Taking your ideas off the page

This question is a hard one because the phrase "college and career readiness" implies that they are the same thing, when in actuality being career ready in no way means that one is necessarily college ready. Many people often choose a career without ever going to college. I believe what this phrase is trying to imply is being at a certain level of academic intelligence, which has nothing to do with a career per say, so it should really just be shortened to "college readiness".

In my opinion, college readiness means that one is able to maintain an intellectual conversation and can express their opinions both on paper and in person with a certain level of sophistication. By sophistication I do not necessarily mean in terms of grammar, but rather, being articulate and having the ability to formulate your own ideas and beliefs.

The second question again is very difficult for me to personally answer because my standards for literacy will be significantly lower than teachers of a higher grade level. My goal for my students will be to have one capable of describing a feeling or emotion and expressing it in a way that is understandable. I will not be dealing with literacy on a reading level, so my focus will be the ways in which my students will be capable of communicating with one another in a respectful manner. Literate is often mistaken for only being able to read and not the way in which one can comprehend and communicate in a fluid and effective style.

Literacy

Of course the obvious definition that I am sure comes to everyone's mind when they hear the word literate is the ability one has in understanding how to read and write. Literacy means that one is capable of not only sounding out sentences and spelling basic words, but also having the capacity to form complex thoughts in multiple different ways. More often than not when one is called "literate" it goes beyond meaning that they can read the words cat and dog. The word literate generally has a deeper meaning attached with it--being intelligent. If a man is in his thirties and could still only read books meant for first graders, I would still call that person illiterate even if technically he can read and write on a basic level. Similarly, the word illiterate often times is used to express more than just one's inability to read and write, but suggests a stereotype into a persons upbringing. I think that it is very easy to say on the surface that one means you can read and write and the other means that you can't, but to me these words are connected with a much larger concept.

Grammar Shmammer Part 2

I just wanted to write a brief update to my last post because after going to class today it really helped clarify a few points that I was unsure about. I realize now that grammar 1 is not what I will be teaching my students because that is what comes instinctively and can't actually be taught, or at the very least is unnecessary to teach. After better understanding the definitions of the different grammars I would say now that what I will be primarily focusing on is grammar 2. I honestly don't think that I will be going any deeper than just basic conversational grammar because children don't even really begin to write until about 1st grade. I was interested in clarifying what exactly kindergarten teachers cover just for my own better understanding so I went online and found out just how basic it really is. What I found online about the overall basics of kindergarten learning was:

Recognize and form uppercase and lowercase letters of the alphabet.

Match sounds to each alphabet letter.

Recognize and use rhyming words.

Begin reading words by using initial consonant sounds and such sound patterns as -an and -at (fan, man, can) and (sat, rat, pat).

Recognize a few frequently used sight words such as: the, and, is.

Capitalize the first and last name of a person and the word "I".

Count, recognize, and write the numbers up to 20.

Identify, draw, cut, and name squares, circles, triangles, ovals, diamonds, and rectangles.

Classify and group objects according to such characteristics as shape, color, size, texture, and so on.

Understand how people in communities work together.

Use their five senses to make simple scientific observations.

So to be perfectly honest I may now be completely going against my previous post in saying that grammar may not be widely covered at all in my classroom. I think it is hard for me being in this class because I want to participate and be able to stretch my positivity into thinking I can cover most of the topics we talk about in class, but after looking at the basic  guidelines that kindergarten teachers cover, it gave me quite a wake up call.  I guess in my mind I had kind of linked kindergarten and 1st grade as pretty much the same thing--but I am quickly learning that this was a very false assumption. What I will be doing mostly in my class is just preparing the students for what is next to come in terms of grammar and writing. I will mostly be working hands on through oral communication, grammar 2, and as I know realize that may just be the extent of it. 

