Day 116-117 The Praxis of Pedagogy

Thursday was the first day that I used the TCI stuff that I had photocopied. It worked out rather well. The students like group work and I got a lot of positive feedback from them. I've taken to choosing students to stamp and collect homework. They like to feel like they are a part of the class and doing something. In particular, I've started off choosing students that got "problems." The ones that have started to expect failure in school. They are the ones that feel the least included in classroom. Getting them to participate and "buy in" to the class experience is very important to the overall attitude and general mood of the class. The dynamics of classrooms are absolutely fascinating to me. There are some students that head to the back of the classroom as soon as they get there. I know who these students are. Then everyday I tell them the same thing, "Move forward. "Just to fuck with their heads, next week, I'm going to take my rollable whiteboard and move it to the back of the classroom and have everyone turn their desks around. Then they will be in the front of the classroom. I'll later tell them it was a sociological experiment. To be able to upset their routine, their habits, their dead behaviors by changing where they are in relation to the class and teacher. Now if the students were smarter they would start to sit not in the back, but 1 up from it. Shit I've even told some of the students that, But they keep sitting in the back.

So in first period, I read "Disposable People" with them doing thumbs up/thumbs down when I asked yes or no questions. To do the activity, I broke them up into pairs and had them move all the desks except 7 desks to the back of the class. Next time I will clearly delineate what is in play in the class and move all of the desks to the back of the class. Then I handed out instructions that were different for one pair. The pairs then went to their task. So then the one group with the different instructions then went to claiming desks in the name of their country and flag that they had made previously. Other groups were making maps. Then groups started to get into it when they saw 1 group already starting. Then there was a relative frenzy for trying to claim objects in the class. Kids were claiming everything. Next time I'll limit it to desks. After this exercise I had them put desks back. I had told them they were going to rearrange furniture but didn't let them. Next time I'll let them. Then, I put an overhead up that had a bunch of discussion questions. Finally, I keyed them into the fact that the exercise was essentially how the European colonists broke up Africa. Some groups got started before the rest and ended up with more stuff. Then, I tied in the idea of social darwinism, though I didn't go into that as much as I should have. Their feelings of control were the same ones that the imperialists felt. We all have it in us.

In 2nd period, I started off presenting a powerpoint presentation that AL had made up for background info on Nigeria. Great powerpoint that she made. Really well done. Then we started reading "Things Fall Apart." I am very interested in seeing how AL's lesson planning turns out with this class, cause I'm using all her shit. I'm not an English teacher and I'm teaching an English class. So I'm pulling from the English teacher. After reading the 1st chapter and a bit of the 2nd, I stopped and had students make bookmarks. They folded paper into 3rds and they wrote columns for title, characters, setting, quotes, and human issues and conflict. The last column they continued quotes but I'm going to change it to add on more place for characters.

In 3rd period, we just read "Things Fall Apart" and made bookmarks to start. I didn't do the powerpoint and I'm interested in comparing the two classes and how well one does compared to the other. It won't be a fair comparison since one class only reads once a week. For the activity, I gave student directions and told them they were on a deserted island and had to build a community. They had to come up with a rulebook and everyone had to sign and approve the book. While they followed the directions I sat back and took notes. It was very interesting to see latent tendencies in students. A group of students have taken control of the classroom and are the "power centers" of the classroom. As such, they did all the deciding for the class. It was "Does everyone agree to that? Ok good?" My little oligarchs. People expressed the desire for violent punishment for violators of law. My little flies. Next time I'm going to teach "Lord of the Flies" to World Cultures I instead of "Things Fall Apart." It was funny cause students signed a paper approving the rulebook without ever looking at it. And my greatest lil autocrat called out rules after the book had been signed. He assigned jobs to people without their input. It was great. My budding Mobuto. Then I put up discussion questions on the overhead and I spoke about some of the things that I observed. I like observing classrooms. I learn a lot about students.

All in all the TCI shit was great. Very fucking helpful. Imagine that. Premade simulations to make my life easier. It doesn't allow me to sit around and do nothing. But now I have a foundation with which to work from.

On Friday, every class did the same thing. A student stamped and collected homework. Then the metacognition quiz and binder check. After the quiz, I taught the I-messages lesson to them. This went very well. I started off by having students come up with words that have similar roots as communication. Then I talked about linguistic roots of communication and stressed the idea of communication as being the foundation of community. This led into the exercise. You can't talk "social" studies without people being able to communicate effectively. I don't believe that social studies should be just an academic subject taught. I believe that it is the study of humanity so that we can address our own. We can gather examples of how to live our lives and often how not to live our lives.

So then I get home, have dinner with AL, and fall asleep at 7pm on a Friday night. Then I get up at 5:00 in the morning. Awesome!!! I'm so fucking exciting!