More on "Best Part of Me"

This is yet another posting on "Best Part of Me". But this time, let me explain the process that students went through in creating these beautiful poems.

The Best Part of Me activity is not an original idea from us, Mahea, Vivian and I. In fact, we copied the idea from the book, "The Best Part of Me: Children Talk About Their Bodies in Pictures and Words" by Wendy Ewald. We had the students talk about the photos from the book first, then we read the corresponding writing to them. From there each student came up with two examples of their best parts. We modeled how to write it using four parameters; describe, function, why, and details. Then students wrote their own best poems for their best parts. The next day, students were asked to narrow their best parts to only one and visualize how they'd like to capture their best part on photo. Once they described the exact lay out and setting of their desired photo, we took the pictures for them. We then helped students edit their writing. The students "Best Part of Me" pages look like this:

The Best Part of Me
By Nataly

The best part of me are my eyes.
Because they are dark black like a dark black dog.
With my eyes, I see myself and EVERYTHING around me!
My eyes are the best part of my face.
They reflect my Mexican heritage.
My eyes show my feelings.
They laugh, cry, smile.
I love my eyes!

From here, we had the students turn their writing into a slap book. We learned how to make it from our graduate book-making class. I enjoyed learning and making it very much myself, but it was even more rewarding watching how engaged the students were during this hands-on activity. Their books were beautiful and creative!

Here's how they look,

THE BEST PART OF ME

By CRISTIAN











The best part of me are my knuckles.
Because I have ten knuckles.
They are like little circles.
They stick out.
They help me grab stuff.
I like them because I can hit balls with them.
They help me stretch.

the Best Part of Me

My students started a new unit writing and discovering about themselves. Here are some of their beautiful work samples (typed by students themselves),

The Best Part of Me
by Edgar

The best part of me are my eyes.
They are chocolate brown.
My eyes can see Everything!
My eyes are big and happy. And my eyes can reflect.
When I am furious or nervous,
my eyes can cry, sick, or tired.
My eyes are like little circles.
I like my eyes.

My First Comment From a Student! :))

I'm so excited today, because this Blog finally received its very first comment posted by a student this afternoon! See the comment link for the "Self Portrait" posting for details. :)

This really wasn't a surprise to me, because three of my students actually huddled together on the carpet in front of my laptop and posted the comment, almost collaboratively, right next to me. Since not all of them have a computer at home nor do they get much of an opportunity to use a computer at school, I first showed them a few basic moves for navigating around the site. After reading some of my postings, Jonathan, the artist of the boy portrait from the "Self Portrait" posting, decided to post a comment about his own portrait.

Aside from feeling overwhelmed with internal joy as I watched the students showing so much interest and desire to participate on this blog, I felt even more rewarded as I watched the three of them talk about how to spell "violin", whether "play" should be in past tense, or how to form the next sentence entirely. With no official training for typing, their three sets of eyes were also much more effective at spotting these randomly scattered letters on the keyboard.

This was such a treat! Thank you Jonathan, Alejandra and Alexa!

A side note, whenever I've had the chance to work with kids using computers, the urge to teach them how to type always immediately rush to mind. Watching their little index fingers trying to find the randomly scattered letters on a keyboard is a 'itching' sensation. I can't help but to get an instant reminder that typing is a skill that needs to be taught and learned. With computers playing such a huge role in our lives today, I often take the ability to type efficiently for granted. I learned how to type when I was in 9th grade. But back then, computers weren't as a big part of learning and life as it is today. Now that it is, shouldn't we consider teaching this enabling skill much earlier?

Storytelling

Many argue that the best way to learn a foreign language is to move to that foreign place where everyone around speaks the language. Well, all of my students did. They all moved to Oakland from Central and South America, however, I can't say that they are truly surrounded by English speakers. The community they live in is very much sheltered in Spanish speaking. This is why, my teaching group is trying to find the 2nd best way to help them learn and improve on their English.

For the next 6 weeks, we will use the power of photography to help students create language, stories and imagination, so that hopefully, their English development will start emerging through this storytelling process. Below are some stories the students had come up with orally, and the teachers helped with recording.

