Summer+Assignments+2011


 * TEACH B2F-Summer Assignments **

** Happy summer to all of the incoming members of BRIDGES to the FUTURE 2012! **

The 2010-2011 school year is ending, but in just ten short weeks, the 2011-2012 school year is scheduled to begin. I am sure you can hardly wait to start this stage of your professional career. This message has been designed to get you started on your first course, EDUCATION 524, Work of the Middle and High School Teacher. Education 524 is one of the core courses in Bridges to the Future. It is a course that all Secondary Teacher Education Program candidates (STEP) take at the beginning of program year. It is intended to introduce you to the work of teachers in general and the roles of Bridges teachers in particular.

Our first “in person” meeting of EDUC 524 will be on Aug.24th (during our orientation) at the school of Education, Furcolo Building, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Before that meeting you will need to complete the following assignments:


 * READ A BOOK-Take some notes, be ready to share **

Choose a book from the list below. Write down your thoughts--after reading the opening chapter(s) of the book. How do your impressions change (or do they) after reading half the book? Do you feel any differently after finishing the book?

Sometimes books touch you, reminding you of your own life, as part of the larger human experience. Are there connections between the book and your own life? Or, does the book remind you of an event (or events) that happened to someone you know? Does the book remind you of something that you have already heard about or read?


 * BOOK LIST **

Teach Like Your Hair’s On Fire: The Methods and Madness Inside Room 56. Rafe Esquith, Penguin Books, 2007.

NurtureShock: New Thinking about Children. Po Bronson & Ashley Merryman. Twelve, 2011.

The Freedom Writers Diary: How a Teacher and 150 Teens Used Writing to Change Themselves and the World Around Them. Zlata Filipovic. Broadway, 1999.

Whatever It Takes: Geoffrey Canada’s Quest to Change Harlem and America. Paul Tough. Mariner Books, 2009.

What Video Games Have To Teach Us about Learning and Literacy. James Paul Gee. Palgrave, 2003.

Why Don’t Students Like School: A Cognitive Scientist Answers Questions about How the Mind Works and What It Means for the Classroom. Daniel T. Willingham, Jossey-Bass, 2010.

Five Minds for the Future by Howard Gardner, Harvard Business School Press, 2007.

The Courage to Teach: Exploring the Inner Landscape of a Teacher’s Life by Parker Palmer. Jossey-Bass, 10th edition, 2007.


 * ASSIGNMENT TWO- Go on a virtual field trip **

Take a virtual field trip to the website of school systems served by Bridges to the future:


 * Greenfield High School **


 * Ralph C. Mahar Regional High School **


 * Turners Falls High School **


 * Franklin County Technical School **


 * Pioneer Regional High School **


 * Mohawk Trail Regional High School **


 * Frontier Regional High School **

Explore these school websites as if you were going to be interviewed for a teaching job by an administrative, teacher, or student team.

What types of questions would you ask the principals, teachers, students who are teaching and learning at these schools?

Write down your questions. Have these questions ready by Aug.24th


 * ASSIGNMENT THREE- Explore your Social Identity-Write a Social Identity Paper **

As a step towards understanding the impact that race, ethnicity, class, gender, etc. have on the school experience, this paper is designed to help you explore your own sense of social identity. Social forces such as gender, social class, ethnicity, religion, etc. become aspects of individual social identities. Describe the historical development of your own sense of identity. For example, you might address ethnic background, social class, gender identity, religious identity, etc. In your description, include how your family, school, work, social and religious experiences have contributed to the development of that identity.

You will be asked to read your paper out loud in class (starting Aug. 25th). Consider this in choosing what to include in your paper. Share to the level that you think will be of interest and significance to your class. Be thoughtful about how vulnerable you want to make yourself. Your paper should be 500-1000 words.


 * ASSIGNMENT FOUR- Video yourself teaching and learning **

1.Videotape yourself teaching another person (any age) to do something new (e.g. playing a video game, cooking a recipe, kicking a soccer ball). Your teaching and learning scenario should last at least 15 minutes. Don’t forget to ask your “student(s)” permission to video the teaching process.

2.Watch your video and be ready to pause the clip so that you are able to note any key vocabulary/phrases that you used while teaching.

For example: If your movie shows you teaching someone to cook, you may hear yourself using the following types of words/phrases. (See the chart below)

4. After watching your video clip, please reduce your video to a five-minute movie. Be ready to share your movie with the TEACH BRIDGES cohort by August 24th. Please make your video transportable (put it on a data stick, email it to yourself) please do whatever you need to do in order to make the file and shareable across platforms.

** Teaching Vocabulary Chart **


 * ** General Instructional Words and Phrases ** || ** Subject Specific Words or Phrases ** || ** Context Defined Words ** || ** Consider any Figurative Language Words associated with your topic ** ||
 * “turn off the heat” || butter, eggs, spoon, spatula || batter, defrost, preheat || “a baker’s dozen“

“a piece of cake”

“in a nutshell.” || CR