Powerful Introductions - Various ways to start your introduction.

 Powerful Introductions - Various ways to start your introduction. 

• Raise a good question

• What is the difference between successful college students and unsuccessful college students? 

• Imaginary Scenario

• Imagine what your life would be like if you said everything that was ever on your mind.

• Quotation (make sure to give credit to the author)

• If you write an essay on the topic of education you could begin with: Nelson Mandela said, “Education is the most powerful weapon you can use to change the world.”

• Anecdote/Story

• I got off the train and pulled my luggage behind me.  A cab pulled up to the curb, and the driver got out.  He lifted my luggage and said, “Miss, I’m just going to put your stuff in the boot.”  I didn’t know what he meant until I saw him open the car’s trunk.  Then I realized the boot means car trunk.  I got in the cab, wondering how many other words would be different in England. 

• Powerful descriptive language and imagery

• She smiled kindly and stopped by the twisting river. Never before, looking at herself so intently in the water, had she understood who she was. Swimming had become her life. It was her passion.  

• Metaphor/Simile/Analogy

• "Working part-time as a cashier at the Piggly Wiggly has given me a great opportunity to observe human behavior. Sometimes I think of the shoppers as white rats in a lab experiment, and the aisles as a maze designed by a psychologist. Most of the rats—customers, I mean—follow a routine pattern, strolling up and down the aisles, checking through my chute, and then escaping through the exit hatch. But not everyone is so dependable. My research has revealed three distinct types of abnormal customer: the amnesiac, the super shopper, and the dawdler."

– "Shopping at the Pig"

• Surprising Fact/Research to engage reader

• Almost two-thirds of American adults at some point in their life lived in a home with at least one gun. 

• Strong, assertive statement 

• Online college classes are cheaper and more effective than in-person college classes. 

• Get Personal

• "In March 2006, I found myself, at 38, divorced, no kids, no home, and alone in a tiny rowing boat in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. I hadn’t eaten a hot meal in two months. I’d had no human contact for weeks because my satellite phone had stopped working. All four of my oars were broken, patched up with duct tape and splints. I had tendinitis in my shoulders and saltwater sores on my backside. "I couldn’t have been happier...."

– Roz Savage, "My Transoceanic Midlife Crisis." Newsweek, March 20, 2011

• Use Humour/Joke

(sources: https://www.thoughtco.com/introductory-paragraph-essays-and-reports-1691081 and https://examples.yourdictionary.com/strong-introduction-examples.html)

Writing Samples - Olympic Style Analysis

Reading and Writing Course

Writing Samples 

Narrative Essay on Cultural Identity by Lainett Méndez

Society has an irreversible tendency to separate people into different boxes. This is how they can differentiate them and determine each person’s way of thinking. At the end of the day, each individual will decide which box he or she fits in, but this is only possible when they acknowledge how their life experiences shape their interactions with the world. With this in mind, that person would have found his or her cultural identity. The factors that influence my behaviour, the way I speak and the things I consider as good or bad form my culture. Indeed being South American has affected my identity in terms of traditions, society, demography, gender, ability, among others. As a Venezuelan, my cultural identity has been molded by my family, religion, social environment and political system. 

My country is called Venezuela, it is located on the northern coast of South America and its official language is Spanish. They have been considered to be the “happiest people in the world.” The fact that I was born in Venezuela is key in determining who I am. Usually people in South America are friendly, hardworking, and tend to express their feelings and thoughts very openly. My family lives in Valencia, one of the most important cities in Venezuela due to its industrialization and technological advances in comparison to other cities. 

Childhood Dreams by Jennifer Yee

When I was a child, I loved balloons, carousels, candy floss and my father, who shared them all with me. I never wanted more. To me, the amusement park was a place in which I was free to imagine, to indulge, even to fly. I never forgot those childhood days, but the concerns of adulthood gradually moved them to the back of my mind. 

Sometimes, though, I dream I am at the amusement park again with my father. He takes me to the clown who sells helium balloons, each tied to a long piece of white string, and he buys me a huge red balloon. My father then ties the loose end of the string around my wrist so that the balloon does not drift away, but it does anyway, taking me with it.

