Saturday, September 13, 2014

The circus has opened


My apathetic seniors.  My listless, sleepy crew that dutifully meanders into the classroom on Green Days, but only as close to the 8:20 bell as possible without being tardy.  My likeable slugs who rarely have their materials with them, who still haven’t gotten used to getting out their writer’s notebooks to answer the prompt written on the board every day since August 4, and yet who still gnaw at me to find a way to connect to them.

We have ditched July’s carefully crafted plan to appeal to popular culture with a Gothic unit and have shifted to the outdoors as a theme.  Anything related to outdoors, the one place most of them would rather be than stuck inside my concrete block walls, even though I have painstakingly plastered them with motivational posters, student work, inspiring quotes, class-generated anchor charts, and pictures of famous writers.   They couldn’t care less.

This week, like other hopeful highly effective teachers, I used the data I had collected from their pre-assessment to divide the pack into three smaller, more manageable groups, so it’s not so easy for them to snooze in the back.   And like a savvy teacher, I even remembered to document my use of data as evidence for my future evaluation.

Each group had a poem connected to the outdoors and a student whom I immediately proclaimed the expert in the group based on his 100% score on the poetry terms pretest. 

The gasps and groans commenced.  “How’d he get so smart?”  “ A hundred percent!”  “Are you kidding?” 

We had already done a model together with Elizabeth Bishop’s“The Fish.”  Three reads, a la Cris Tovani, and deeper each time: Once for what it says; once for what it means; and a third time, more deeply, for why it matters.  The why it matters part stumped them. Why would anyone care about an old battered fish and some fisherman/woman- they couldn’t decide- throwing it back?  Most of these kids had done that lots of times. 

Then Kim quietly offered a thought:  “It’s about respect.”

Heads turned.  Sleepy eyes opened.  “What are you thinking?” I asked her.

She elaborated, albeit tentatively: “It’s about respecting something. Even though it’s ugly and old, it can be beautiful.”

I nodded and smiled at my star.  Then we dug into the poem for evidence that would support Kim’s idea.  A few other stars found it while their peers nodded and smiled and copied down the evidence.

Later, as they read new poems in their groups, their interest fizzled with the third read.  Why does it matter to be “acquainted with the night?”  Why does it matter that “The Negro Speaks of Rivers?”  Why does an old root cellar matter?

Summoned to each group by the ensuing moans, I offered a little background about the poet or asked about the era in which he lived or suggested a part to reread.   Heads tilted and eyes shifted as students began thinking.  

Suddenly, the room changed.   It had come alive, as students blurted out ideas.  Higher order thinking ideas.  Ideas that connected a theme to the poem.  It was as if some worker had thrown the switch that illuminated each bulb in a random sequence around the three circles.  The circus was open for business!  Some students went back to the text, exclaiming that they had found evidence.  Other students gaped in amazement, then quickly jotted down notes. Everyone was engaged and amazed at their performance as a group.  They could analyze poetry!
 
All my carefully-crafted discussions about themes and characterization and conflict from the Gothic unit that had fallen flat now suddenly had impact and relevance in poetry, poetry about places these kids would rather be, and places that they know.

The circus is open! 

Now my new challenge: Keep the future acts exciting, the cotton candy deliciously fresh, and the timing just right to reach ever amazingly new heights.  That’s my ringmaster’s job.
 

 

 

 

 

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