Dare we say, exciting?

“Reading everything you can feeds curiosity” is the theme Daniels and Zimmerman worked off of when developing this chapter. Before I go off on a tangent of how critical the implementation of a variety of sources will be in our future classrooms, I do think that there is always a time and a place for a textbook in certain fields, as it is where teachers can provide their students with some of that “raw material” D & Z talk about when describing primary sources. However, as the rest of the chapter focuses on, we must mix the textbook and provide a balance of many different sources for our students to engage in. EVERY SINGLE teacher needs to understand that a textbook is not a Bible, nor should it be used as the only source of information in a classroom. Daniels and Zimmerman are telling teachers the reality of the situation, that there is no way to develop an intrinsic curiosity, nor feed it, through a textbook-driven course.  There is a natural intimidation factor between students and the textbook, and by structuring a classroom in this way will in NO WAY lead to an enduring understanding of concepts, but rather a simple remembering and regurgitation of facts on a test. Simple as that.

                Let us all look at our own lives. Not one of us receives  all of their information from one source. I myself use books, magazines, newspapers, music, TV shows, and movies to feed my hunger for knowledge. THAT’S RIGHT I SAID IT! Music and TV can be a great source of knowledge, if we know how to read these sources. What D+Z are essentially saying is that we should not limit ourselves or our students to what we learn from and how we learn from it, as they state on page 62, “As we move away from dependence on a single textbook, one of the wonderful possibilities is to show students the range of views, the variety of theories, the different schools of thought that make intellectual life in our subject interesting, controversial—dare we say, exciting.” The more we open our students up to where they get their information from, the greater the spectrum of ideas and theories they will perceive. Plus, we as teachers can develop more engaging lessons with a higher return rate if we expand our creativity and utilize as many sources as possible.

                Of course, this all sounds great. I just have to remember to not get ahead of myself here. Yes, I want to keep this in mind when designing my lesson plans, but after learning about backwards design and believing more and more in it, all this will come only after I have firmly established my essential questions and from them set clear objectives as to why I will use a particular source to demonstrate a concept, skill, or theme. I am very glad to have read this chapter though, as it does provide some relief for the third step of lesson planning. There seems to be a large amount of instructional methods to choose from, and openness for choice on both the teacher AND the students part.

Scavenger Hunt of the Central Falls Communities

1. What is the name of the oldest health care provider in the Central Falls?

-The name of the oldest health care provider in Central Falls is Children's Friend, a non-profit organization founded in 1834. It provides health care and related services to the children and parents of the Rhode Island community, with centers also in Providence and Pawtucket.

4. How many schools are in the city? Colleges and universities?

-According to the district network, there are six schools in the city. One early school, three elementary schools, one middle and one high school. It is interesting that there are three elementary schools. However, if you further investigate the three, only two are actually elementary schools, with the M.I. Robertson Elementary school saying on its home page that it is home to 245 kindergartners. Having driven around the city today it became clear how small of a city CF is, and I can understand only having one middle school and one high school. There are NO colleges or universities.

8. Is there a post office?

-Yes, below is a picture of a United States post office, located on 575 Dexter St, Central Falls, RI 02863. Be careful of the giant pot hole located right at the corner of the street.

12. Are there public parks?

-Below is a picture of Jenks Park. It is spacious and there was at the time many kids sledding on the hills.

15. Find one monument or statue. What is the history associated with it?

-Below is a picture of Cogswell Tower located in Jenks Park. The Park itself (pictured above) was built in 1890, donated by Alvin Jenks. The park stands on a battleground, as in 1676 during the King Phillips war, Indian scouts saw a band of troops approach from that very ledge, also known as Dexters Ledge. Cogswell Tower was built on the ledge in 1904 as a bequest to Caroline Cogswell.

22. The first mayor looks down from his perch as students come into the school.

-High above the entrance of Central Falls High School on the wall is a carved monument dedicated to the first mayor of Central Falls, Charles Moies, who was elected in 1895. I just hope he wasn’t afraid of heights! (See how high in the picture below).

23. British soldier, Irish revolutionary, a fugitive from justice. He escaped on the Catalpa and landed in Central Falls. Eamon De Valera visited him on Cross st.

-John Devoy was one of the leaders of the Irish rebellion in the British Army. He was imprisoned and later exiled to America in 1871, continuing to spread his Irish allegiance throughout the U.S. In 1875, with a little help, Devoy organized the escape of some fellow Irishmen from a prison in Western Australia using the ship Catalpa, which evidently landed in Central Falls.