I forget when I last had that dream. Somewhere between my childhood and today, I have forgotten how to laugh, how to play and how to dream. Now, as a university student, I think about graduation, career choices, money and marriage - not about silly balloons, carousel rides, and candy floss. As an adult, I am smothered by the real world, and no longer have the freedom to enjoy life in the same way I did when I was a child. 

Nothing in a Name by Bartley

“Molly, dinner time!” my mother yells in a sing-songy voice from the first floor. My father calls the waitress over, “Excuse me, Molly,” he states, trying to get her attention. The doorbell rings, and I answer it, “Hi, I’m Molly,” says the cheerful little girl scout standing at my doorstep. 

Names are universal identifiers; they shed no light about one’s personality. They are labels, they fail to display our identity because identity is a unique part of what makes you, you. Names are a terrible way to understand someone’s identity because names are regularly replicated. In my sixth grade class, there were three Mollys. We all had different backgrounds, different religious affiliations, and different personalities. If our names displayed who we are, wouldn’t our identities all be the same? Instead of staring at names and trying to understand their meaning, one should focus on a person’s personality, for personality depicts our identity. In fact, I have learned from experience to not infer one’s identity based on their name. For instance, in middle school, I was mutual friends with a girl named Kassidy. One Tuesday afternoon, my friend Katy told me that Kassidy was going to sit with us at lunch that day. I shrugged my shoulders and replied with a casual “okay.” Before Kassidy walked in, I had a whole image of her in my mind: blond hair, cute pastel coloured clothes…

Aspects of Writing

Subject matter

• Clear - can easily identify what the writing is about

• Depth? - Does the writer provide examples and reasons behind what they are saying

• Interesting and thought-provoking - do people care about this topic?

Voice and Style

• Complex word choice (ex. Instead of using the words "very" or "really," use "profoundly" or "deeply")

• Not wordy (use of big words without understanding the meaning or words are out of place)

• Descriptive - appeals to the five senses (taste, touch, smell, sight, sound)

• Figurative Language - simile, metaphor, onomatopoeia, imagery  

Structure

• Clear topic sentence and supporting sentences

• Varied sentence length (ex. "I like chocolate" "He is kind")

• Logical progression - one thought builds into the next thought

Grammar

• Run-on sentences? 

• Do not fit too many ideas in the same sentence

• Topic sentence first and supporting sentences 

• Proper punctuation? (Capitalization, periods)

• Subject-verb agreement

• Complete sentences

• Ex. I agree. What exactly are you agreeing with? I agree with the statement that says it is important to maintain your identity because...

• Spelling 

Olympic Style Analysis - Reading and Writing Summer Course

Olympic Style Analysis - Reading and Writing Summer Course 

Effective writers examine while reading 

I have taken on teaching a writing and reading course on Saturdays this summer through a local tutoring agency and feel compelled to showcase my thoughts on how the lesson went today. 

For today's lesson, I had the students read through three different writing excepts - these are excerpts I had taken from various essays I had found online (I will link them below). I made sure to choose writing excerpts that were quite different. Even though all three essays were on the topic of "identity," I wanted to make sure that each piece was varied in terms of style of writing, subject matter, voice etc. I chose pieces that would appeal to different readers in distinct ways. I truly believe, and kept reiterating to my students, that the most effective writers, are effective readers. It is important when you are reading for the sake of improving your writing, to actually take time to examine and study various forms of writing and ask yourself questions - What works? What doesn't? Why do I like this piece over another one? What is it about the way language is used? 

