Like I had previously mentioned, I am reading the book titled Multiple Voices, Multiple Texts: Reading in the Secondary Content Areas. To draw the reader in, the book starts with a very descriptive story about children in a classroom—about literacy. “This book is based on the transactional model of learning and presents a classroom model that integrates reading, writing, listening, and speaking within a whole language framework” (Dornah, Matz Rosen, and Wilson 3). I really like the fact that this book will not only be about reading, it will also be about other aspects that effect reading skills.
Reading is a very important part of our everyday lives, “This book argues that literacy must be redefined to underscore the relationship between literacy and action, between knowing how to read and write and using these skills to change the world or at least a corner of it” (Dornah, Matz Rosen, and Wilson 4). By reading “Two Student Readers” in Mosaic of Thought, we were able to see that there is a big difference between knowing how to read and write and actually using these skills. Schools widely use Hooked on Phonics to teach students how to read, not really taking into account that sounding out words does not necessarily mean that someone “knows” how to read, it just mean that they are able to read. Reading not only allows us to dream, but it allows us to become wiser. Therefore, reading allows our meta-knowledge to grow. The more that out meta-knowledge grows the easier it is to analyze and understand a piece or writing.
One of the biggest problems in public education is that the teacher to student ratio is way too high. Teachers do not have the capability of meeting each student learning necessities and or capabilities. Every student learns different, making it very difficult for each student to gain the most out of each and every homework assignment. In Multiple Voices, Multiple Texts, Dornah, Matz Rosen, and Wilson write “education should value each child as an individual to be nurtured, as a whole person taking steps toward a higher quality life. Dewey and others called for educating children to think and speak for themselves” (7). For a long time students were made to feel inferior, if they couldn’t grasp a subject they were just believed to be dumb. The fact that a student or students were not learning in a classroom never had to do with the teacher’s way of teaching. If a student did not learn it was because they were either stupid or because they were troublemakers.
I have to agree with you that the student to teacher ratio is too great in our public schools. Sometimes it seems that teachers are spending more time redirecting and doing behavior modification and less time teaching. In this blog you mentioned that we should treat each child as an individual who needs to be nurtured. I can't agree more!
ReplyDeleteAll too often, we think that being a good reader means you can read well orally. As we see, this is not the case. Reading is such a big part of our everyday lives. You mentioned that if students couldn't grasp the subject they were believed to be dumb. This should not necessarily be the default reason we turn to. If teachers changed their thought process and modeled how they started from ground zero and got to where they are now, I think that notion that students are just too stupid or troublemakers would be out the door. But how are we to accomplish so much with one student when we have so many in our classrooms?
ReplyDeleteI agree that there is a big difference between learning to read and reading to learn.
ReplyDeleteTeachers need to be understand the importance of teaching reading skills in order for students to learn at a higher level.
I agree with you that a major problem in schools is that we do not have small enough classes for teachers to really engage their students about reading. I was fortunate enough to go to a small private school in which the biggest ratio was 24:1. This helps so much. Being at UNM I can see how harmful the bigger classes can be. I don't feel like anyone cares if I pass, fail, or even get the material. They are just herding us through the gates on to the next class. Psych 101 at UNM drove me insane. There were 800+ people, and one professor. It also didn't help that everyone in that class cheated on tests because there were so many of us. I learned a lot in that class, but only because I wanted to. I know a ton of students that take nothing away from that class because they don't have to.
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