I found an article called Teaching Middle and High School Students to Read and Write Well written by four ladies from the National Research Center on English & Learning Achievement (Judith A. Lange, Elizabeth Close, Janet Angelis, and Paula Preller). I've never heard of this particular institution before now, but they do have a respectable sounding name, an .edu address, and the production values on their PDF file are top notch. The article isn't specifically about teaching vocab but does have a lot of information relevant to the subject.
The authors of this document argue that for English instruction to be relevant has to be integrated with other activities and skills. For example, a teacher could have their students read an somewhat advanced novel and each week's vocabulary instruction around a chapter or section of the book. Another exampled offered is "living dictionaries"; having students collect unknown words they've encountered in newspapers or books and sharing them with the class. Teachers need to be able to connect sometimes mundane class material with the real world and should continue to reference information learned earlier in the year.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Monday, February 7, 2011
Guidelines
I thought the most important rules were related avoiding attacks on the blogger in question rather than his/her ideas, which can be really tempting when you can't see face to face the person you're attacking. Because most of the rules listed in the four links are sensible, I think it would be easier to just comment on the rules I DON'T agree with. So:
1. The Bangkok rule about only posting what you can verify is true goes way too far. A blog isn't supposed to be an endless litany of statistics; you shouldn't be getting your facts from blogs anyway. That being said, I agree with PC Worlds' Commandment: "Thou shall not confuse thy opinion with gospel truth". It's fine if a blogger offers their unconfirmed opinion on an issue, that's the whole point. But many people get ridiculously overconfident when they're arguing with others online.
2. I think "Thou shall not use aliases or sock puppets" doesn't work either. One of the best (and worst) things about the Internet is that people are much more willing to give their real opinions when they're anonymous; they don't have to worry about how their peers and bosses will react to their writing. For goodness' sakes, The Federalist Papers were anonymous and they turned out all right. Still, I wouldn't trust middle schoolers to post anonymously for obvious reasons
1. The Bangkok rule about only posting what you can verify is true goes way too far. A blog isn't supposed to be an endless litany of statistics; you shouldn't be getting your facts from blogs anyway. That being said, I agree with PC Worlds' Commandment: "Thou shall not confuse thy opinion with gospel truth". It's fine if a blogger offers their unconfirmed opinion on an issue, that's the whole point. But many people get ridiculously overconfident when they're arguing with others online.
2. I think "Thou shall not use aliases or sock puppets" doesn't work either. One of the best (and worst) things about the Internet is that people are much more willing to give their real opinions when they're anonymous; they don't have to worry about how their peers and bosses will react to their writing. For goodness' sakes, The Federalist Papers were anonymous and they turned out all right. Still, I wouldn't trust middle schoolers to post anonymously for obvious reasons
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)