I wanted to get the students to really begin to pick out and pinpoint, describe and put a name to what they find most effective about what they read. If they are intrigued and interested in a certain style, they must ask themselves why and actually take the lengths to describe what they find to be the most effective. This is a process that they then transfer over to their own writing. I let my students know that effective writers in essence, borrow, imitate, combine, and create based on what they have read - based on what has excited them about other people's writing and from there they generate something new, their own voice. I also let my students know that the purpose of writing is to communicate the power of their own unique and original voice. I told them that they are singular in their thoughts, opinions, views, and backgrounds and that there is nobody else on the planet who thinks the same way they do or can offer the same things to the world as they can. Writing is thus about getting out their own  particular colour or shade of thought and shining it out onto the world - for the world to enjoy, be challenged by, find affinity and commonality in - and so much more! :) 

I thought this activity went particularly well and I was pleasantly surprised as God helped me come up with some random ideas throughout. There were three excerpts. We read each excerpt twice and took turns reading. I told the students that (in my view) reading is not only done once but twice, three times (even more!). I let them know that effective reading is rereading as it is only when you read something a few times that one can truly grasp, understand, and pick up various understandings. Each time they read, they are to slow down, truly take in the language, loiter, understand how one idea connects to the previous, question what they have read, linger in the writing, hangout there, make sense and meaning. As they read again, they can start breaking language down - hmmm, they used this word instead of this word, what is the author really trying to say here, they used a particular type of description - why? How does this create the meaning of the piece? Reading and rereading is about losing oneself to the world of that novel, that essay, that article - it is unique to the individual how they will lose themselves in the text, but they are to do it. They are to use their own creativity and imagination to do so - their own background, experiences, their own previous play in language, to connect ideas, to go places, to experience more through the text. The text is their own bouncy castle or spring board in which they can reach amazing heights within themselves. 

Gamification of lessons! - This was one of the God ideas - but I told students to pretend that this is the "Reading and Writing Olympics" - as the Olympics are happening right now. They have to rank each piece of writing and give a Gold, Silver or Bronze medal to each piece BUT they must choose ONE aspect of writing in which to make their examinations by - subject matter, voice and style, structure, or grammar. I had searched online previously and looked up - "what makes effective writing" or "what makes good writing" and these were the categories that came up. I then made a kind of criteria sheet for the students to use when they are analyzing and critiquing these pieces (which is at the end of the document that I will link below). Another God idea was to have each student focus on ONE area to critique rather than to critique each of the various areas. I find this helpful as it allowed each student to narrow in on one aspect and concentrate their thoughts more effectively as I find if they focused on all categories it would become quite confusing. It is important to chunk and break things down. 

Now I don't know if I was reading the room well but I think the students enjoyed this activity quite a bit. I felt like having them rank the piece gave them some type of autonomy and power to make choice and exercise their opinions. While student answers were similar, their choices were different. For example, where one student chose bronze for a certain excerpt, another student chose silver. I thought that was great as it enabled students to give the reasons behind their choices and the other students had to listen. This also enabled students to exercise critical thinking skills and actually analyze and understand why they like one piece of writing over another. For example, one student said that the writing, "Childhood Dreams" by Jennifer Yee, enabled her to paint a picture in her mind when she was reading it as the language was descriptive. She said that the topic was very interesting to her and examples presented were quite specific. Another student said that they were tied between "Childhood Dreams" and "Nothing in a Name" but it was ultimately the grammar in "Nothing in a Name" that made them finally choose "Childhood Dreams" instead. Another student said that "Narrative Essay on Cultural Identity" was a bit confusing in the beginning and they weren't exactly sure where the piece was going. 

The breakdown of the excerpts was effective. I told students that this is what I would like them to do with their own writing - to break down what they write and examine it through a lens of what makes effective writing. In this sense, students are always revising and improving their writing and becoming effective communicators through their words. This exercise took the full 1.5 hours and I do think it could have gone even longer if I probed and asked more questions. There were many times where I was trying to have students be more specific with what they liked and didn't like. 

I think if one wanted to extend this activity, they could have students do some of their own writing and have other students perhaps (anonymously) rank and examine each other's pieces and give their reasons why. In a classroom, one could do this activity, and perhaps even give awards or medals like the academy awards and rank different students' writing in various categories - best figurative language, best grammar, best subject matter, best depth, etc - I think that could be really fun! I feel that there is so much more I can say but I will end my thoughts here for today. Overall the ideas here went well and it was a good class.

Writing Samples 

https://forlackofwonder.blogspot.com/2021/08/writing-samples-olympic-style-analysis.html 

Frustration

A few weeks ago I started tutoring a boy! His father contacted me through Craigslist as I had put out an ad saying that I help with one-on-one tutoring. This adolescent has been classified with autism. 