24. There are three professional baseball players from Central Falls. Name them.

-The three baseball players to have made it to the Majors from Central Falls are:

1. Charley Bassett- Born in 1863 and played from 1884-92

2. Jim Slwy- Born in 1958 and played from 1982-84

3. Max Surkont- Born in 1922 and played from 1949-57

26. Becoming wealthy during the Gold Rush of 1849, she remembered her hometown and donated $50,000 to build the most recognizable feature in the city. Everyone knows who she is and can see her donation…time after time.

-The Cogswell Tower was given to the city by Caroline Cogswell in 1904. It really is a pretty awesome sight, and you can see it below. It became a symbol of CF on that day, and has remained one ever since.

29. In this space, the famous and the infamous are side by side. But in one part you can see the bullet holes left by a battle that took place between strikers and the national guard.

-Erected four years ago, this cast iron monument dedicated to the 1934 Saylesville Massacre and General Textile Strike of Woonsocket is firmly situated in the Moshassuck Cemetery on Lonsdale Avenue. On September 10^th of that year, four strikers were fatally wounded and 180 others were injured when the National Guard was called upon to halt the strikers.

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            I’ll be honest, at first I thought this assignment was a little childish. I mean, a scavenger hunt? It reminds me of all the Easters where I would go looking for those plastic eggs with the gross, chalky candy inside. But then I read the bottom of the list, particularly the question pertaining to how I will use this as I continue my student to teacher journey. OK, I thought, maybe there is a reason we were assigned this. So I asked myself, what would the objectives of this assignment be? Students will discover information pertaining to Central Falls and use connections from their findings to how they will become a better teacher. I will in the next few paragraphs ponder how the historical facts, demographics, and experiences have changed my perception of Central Falls and what I can take with me into not only a Central Falls classroom, but a highly urbanized class in general.

            I learned a great deal about the history of Central Falls. It is astonishing how rich the history of the city given its reputation as a poverty-stricken, disorganized residence. Until today, I have never heard of the Cogswell Tower, and upon first glance I was taken aback by its size and antiquity. This is a serious historical monument, and it is in Central Falls!? I was extremely curious how it came to be built, and the story if it and Jenks Park did not disappoint. The story of the Saylesville Massacre is also one I had no idea about. I was unable to check out the monument dedicated to it, but the story was enough for me to get a good grasp on just how tragic and intense that experience must have been.

            After learning the history, I now have at the very least a deeper respect for the city. However, that was indeed the past, and as proud of its history as Central Falls is and should be, there are clearly some issues with the city at its current state. The streets, for one, are the WORST streets I have ever driven on. As I stated earlier, there was one pothole in particular that I was sure gave me a flat tire. I know what you are thinking, Ryan, just avoid the potholes. That is easy to say, and yet harder to accomplish. The streets unfortunately are so narrow, and with cars parked down the entire street, it is impossible to avoid anything at all on the streets. The small, narrow streets match perfectly with the congestion of the buildings, also. Everything just seemed so close and so small; the fact that people drive on those streets every day is unfathomable.

            I attempted to answer some of the questions at the top of the list, but they all dealt with more in-depth factors of the city, and I could not find any answers that would suffice. What I did find were some interesting demographics that are worth thinking about and gave me an overview of the population in CF. There are almost 20,000 people living in that tiny city, which is measured at 1.20 square miles. I think those numbers match up pretty evenly with my experience. This also explains why there is only one middle and one high school, as that is really all you need and all you can fit. Digging deeper, just over 70% of the population speaks a language other than English. Compare that with the 60% population of Hispanic nationality present in the city, and you get a heavy dose of Latin culture in the Central Falls school district. I am curious if anyone found an answer for item number three on the list, as to why there is such a prevalence of Latin heritage in Central Falls, as I could only find the demographics. 

            This hunt has taught me that everything has a history, even the smallest of cities in the smallest of states. My perception of Central Falls has not changed in terms of how I thought about it prior to my driving through and researching it. It is still a highly urbanized and congested city. However, now that I have an understanding of its rich history, I at least have altered my perception and have grown a deeper respect for Central Falls. The stories of Cogswell Tower, John Devoy, and the Saylesville Massacre will definitely pop in my mind next time Central Falls comes to mind. More importantly, I got a heavy dose of reality has I learned the demographics of the city, and I now think it is of the utmost importance to always look into the statistics of the school district you are involved with and/or working for, as you can get a broad picture of the student population and the community they live in. A theme that pops up consistently in my student to teacher journey is the idea that you have to know your students in order to teach them in a way they can use the best of their abilities to master the curriculum. A critical aspect of that is the culture in which they constantly experience. One question I am now pondering  is with a background of the culture in which your students live, what are the ways teachers in highly urbanized schools integrate culture into the classroom, making sure students are proud of where they come from but also aware of the current issues in which their culture is dealing with?

