My Inspiration for Living

What is it that enables me to be motivated in the morning? What is that keeps my feet moving and getting ready for the day? Where does that vigour, joy and humility come from within me? What keeps me wanting to change the world one human at a time?

It's these children. My inspiration for living.  

When I wake up in the morning, I look forward to meeting these precious little ones entrusted to our care. If one child does not appear, I soon wonder and take action to find out what was wrong. I am proud when my students do well and strive for the best, even when at times they seem to fail. Moreover, I sit and meditate as I look at these little ones and see how they can make us adults so humble, so forgiving, so patient and kind towards each other. To me, they are a shining light at the end of the road.

Most of the time we have to be more than teachers to them. We are like nurses, counselors, motivators, friends, their role models and most of all their parents. Each child comes from a different household which may affect their learning positively or negatively. I urge you all to do the best you can for them. If it means making a cherished sacrifice, then don't think twice. Your blessing awaits you eventually.

These are my driving force for living. Let's love them as Christ so willing does. Finally, with all my heart I will add that I am their role model and they are equally mine.

Here is a link to a YouTube video that I would like to share in faith, love and unity.

Hope you will sing along with me!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWf-eARnf6U

"To the melodious sounds of Baha Mar. It seems like a place I want to be. Every glimpse of this luxurious getaway has me tapping to the sounds of drums beating." (Drafting in motion).

A new lesson with so much more to learn. In this session, here is some information that I learnt about Drafting (The second stage of the writing process):

• A stage in which students now put all their thoughts on paper. (Getting your creative juices flowing!)
• Ideas are used from pre-writing in order to form sentences, then paragraphs, lines or stanzas.
•  In this stage, emphasis is not placed on structure, sequence, neither on writing conventions. 
• Teachers must use their own drafts to demonstrate, so that students can better understand how to start writing their piece. Students must be able to recognize and analyze how the teacher connects his or her ideas to form sentences.
• Multiple drafts ought to be used in this stage. The first draft should never be the final draft. 
• All ideas may or may not be used in this stage from the details in pre-writing. Do not worry! The students may develop ideas as they go along. 

These ideas learnt from class are very useful for students to become good writers as they follow certain processes.

As I reflected during this lesson on my past experiences as a teacher, I somehow realized that I have not showed students how to use their first drafts to make them better by writing multiple drafts. I sigh sorrowfully to know that these students have been short of their education. However, on the brighter side, now that I know better, I will definitely use the information learnt to help them become good writers. With the upcoming sessions, I hope that my lecturer will read student examples and show how students should go about expressing more ideas.  For the next session, I am so anxious to know how this story will unfold!! Let's keep on writing!

Draft about My Favourite Spot:  
                                    

Quote: "Drafts don't have to be perfect. They just have to be written."

As is customary, we reviewed the previous lesson. In my own words, I learnt that the teacher must use his or her draft to model the type of writing being taught. In order for the students to be familiar with any type of writing, various texts (mentor texts), articles and so on, should be read to them. For example, in descriptive writing, the teacher should read a selection of descriptive pieces so that the students can get an idea of how the writer conveys a message,  how the writer uses colourful language and so on. 

I was indeed quite happy to be introduced to the prewriting stage. My teacher chose a topic and modeled how to go about generating ideas. We had a class discussion and she also used the questioning technique to obtain responses, which will in turn generate ideas. I was so excited because I have now learnt how to go about introducing students to a topic and how to get them to generate ideas. Additionally, using different graphic organizers can help students plan their writing.

* The ideas in the chart were generated by the teacher and modeled to imaginary students. I formed part of the imaginary students in the class. She used think alouds to let student know of her thoughts on the topic. 

This cluster helps students to use all or most of their senses to activate knowledge and their personal experience about a topic.

   Genre: Descriptive Writing

   Graphic Organizer: 5 Senses Cluster

   Topic: My Favourite Spot

   Grade: 4

   Purpose: To describe my favourite spot

   Audience: The students

As I reflected, while trying to understand the demonstration, I appreciate the fact that I have learnt a new way of teaching. Oftentimes as teachers, we simply start off by telling students to write on a topic. This is wrong. Students need to start with topics familiar to them, topics that trigger experience. It is imperative that teachers engage students in discussions before writing. It is imperative to model to students before writing. Help them plan. Help them think. Help them be good writers. Confidence is built both in the teacher and students for success in the writing classroom.

I suggest that my teacher continue with the other stages in order for me to get a sense of how students form paragraphs and where the focus should be in each stage of the writing process.

Quote: "A good idea becomes a great idea when you let it out." 

In this class session, we began by reviewing the contents of our previous class. I believe that this is  a good way of beginning our class because it helps me as a current student teacher to demonstrate my knowledge and understanding of what was taught. By so doing, I feel more and more confident that I have understood the lesson and can apply skills learnt in the classroom.