Today in our session we were talking about theme within the short story he is reading and I pryed and probed a little more based on the theme he had suggested for the story. I asked him "who" - which character in the story feels this/that way based on the theme he proposed. 

I asked the question maybe five times and there were a lot of pauses,  perhaps breaks in his thinking and shutting down. In the end he hit his head on his table obviously resigning himself to his frustration of not being able to answer the question in that moment. He is a very capable boy and so extremely clever - I am not just saying this! He brings up topics and takes our conversations to some very interesting and unique places. I believe strongly he could answer the question and in the end he did with more prompting and encouragement from his father. 

I feel led to write about this experience, however as my mind is stayed on this whole concept/idea of frustration. I understand that this boy has been labeled as having autism thus there are some types of developmental differences that perhaps make it more challenging to process information and think on his feet and thus shut down, but I am still led to explore the idea of frustration on more of a social level. 

Typically we become frustrated I think due to pressures - perhaps we feel that we are not meeting a certain expectation we have placed on ourselves, somebody or something around us is not measuring up to a type of standard - we have an idea of what we think should happen and that thing is just not happening. In the case of Uriah, he perhaps wanted to express his thoughts quickly and just could not put A and B together, maybe he was having breaks in his thinking, distracted by other thoughts or perhaps and very likely so, he was thinking about the label of having Autism coupled with the ideas that have been flying around that he is not "so great" in English - all of these pressures were perhaps barriers that made him shut down in the end. He had to take a break in our session and went to talk with his father. 

I am reminded in this session of what I learned in the teaching program called "growth mindset" - a type of mentality that is encouraged in children where they celebrate the process, the step by step successes rather than just the outcome. I feel that there is too little of this right now in our education system or perhaps in trying to make this transition we are still focused on the older system which is very much results driven and oriented. Even though Uriah has been classified as having autism, I still believe that there are some aspects of his behaviour which were learned or he was conditioned to believe. 

For example, why is it that when he could not answer the question, he became frustrated? Where did all this pressure come from? His father was with Uriah and myself on the call for a bit after this happened and was encouraging him to pinpoint or pick out the causes for his frustration. I feel that this is a good strategy and a good step towards being the master over one's emotions. When we are able to understand the root causes for our anger/frustrations then we can actually address the underlying problem and not the symptom (the emotion) that results from the issue. I was also encouraging Uriah to be patient with himself. I think it is so important and necessary to be kind towards ourselves, slow down, take a step back, breathe, and start again. Frustraton like every other emotion, will come and go, it is how you handle the emotion that makes all the difference in the world and knowing that you can move forward, that there is a possibility to move forward and knowing the right steps of how to do so is paramount.   

Aujourd'hui, j'ai eu le privilège avoir la séance avec T. Il est un garçon qui j'ai rencontré à travers de Craiglist. J'ai affiché un pub parce que j'ai voulu commençer ma carrière en enseignement et j'ai eu l'idée á commençer les choses á travers de en ligne. T est un garçon trés intelligent. Il aime les nombres, mathématiques, art, l'histoire et géographie. J'apprecie et respect l'amour que son pere J a pour son fils. J'ai une sentiment chaleureuse dans mon coeur. 

Je me sens que beaucoup des les temps, on ne passe pas les temps á apprecier les uns les autres. On rejete les gens avant on a la chance pour les connaitre et les gens n'ont pas la chance d'exprimer eux-mêmes. C'est très triste. J'espere que Dieu benira ce relation et que je peux vraiment l'aider. 

Slowing Down Pace

I found today's two classes a bit challenging for me - why? All the students in the class are at different levels of output. Some students - no problem are able to produce what I ask of them - write 2-3 examples, etc - while other students can only complete one and some students do not seem to understand the directions at all and have to ask several times what we are doing. There are also several students when I go up to them - cannot formulate any ideas - it is hard for them to write anything down on a piece of paper and when I probe them for ideas - they say....hmmm, I dont know...I'll ask...what about this, or what about that? And they'll say again....I dont know. I really dont know how I am to assess this type of output. It shouldn't be the case that these students get left behind.

