Chapter 10

Much of this reading was a review of the readings from last week as well as over the course of the past years of classroom observations and my own schooling. It is common information that not all students want to participate in reading aloud, answering questions, or both. It was nice to read some suggestions for participation as I often wonder what strategies teachers can use to get students involved. At my field placement last week I lead a reading group and one of the girls refused to read out loud to her classmates. I had lead the reading group differently this time by taking volunteers whereas I usually have each student read in a circle and this avoids any student getting left out of participating. When I suggested this girl in the group should read (since the other children had multiple times already) she adimately refused. Similar to ideas such as large group popsicle stick drawings, I have realized the importance of using a system that will not allow any group member to exclude themselves from participating. On the subject of popsicle sticks...although they were suggested for use in classroom participation, I do not necessarily agree that the system is good, espeically for answering questions. Students can feel overwhelming anxiety and pressure when they are forced to answer a question that they do not know the answer to. I have experienced this many times as a student and it has never been a positive experience for me. However, there are circumstances that I find this method reasonable to use, such as when doing entire class readings, asking opinions, or when paired with fun learning activities. On a final note, I like how this chapter explained the difference in teacher roles between discussions and recitations. It referred to the teacher as the manager of recitations and moderator of discussions. Often times I think teachers have a hard time identifying with just one of these roles and that is a main reason why discussions are often unsuccessfully occuring in classrooms.