Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts

7.2.10

Re:”What Makes a Great Teacher”


An article in the latest issue of Atlantic Monthly on what makes great teachers revived my spirit a bit.     After reading the article, I realized that growing up I thought of my best teachers as magical beings, as if they had possessed something we didn’t and they were willing to pass that magic on to us. I know. I had a heavy infatuation with teachers as a kid. So I am biased. And now, I am a high school English teacher. So there is that.
Obviously, good teachers are not superheroes.
     They have foibles just like the rest of us. But, we have to stop thinking that “good teaching” is some mystery that lies in the realm of the unknown. As if the skill of teaching is an intangible thing that cannot be taught. There are qualities that one can detect in a teacher. When you meet a good teacher you realize they are never satisfied. Good teachers say stuff like this to visitors to their classroom: "' You’re welcome to come, but I have to warn you — I am in the middle of just blowing up my classroom structure and changing my reading workshop because I think it’s not working as well as it could.'" Good teachers are constantly re-evaluating their methods and constantly looking for ways to make the learning environment better.
  • Good teachers “avidly recruit students and other teachers into the process.” I know this to be true. Good teachers create a vibe that sends the message: “let’s be a part of this.”
  • Good teachers maintain focus and ensure that everything they do in the classroom contributes to the learning process. I chuckle at this sign of a good teacher because it reminds me of a teacher I had who would always use every opportunity as a learning moment, to such an extent that we as students were not always aware of it. We might be collecting cool quotes to put into our notebooks, not realizing he was teaching us how to be better researchers.
  • Good teachers plan exhaustively and purposefully, planning backward from the desired goal. Yes, I agree this is a good sign of a great teacher. They have broad goals they want their students to reach and make sure every lesson somehow inches toward that goal. The work is in the details. It takes a mammoth amount of creative energy to accomplish this feat.
  • Good teachers seem not to complain about the system, but work relentlessly despite the combined efforts of budget, poverty, and budgetary shortcomings. The converse of this is those good teachers often are ground down by bureaucracy and quit due to burnout.
In a nutshell: Good teachers have grit.
      Here is a different video than what I originally had seen on the Atlantic's web site on the "Manager Teacher" (a model I would like to emulate). The original video was taken down and I cannot find it, but this video is sufficient for what I want to showcase. Notice two things: how the teacher has the students' full attention (that did not come out of thin air) and how from the beginning she demands from students to illustrate their understanding of what they need to do. But she is concise and she uses "economy of language" — and then the students get to work!

22.10.09

When a Classroom Lesson Does Not Go As Planned: Where the Wild Things Are


Notes from my teacher diary on a lesson that went south:
Human nature is funky. Take Max, from the Sendak story: brazen and ferocious, ruler over the beasts. Example: stretch your brain and your brain bleeds. The kids become restless. The Wild Things pervade. I forgot to get the book to read to my students and therefore the entire lesson faltered a bit. I wonder sometimes if words can ever be restored; can a word marry itself with unadulterated passion? Can Max ever reconcile the beast-logic with home?

30.9.09

Word Diary: How I Discovered Coded Languages Like "Pig Latin" and "King Tut" as a Child (And As an Adult Learned More About Their History)

In this post (which is an update of the original post I wrote in 2009), I write about the use of encoded words and phrases that have meaning only to the initiated — or, put in another way — how we can even understand each other at all! If you think about it — words are just sounds, aural signifiers that are inert, the utterances of our vocal cords. But put into context, into meaning, and then voila — we have utterances that can break through the void and become language.

Nonsensical Languages in Linguistic Terms

Nonsensical languages are so much fun. Nonsensical in the linguistic sense, that the use of words, syntax, order of words, encoded meanings, enact a playful dynamic to undercut the formal use of the dominant language form and to lay bare the construct of language, how it works and operates. You know you are a fan of the nonsensical if you can enjoy Lewis Carrol's "The Jabberwocky." I am stunned that I understand what a vorpal sword is and chortle. Amazing. Simply amazing.