Grammar Shmammar

To be perfectly honest, grammar is extremely difficult for me to understand. It has always been more of an instinct to me and I have found that whenever someone tries to explain the rules behind it, I get completely lost. It is because of this that the article was exhausting for me to get through. From what I understand, as a kindergarten teacher I will be mostly dealing with Grammar 1. Besides a child's natural instincts, this will be the first proper introduction my students will have to grammar and so it will be my job to teach the basic fundamentals. Now, because grammar is hard for me to understand I want to use my weakness as a way of helping them by understanding that complicating grammar doesn't do any good. In this sense, I will encourage students to go with their natural tendencies and then work from there on what I feel needs to be helped. I really want to stay away from over-complicating like so many of my teachers did to me. But, with this in mind it really isn't until middle school that a student starts to use extensive and intricate grammar. As far as grammar 3 is concerned with "linguistic etiquette", I am not sure if this is something that I will be seeing a lot of with students of such a young age. However, I am planning on teaching in Montana and because of this I am aware that in general the language being used will be a little bit more rural than what I grew up with.  From my experience in Bigfork (where I spend my summers), I have definitely noticed a lack of grammar 3 being used with both adults and children.

This is definitely a topic that I have to consider more thoroughly when it comes to my personal teaching approach because at this point in my life I am unsure of how I even feel about the importance of grammar. All I am really certain of right now is that when it comes to this topic, less is often more.

Childhood Bedtime Routines

One of the most prominent things I remember about my childhood bedtime rituals is that my dad would always make up stories to me. We very rarely would read from an actual book and when we occasionally did it was always one of those fill in the blank books where you pretty much got to make up the story as you went. (For example, the book would ask me to think of a happy place, think of what color the sky was and who was with me.) This was always my favorite kind of tucking in routine. If I could, I would have someone read this type of story to me every night for the rest of my life. I absolutely loved using my imagination and knowing that whatever I created, no matter how absurd, was no one's business but my own. Even when my dad would read these types of stories to me where I made up the surroundings as he read I would never talk about them out loud--I would always just quietly think to myself what my perfect magical land looked like. To be the youngest child of three, it was nice to have one place that was all my own and that was controlled by no one else but me.

With my mom, we would also hardly ever read from traditional bedtime story books and instead would look at "Where's Waldo" or "I spy" together. I don't remember really ever reading to my parents at all, I was always the one being read to. I also remember that my mother was very strict when it came to what cartoons I could watch. There were certain cartoons that she had deemed inappropriate or too intense. I remember that she would never let me watch tiny toons, for example, but I was always allowed to watch loony toons. To me, they seemed like the exact same show but to her, tiny toons was seen as vulgar (to this day I still don't understand how that is possible).

My parents generally would always talk to me like an adult; they were never the type to communicate to me through a high pitched baby voice. If I was bad I would get a time out, and nap time was never negotiable. My parents weren't exactly "tough" by any means, they just didn't give into the idea that a 4 year old could have more power than them. However, my mom was definitely always the stricter parent.

Da Hawaiian Pidgin Project

This project was so much fun for me that it didn't even feel like homework! I have not laughed that hard in such a long time the way I did while trying to develop the perfect accent to go along with our dialect. I just wanted to preface this by saying that I really did truly enjoy this project. With that said, it helped me understand a little more about just how hard it could be to teach a child who has grown up speaking a different dialect as their first language. After looking at how completely contrasting Hawaiian pidgin is from standard english it definitely gave me a reality check on how tough it would be to get a student to gradually slip into what seems to them to be a completely different language. However, it also showed me that learning and teaching other dialects can be fun! Before this project I was a little confused on how I would teach kindergarteners what a dialect even is, let alone how to make it fun in a way they would understand. But after seeing how much I myself enjoyed learning about the different dialects it gave me a new boost of excitement to teach others.

Not considered correct--just socially accepted as the best?

When reading the article bidialecticism I found myself wondering how we can teach children that all dialects are equal, while at the same time telling them that only one is considered the most socially acceptable and will get you further in the professional world? It seems like what we are really teaching them is that we can't outright label standard english as correct...yet it is what you need to learn in order to stay on top in our society? We say SAE is not the only "proper" form of english, yet we judge every other dialect in comparison to it. I am having a hard time understanding how to teach my students about this topic without sounding like a hypocrite.