Get Ready to Blog!

Here are the essential links for you to start your blogging. The first is the Blog Assignment Sheet. Here you will find the assignment with all of the embedded links to start blogging and make sure your blogs are being graded.

Second, you'll need the Blog Comment Form every week you post a comment. Your comments will be graded based on your timely submission!

The survey for me to give you your grade is here!

A Blogging Community

Blogs should engender an online community. We have been doing a good job regularly writing blogs, but for a lot of students, comments are still missing or underdeveloped. In order to remedy this, I am going to have you skip writing a blog this week. Instead of writing a post, you are going to comment on someone else's blog post.

Your blog comment should be interesting and show the author that you are really engaging in the content of the post. Comments that only speak to the relationship you have with the writer (aka You're the best!) will not be accepted for credit. Asking questions or supplying your own point-of-view on the topic are great ways to provide feedback to other students. A disrespectful or mean post will earn you an automatic 0.

After you make your comment, complete this form and you will receive credit.

Testing (CCR)

Testing happens everyday in a school or test center somewhere. Testing is a well known problem throughout many sectors of society. Doctors and lawyers have boards. Financial planners, accountants, architects, nurses and (even) teachers have certification exams. It seems like our society is gearing more and more towards high stakes tests. These tests can prove a lot about an individual, but at what cost? Hours and hours are spent cramming information into brains, but doesn't that just show that the subject is devoted to studying.

When it comes time to prove an individual can accomplish something, that individual is almost guaranteed to have access to the internet. Once you have access to all the information available, all of this memorization seems irrelevant. On the other hand, many of these tests are becoming more sophisticated. They may not ask test takers to regurgitate information. Instead, they may want to see that the test taker has the ability to develop ideas or analyze information. This type of test makes more sense to me.

Still, I wonder. Are these tests holding people accountable? Are they stressing test takers out too much? Are they using all of the data from these tests appropriately? I know the MOSLs we took in class this week were not enjoyable. I know that many students struggled to focus on the information in the test. However, maybe the final product shows what it is supposed to. Students can't maintain focus for extended periods. Really, this is good information for all of us to have. As adults, you will be sitting for more of these types of tests. As you prepare for the next steps of your lives, you will need to develop those skills to focus on and analyze the information that is presented to you.

Henrietta Lacks (SSR)

Over the summer, I read a fantastic nonfiction book, titled The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (here is the book trailer). It was written by Rebecca Skloot. This book made me think differently about going to the doctor, about how scientific discoveries are made, about privacy (especially medical privacy), and about how research is conducted.

Henrietta Lacks's cells have multiplied trillions of times. Her cells have literally been used to develop cancer treatments, vaccines (including polio, an almost unheard of disease in the US), in vitro fertilization, gene mapping, and cloning. All of these advances are fantastic for science and, not only the American public, but humankind. However, the advances were made without the knowledge or consent of the woman from whom the cells came. Her body helped science, but science did nothing for her. Worse than nothing, scientific companies, individuals, research centers and universitires have made millions off of her cells, but at the same time her family was living uneducated and poor in Baltimore. They couldn't even afford the benefits of the medical advancements their family helped to provide. The injustice the book uncovers is profound. As one reads, one is forced to question whether the events of the book could have possibly happened if Henrietta Lacks had been well educated and/or white. I won't claim to know the answer to that questions, but I have a strong suspicion that her race and background played a big part in what happened to her and her family.

People are too quick to brush off science as boring. This book was not only interesting, it seems to me that it is really important to read this book and understand how scientific discoveries move society forward. At the same time, we should understand that science has its own ideas of ethics. As individuals in this society, we need to know what our medical rights are and how to protect them. If we don't protect ourselves, no one will protect us. If nothing else, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks convinced me (again) that knowledge is power. Without knowledge, it is all too easy for society to take advantage of the unknowing individual.

Bully (CRR)

In my elective class, we are watching the film Bully. This movie is really sad and touching (and it's on Netflix if you are interesting in watching it). It brings up so many questions for me about human beings, human interactions and the human spirit, not to mention all of the questions about schools, adult responsibilities, teachers, and safe spaces. 

The film begins with the story of a child who committed suicide because he was so tormented in middle and high school. I really wonder why those children are driven to be so cruel. It seems to me that they must be learning these behaviors somewhere. If these children's parents are abusive, the children learn that abuse equals power. They feel helpless in their own lives, so they try to find that feeling of power by abusing others. At least, that's what I've learned in psychology classes. 