The Jabberwocky by Lewis Carrol

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
      And the mome raths outgrabe.

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
      The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
      The frumious Bandersnatch!”

He took his vorpal sword in hand;
      Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree
      And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
      The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
      And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
      The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
      He went galumphing back.

“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
      Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”
      He chortled in his joy.

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
      And the mome raths outgrabe.

Most of the words in this poem are completely made-up. They are neologisms. It was only recently, after they entered the dominant language, that words like chortle and snort came into the main as "English words". But coded languages do not only appear in poetry. Look to the child's playground. Or other social spaces where the need to speak in secret emerges. Do you remember Pig Latin as a kid? I-ay o-day! We used to speak Pig Latin in the schoolyard so we could say bad words. Uck-fay ou-yay!

King Tut

"Hello" in King Tut Language
But, what about King Tut language? I stumbled upon this coded language* several years ago, working as a page in a public library - you come across a plethora of arcane, but useful books.

King Tut is a language I read about as a child in a book by Paul Dickson — it involves taking all consonants and simply doubling them and inserting a "U" in the middle. It works like code. Vowels are pronounced as usual. Here is the alphabet:

King Tut Letters

A, Bub, Coy, Dud, E, Fuf, Gug, Huh (or Hoy), I, Juj (or Joy), Kuk, Lul, Mum, Nun, O, Pup, Quk, Rur (or Roy), Sus, Tut, U, Vuv, Wuw (or Woy), Xux, Yuk (or Yoy), Zuz

Double Letters

If a letter is doubled, like in "book" you say bub-o-square-kuk.
"Hello, How are you?"
in King Tut is rendered
"Huh-e-lul-square-o, Huh-o-wuw a-rur-e yuk-o?" 
When King Tut is spoken it is unintelligible only to the uninitiated. It sounds like complete nonsense. But once you understand the code (i.e., the rules,), it's meaning becomes clear. Once you learn how it works, the code is broken and you can understand it. I have taught coded languages like King Tut to my freshman English class to impress upon them the artificial construct of a language (although I don't tell them that is why I am teaching it to them). 

It is quite impressive how quickly the students can understand what I am saying once I explain the rules. And what was at first an unknown string of sounds becomes intelligible.

But — of course, coded languages come into being for a purpose. And while I did not at first know the origins of King Tut, I learned about it as a coded language that was used by enslaved peoples in North America.

Update (August 2021):
I wrote about King Tut Language on my blog in 2009. I first read about it in the 1990s when I was a kid — reading about it in a book by Paul Dickson. Subsequently, I have learned that Tut Language has its origins in American slavery. Enslaved people used Tut to communicate amongst themselves and to practice literacy without being caught. Tutnese, or Tallehash, is way more complex in its original form than the modified version I learned. In fact, the alphabet I learned as a kid most likely is not Tut’s original form. When speaking in Tut, or writing in Tut, the coded words appeared unintelligible to outsiders; this allowed enslaved persons to speak, write, and practice literacy without being punished — as learning to read and write was forbidden by slaveholders. Enslaved people fought against their masters and learned in secret, and in code — in a way that shows the resiliency and tenacity of the human spirit. I apologize for my ignorance in originally writing this post, thinking that Tut was a child's language (like Pig Latin). It has a much richer history. And one that seems to be getting noticed as people start learning more about their individual histories.

Thank you to Gloria McIlwain's book "Tut Language" — it was the book that I read that introduced me to the Tut language's history and origins. Check it out if you wish to learn more. Here is the pronunciation table she provides (using the phonetic alphabet):
McIlwain, Gloria. “Tut Language.” American Speech, vol. 69, no. 1, 1994, pp. 111–112.
*(thanks to Dickson's Word Treasury by Paul Dickson)
Also, thanks to Wordie