Students were divided into 3 small groups, and each group was given one picture. In planning this lesson, 3 goals came to mind. First, I wanted to expose the students to the concept that pictures tell stories. Second, I wanted to use pictures as a way of producing language through the functions of making observations, describing details, and creative storytelling based on observations and details. Students were prepared for this during Opening Circle as we practiced describing details and drawing assumptions from these details using two different pictures I had brought in. The third goal for this activity was to stab at the idea that each photo was taken from a specific perspective, and it can only represent what is shown and not necessarily the entire 'truth'. I understand this is a huge idea that is even difficult for many adults to grapple with, but as we discuss and take more photos going forward, I think it is an important message that needs to be addressed at some point earlier on.

When reading the stories for each picture, notice how the stories and style of stories created by students change as the lense of each picture zooms out.



One day there was a little cat that was sleeping , because it was sick. Smeow, the cat was sleeping on a sofa with a red pillow. And then a dog growled at Smeow, and the cat got scared. And then Smeow found Ms. Niki laying on the bed. Smeow wanted to wake up Ms. Niki, and she did. Ms. Niki woke up and said, "Shoo! Scram little dog." And then Ms. Niki grabbed Smeow and let her sleep on her lap.

~ The End ~

One day a mommy cat had four baby kittens. One of the kittens was sleeping and the other kittens were drinking their mom's milk. The mom took three of her babies to Las Vegas to live there, and left one baby in Oakland, because this kitten didn't want to wake up. he was having a dream and wanted to keep dreaming. He was dreaming that his mommy was having another baby. When he woke up, he got really scared because his family was left.

In Las Vegas, a big monster truck crashed into the mommy, and she died. The babies found a new mom, and they lived together in Las Vegas.

~ The End ~
:(....

A baby cat is playing with a red yarn.

Another cat is sitting.

One cat is walking.

The big cat is the mommy. She is lying down. She might be sleeping.

The three cats are in the kitchen because of the seats, and table, and fire stove.
The walking baby cat might be looking for something.

One baby cat that is black and white.

Two other cats are brown with white.

This is a poor house with three cats inside. I think its a poor house because I know that the stoves now don't look like that. They look more new. And the floor is dirty.

No one lives in the house because there is not a lot of stuff, and no one is around. The cats are alone.

Wait, but maybe someone does live there, because there's a book. And maybe someone is making coffee. And the cats look too white to live in the street.

Maybe someone found these cats from the street and cleaned them.

Maybe the cats snuck in the house when no one was around.

Maybe they got in from a cat door.....

~ The End? ~

Self Portraits

There is always something magical about a child's self portrait.








This is one of my student's self portrait of himself in a starry night, inspired by Van Gogh?















This is another self portrait by a student.
Quite grown-up looking!

A Plug for GLAD

GLAD (Guided Language Acquisition Design)

Pictorial Input Chart

Today, in my own class, we had a GLAD trainer come in and gave us an abbreviated version of their overview training... In less than 3 hours, we were exposed to 8 different GLAD strategies (Inquiry Chart, Pictorial Input Chart, 10/2, T-graph, Graphic Organizer, Chants, and Zero noise Signal) and countless great ideas and modeling on how to make language more comprehensible for English language learners. I guess, one of the big things with GLAD is establish consistent patterns and structures that will help students learn new contents, so the coordination and consistent use of colors and visual support is key. Notice in the picture above, the elf owl is drawn in red, and the words describing this owl is also in red... This is the perfect program for someone slightly obsessively compulsive like me.. :)

Partner Portraits

Last week, the students interviewed a partner and learned all about them and drew a picture of their partner based on the information they have learned. There wasn't any specific direction for how each student should draw their partner. Many different expressions came through...



This is a great picture that told a lot of information about one particular student. For example, the interviewed student likes the # 10, likes to play kickball, likes pizza, etc.










This is a picture drawn by a different student. Here this student decided to divide the paper into 5 different sections and drew 5 different things about the interviewee in their own section. Very organized way of displaying and thinking!










One thing was interesting though, most students had much more to say about their picture and their partner when talking me during the process of drawing. When they actually went to the front of the class to present their partner and picture, half of the words and descriptions were gone... Was this purely caused by shyness or is there some kind of a correlation between drawing and language production?