Here was a break down of my lesson today -

(1) Students will assess their neighborhoods in three areas - outlook/perspective, opportunities/choice, belonging, making sure to account for their physical and digital spheres.

(2) I asked each student to write down examples of each and gave them a chart and a venn diagram to start comparing their neighborhoods to that of the main character in the novel.

I found that it was hard mobilizing students in both classes. It seemed in a way that I needed to hold their hand through the entire process and many students did not seem to understand.

Ways I can improve
* I could include more labels on the venn diagram or even do modeling on the computer that they can follow along
*I am breaking things down....okay well break things down even more into tiny little bits that they can process and I mean tiny. Maybe dont make them think about the physical and digital, but make them thinking about only one or the other.
*Everything needs to be structured bit by bit  - instead of introducing PEA - Point, Evidence, Analysis all at once I need to introduce P - point, thats it and then E - evidence, and then A - analysis. The templates I give them need to be very much broken down.
*How I organize the handout MATTERS - labels need to be clearly defined, did I mention that everything needs to be broken down? (lol)

Success for today:

-they got their ideas onto a venn diagram - albeit slowly but the ideas were there

Teaching to students with emotional problems

One question that has consistently been on my mind is how to teach students who are going through emotional problems. I think oftentimes we can forget that the children / youth we are teaching come from complex and often painful backgrounds. Some students come from troubled and broken homes - absentee, strict, harsh or abusive parents or family members that make life for them unbearable at home. The classroom, therefore, or high school environment is their own safe place or respite from the difficulties at home. It can be very challenging thus for teachers to teach with these difficulties in mind. We see in the classroom how these challenges in students' living environments manifest in behavioral problems in students - students who are distracted, unable to stay on task, disruptive and attention seeking, angry, etc (the list goes on).

Last week during my volunteering one student disclosed to me that she has difficult family problems that she faces at home - her father tends to be quite strict and does not understand her. This student is also dealing with friendship problems in the school - not fitting in and not feeling safe with the current friends that she has. She explained that she suffers from depression and has self-harmed in the form of cutting and suicidal attempts. Another student, I learned this week lives with her mother, but her mother is ill and in and out of hospital. She has other siblings but they do not live with her. She lives only with her mother. My guess then is that she is home alone a lot. This student also has a boyfriend. Both students are only 13 years old. 

I question to myself how a teacher teaches students who are going through such unbearable circumstances in their living environments. I was reading a few articles online that offered good points to consider.

1) Making curriculum relevant to students' lives - I already hold to the importance in making sure that curriculum and in classroom material has a personal connection to students' lives or that the teacher works to create a personal connection to material. Oftentimes resources in the school system are scant, so in the English classroom teachers must use novels, etc that could be rather outdated. Teachers then must endeavour to create and draw personal connections to the text. For example, a novel study on the book Coraline by Neil Gaiman could have students explore their own personal fears and the virtue of courage - areas in their own lives where they must demonstrate courage, why courage is necessary in life, how courage can impact not only their own personal lives but the lives of others. I think the goal is to make their learning in one area transferable to other areas, not only in the field of academics (essay writing, etc), but their own personal growth and development. One article suggested giving students a survey of their own personal interests and how they use their spare time and developing lessons that are geared to student interests.

2) Create positive peer interactions and relationships - developing a sense of classroom community. One article explained that peer relationships are second to impact in a student's life - group learning, peer tutoring/editing, classroom meetings.

3) Relaxation Techniques
4) Teaching students how to cope with stress
5) Developing & encouraging student strengths
6) Keeping classroom rules and instructions simple
7) Using texts (novels, short stories, poems) to help children navigate through their emotions (what was the character feeling, why do you think she was feeling that way, how would you feel in the same situation, how could she deal with this emotion, how would you deal with it?)


http://www.ascd.org/publications/classroom-leadership/nov2003/Helping-Students-with-Emotional-Problems-Succeed.aspx

https://developingminds.net.au/articles-for-professionals/2017/5/21/helping-kids-deal-with-negative-emotions-in-the-classroom