The thing I find even more difficult to understand is that there were about 45 kids on the bus. One kid was being attacked. About 4 kids attacked him. What happened to the other 40 kids on that bus? Why do they just ignore what they see and know to be wrong? It seems like there are probably some deeper issues going on. Group think maybe? They don't see anybody intervening (trying to help), so they don't intervene? I don't know, but watching this, I really wish one of the other kids would have tried to stop it.

Next, the schools: almost all of this abuse happened in schools or on the school bus. Don't schools have an obligation to protect students from physical and mental abuse. If a child is being abused in school, how is that child going to learn anything? No one can reach his or her learning potential when he or she is afraid. The administrators in the schools in the movie are not very good at dealing with these issues, but don't you think that teachers and administrators should be trained to deal with this? We can't let students become victims or abusers.

Finally, I have a respect rule in my classroom. I know some students feel like they are just playing when they tease each other or make fun of each other. As a teacher though, I don't know how the teased person really feels. I can't read that person's mind. They could be laughing along, but still feel hurt. That's why I don't think 'playing' is funny. That's why I go out of my way to stop it when I see it or hear it. Physical and mental abuse is not cool. It's not acceptable. It's not funny. It does not create a safe and respectful classroom. I will not be a party to abuse happening when I can try to stop it.

Guggenheim (SSR)

After school on Tuesday, I took a little trip to the Guggenheim. It really was a short, but fascinating trip. While I was there, I saw an art installation by James Turrell. He literally turned the entire museum into an art piece.

http://www.archdaily.com/377267/frank-lloyd-wright-s-guggenheim-rotunda-to-be-temporarily-transformed-into-a-turrell-skyspace/

James Turrell is an artist who concentrates on the study of light. While you and I might not think much about  how light and color affects space, that is the focus of Turrell's artistic life. He turned the Guggenheim's already beautiful rotunda into this magical place where colors change and space disappears. There is no ceiling in his art, just spheres that merge into light. This image doesn't quite do justice to how awe-inspiring the experience was. There were other aspects to the light show that I did not have the opportunity to experience. The line for his installation was almost an hour long and I arrived at the museum an hour before it closed (after the school day ended of course!). Living in New York City supplies so many interesting opportunities to people who are interested in reaching out for them.

This trip to the museum reminded me of how much of the world I do not understand. It is easy to think about all of the things we know: about our neighborhoods, what we read in the news, what we learn in school, and all of the experiences we have in our lives. Still, there is so much to know in this world, and we won't ever know all of it. The idea that I will continue to trip upon new, unexpected, and beautiful aspects of life inspires me to keep looking for more. 

A Slave Grateful for Slavery? (CRR)

Phillis Wheatley is such an interesting and controversial character in American literature and history. Her life was most certainly tragic, but her poetry reveals something else entirely. In class, we are reading "On Being Brought from Africa to America." This poem makes me think about so may different controversial topics: religion, slavery, race, self-expression, and authenticity. As a person, Wheatley went through so much: being taken from her family, the boat ride from Africa to America, learning the English language, learning to read and write in three(!) languages, traveling to England, being freed from slavery, and eventually dying in poverty. Her biography makes her life seem terribly difficult and heartbreaking. I want to cry for her and the difficulties of her life. 

And yet, the poetry she produces does not complain about her place in the world at all. In fact, she seems comfortable with her position in life as you read her poetry. This sparks so many questions in my mind: Did she really think that slavery was a 'mercy?' When she wrote that, did she mean it was a mercy for her in particular? Maybe she wasn't trying to say that slavery was a 'mercy,' but only that it turned out well for her? How would her poetry have been different if she were a slave on a plantation? Could she even have become a poet if she were a slave on a plantation? Was she writing her poetry to sell it? Maybe her poetry was not authentic at all, but was written to find white readers to purchase her books? How did her legacy affect the African American poetry that came after her?

I don't know the answer to any of these questions. I'm hoping that some new ideas and perspectives will come out in class over the next few days and weeks. Phillis Wheatley is definitely an enigma, one that I find compelling and thought provoking. Hopefully, our class discussions, debates, and essays will prove just how interesting and controversial Phillis Wheatley is.