We focused on the first stage of the writing process: Prewriting. Prewriting can be defined as a thinking and planning writing activity which helps the writer think about a topic. Basically, this first stage involves the following:

• Choosing a topic
• Brainstorming ideas (words/phrases) 
• Organizing ideas in a graphic organizer
• Identify an audience
• Define the purpose/reason for writing

I liked this lesson. It was very interesting to me. The part which I liked best was that an effective characteristic of teachers of writing is that they must demonstrate to students that they are writers by engaging in the writing process. The teachers must use their pieces to model writing to the students. A graphic organizer should be used according to the topic/genre. It will help students to jot down their ideas using words or phrases, which they intend to use in the second stage. The students are now confident to begin this process after having noted the demonstration by the teacher. 

I also learnt that the teacher can use mini lessons to provide explicit writing instruction to the students in order for them to learn a particular skill. A mini lesson is taught depending on the students' weakness in writing.

My question was: How does a teacher go about conducting a mini lesson? 

I was given the components steps of a mini lesson which is as follows (in brief):

1. Introduction/Connection: Connect the lesson to a real life situation. Inform student of the purpose of the lesson.

2. Teaching Point/Content: What skill does the teacher want students to learn?/ What do effective writers do?

3. Teaching Component/Demonstration: Teacher models to students and uses think alouds and examples.

4. Active Engagement: Students apply skills in groups, pairs, then on their own.

5. Closure: Teacher reviews skill learnt in the lesson, then states objective of the following lesson.

With  these in mind, I hope that my lecturer will conduct a mini lesson so that I can model the necessary skill that I want students to learn. I suggest that my lecturer use a topic of interest so that I can see the different components of the mini lesson in action.

Quote: "Writing is thinking on paper."

Every moment felt good. Every word was worthwhile. Every thought well placed. Every activity seemed meaningful. Just when I thought I had achieved the purpose, I was somewhat wrong.

I am spending much needed time with my neighbour in helping her achieve her academic success. The moments spent so far have been informative and interesting. So far, we have focused on the types of writing. Samora has been introduced briefly introduced  to the 4 types of writing. At this stage in Grade 6, she should have known more of each type, but I have now come to realize that she lacks much knowledge, application and understanding of them. Her main weaknesses have gathering descriptive ideas, extensive knowledge of various topics, structuring of sentences, planning writing: all of which have been first noted in descriptive writing. I have decided to focus on her weaknesses because these are what I need to help her improve and to help myself improve as an educator. You may ask: Why you? Are you not the driver behind the wheel? 

As I have started my first one-on-one class in LIT102 this semester, it was there that I understood the path which I was taking was not the right one. I learnt about what good writers do, my role as a writer in the classroom, the difficulties encountered by students in writing and so on. We looked at each stage of the writing process in brief. In addition, I was taught by my lecturer that good writers think about their writing. They jot down their ideas. Good writers spend time reading. They think about the purpose and audience. All these and more, help students to gain ideas and more extensive knowledge on various techniques. My lecturer and I also discussed the challenges faced by students and by the teacher in the writing classroom. As I reflected, it was then that I knew that I was not teaching Samora every component of descriptive writing or  the basics of writing in itself.

Some of the difficulties mentioned were very important and interesting. Some of these were that students do not know how to express ideas in writing. Students do not get more appealing and familiar topics to write about. They have little to no knowledge on a topic. They engage in no class discussions to support writing. Students do not get to engage in collaborative writing, nor read each other's work. Most of all, teachers do not model writing to support students' writing. I can definitely say that some of these do apply to me. I have not supported Samora that much by modelling. As teachers, we overlook many things on our part which we do not think can damage the students' creative abilities. The students themselves also have difficulties, but we need to play an even greater part in helping them move from nothing to endless possibilities in writing. 

I have duly noted some tips for the writing classroom. There are so much more which have to be explored, but these can make a big difference. Some of these include: engage students in class discussions about various topics. By so doing, they are able to generate ideas when writing. The teacher can have students close their eyes and visualize, talk, sense. Secondly, use background information/personal experiences to familiarize them with various topics. Source different articles/mentor texts for classroom discussions. Moreover, teachers are to write themselves. Modelling outlines the do's and dont's for writing. Modelling demonstrates to students the paths which teachers take to create a great, captivating story. All these and more, are effective ways of broadening the scope of student writing. All the skills which they need will come slowly but surely.

This session has made me hunger for more knowledge and understanding of the writing classroom. Not only with my neighbour, but I plan to incorporate every lesson learnt to every child who has a writing need. Applying little by little every day and in every moment encountered with the student, aims for progress after progress for academic success. 

Therefore, all has not been lost. There is hope. A silver lining beyond every dark cloud. Things can be better. Success will be achieved. Not only for the now, but for the future of these young minds.

Quote: "Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world."