Insights from UBD chapter 1, module A, and RIASCD conference

“Understanding by Design is predicated on the idea that life-long achievement gains are more likely when teachers teach for understanding of transferable content and processes while giving learners multiple opportunities to apply their understanding in meaningful contexts.”

I like this quote for the sheer fact that it sums up the ideas in the readings quite nicely, as it really is all about “life-long” processes.  Actually, if you go back to the Wilhelm chapters we read, there is that word, lifelong, right on the cover. When I read that the first time, I thought of what a huge concept lifelong is. What is interesting is that I haven’t really heard concept before this class, the idea that we should really be teaching students not to just succeed in our class, or even school in general, but throughout their entire life. What these readings basically are saying is that when my students leave this class, the ultimate goal is to give them the tools they need to not only write a well-organized and structured analytical essay, but also think about why they should master  the skills of being able to analyze and apply them to the real world, not just to Huckleberry Finn. If that’s not a daunting task, I don’t know what is.

This transfers into a heavy emphasis on assessment, both internally and state-wide, as we now have to make sure that the “enduring understanding” goal that we created out of the standards is on its way to being met. Figure 1.4 gives a list of assessment types, which is of course is an essential tool, but which ones work the best? How much should I vary my assessment strategy? I attended a conference this weekend and one of the sessions was “focused “on the Common Core and PARCC. I placed the word focused in quotations because I was a little disappointed the way the conference turned out. My presumptions were that we would go through some of the standards and look at big picture ideas and instructional design that will teach those big ideas, but those presumptions may have been grounded in the readings I did the night before. Instead, perhaps because the conference was only an hour and a half and the topic so large, we were not really able to dig deep into either, but it was evident that the presenters, both of whom played a major role in the development of the CCSS and are working with PARCC representatives currently, are unhappy with how PARCC is being implemented.

There was a lot of talk of how computerized it is, how much of it early indications are show, and how rigorous it is appearing to be. I mean, they showed us an example of a third-grade level question, and I was shocked at how difficult and demanding it was. THIRD GRADE!!! Now, they only scratched the surface of the ideas surrounding PARCC, and I’m curious as to learn more. There was a question brought up however, and it surrounds the idea of differentiation and how it applies to assessment. Should we differentiate it? If so, how extreme? One woman, a Special Education instructor at the fine college of Rhode Island asked me my stance on this and my thinking then and still now after doing some pondering, is that by differentiating instruction we could possibly be walking on eggshells. Students take assessment very seriously, as they know it has the biggest impact on their grade. The environment and spectacle of a “test,” is really an intense one for a student. Imagine what student reaction would be if because Billy is a kinesthetic learner,( he doesn’t have a IEP, I just know he responds better to hands-on learning) he can take a test more suitable to his learning style, while the others take a different version. Billy gets an A, they get a lower grade. Wouldn’t they get upset? She didn’t get the chance to respond, but considering how much importance these readings place on assessment, as well as our understanding that all of our students learn differently, do you think there should be a movement towards differentiated assessment?

Daniels and Zemelman, Chapters 1 and 2

What really struck home for me while reading the text was when the book gave us a "quiz" on our reading strategy. The passage that related to cricket was an absolute debauchery for me at first, but as the text began to elaborate on why they gave such an irrelevant passage, i began to understand. The way i read, interpret, analyze, and evaluate a text has become implicit to me. I don't think about the methods I deploy when breaking down a text to discover what it means and represents. However, after the text talked about the importance of surfacing reading strategies, I realize the benefits that the observance and exhibition of my reading strategies will have on my students.
This reminds me of our class conversation on understanding our pedagogical theory in order to properly develop and effectively exhibit them in a classroom setting. As teachers, we must showcase ALL of our knowledge and strategies to our students, in order to break down that barrier between us and the students; the barrier that gives a false perception that teacher knowledge is "magical" and "unattainable." We must instead show our students the what, how, and why of reading in order to build confidence in our students and elevate their awareness when reading. After all, we all want to desperately avoid that horrible situation that took place in the imaginary Mr. Cosgrove's class.
The second point that really stood out to me, and this in part goes back to the passages the book had us read and analyze, was the commentary on mental schemata. As the text states, "reading is not just "receiving a message," but actively building meaning upon prior knowledge using staged, strategic reading..." (Pg. 31). I like this quote because it states that students do possess the ability to comprehend complex readings, it is just a matter of developing methods that will bring it out of them.