never the case).

                In the chapter, Smagorinsky offers up some excellent suggestions to alternates to teacher-led discussion. Among the multitude of ideas, my personal favorites were the anthology, the body biography, the book club, and the ranking activity. The anthology built around a central theme seemed to jump out to me as an idea that would reach the kids in the back of the class. What I mean by that, is that this type of activity seems to appeal to the students who seem disconnected or jaded to “typical” English education. This type of activity would allow students to apply and use the things that they enjoy (music, film clips, articles, etc.) to exemplify their learning and “present their experiences”. The body biography appeals to me as a teacher because I often struggle with coming up with meaningful ways to incorporate art into my curricula. This activity takes a myriad of concepts that appeal to a variety of learners and allow students to express their learning in many different ways, which “provides a richer” experience for the students while enhancing the work they present.

                The book club idea was something I thought could be adapted into an after-school activity in order to garner further interest from students who love reading, as well as allowing students who find the material they are reading in their schoolwork uninteresting a channel to read and discuss literature that they may have more interest in. This is an idea I will keep in my pocket and try to implement in whatever lovely school decides to hire me (shameless self-promotion). The last idea that Smagorinsky presented that caught my eye was the ranking activity. I feel as if this strategy is a great way for students to analyze their own thinking (metacognition) and what values and traits each student places importance on, and why that is.

                The issues that I have with many of these strategies (most of which I have not named from the chapter) is that they would require a great deal of front loading and an open-minded group of students willing to work with you (the teacher). Many of these strategies (such as Putting the author on trial, the fishbowl, etc.) and require that the class has come fully prepared to class for the exercise to work at all, which is almost never the case in a classroom. Several strategies also assume that all students in the activity are willing to participate or are even able to participate. My primary example is the talk show format idea, which requires students to perform in front of a class and a strong understanding of parodying (as well as the assumption that all students can understand parodies, due to LD’s). This would require a great deal of front loading and examples, which is not necessarily a problem, just more to do for the teacher.

                Overall, I found these strategies to be extremely useful when thinking about how to diversify teaching practices. It opened up my eyes to the possibilities in which we can present information to our students and how we may allow them to learn for themselves with us, the teacher, simply guiding them along and providing support and assessment (sure beats having to lecture all day).