First Assignment... ummm

no really I'm not doing this the night before class two... I wrote it ages ago and am just pasting it in. :-)

1. What content area are you teaching? Why are you teaching this subject?

I teach physics and chemistry. I love them, and I want somehow to make relevant, not the content and lessons of either, but the lessons I learned while wrestling with these subjects for the past few years. The latter confusingly worded statement is a big mushy romantic goal and comes with the bittersweet side effect of revealing that my first sentence is to a great deal a lie... In reality, I teach math and literacy more than physics or chemistry.

2. What have you noticed about the students you are teaching this year? Do they have particular problems with reading or writing? What are their strengths?

They seem to have had little experience with core couses like math, science or reading that actually might inspire them to view any of those subjects are something more than what they have to do to satisfy somebody in charge.

I do believe they have trouble with both reading and writing. From the point of view of a physicist, the thing I find most troubling is that they don't seem to be aware of the need to form and clearly communicate a hierarchy of ideas. Another way of saying this is that they seem to approach the concept of the outline much like they approach showing their work on a math problem--why do it yourself if you don't have to; why spend time looking for the big ideas or structure of what somebody else wrote if it's already written; why think you have to if you're not being forced to do it in english (math) class.

As for strengths, they are very good at expressing that they have an opinion. Despite not feeling confident in writing essays or complete sentences, they have none of the fear I remember having about speaking my mind. They have a confidence, passion and expressiveness about their opinions that would put most talk radio shows to shame (and perhaps do so without anyone noticing the lack of coherent structure!).

3. What do you most want to learn in this course?

I want to learn how to identify where my students are at in:
--the terminology of the people who require me to focus on reading across the curriculum
--the language of my fellow teachers
--the lingo of my students...
When I know where the students are and can communicate in all those languages, I hope to translate my own thoughts into each language and not have to be so darned wordy about it.

See, in the end, I find that writing as a form or communication is more important to me than most of the specific content pasted to my classroom wall. I want my students to understand that, harshly said, nobody cares what they know unless they can communicate it... more kindly and truthfully said: very few people have the time to understand what they are trying to communicate when they do it in the mode they are trying to use. I believe this, feel this, want to help them learn this... but honestly don't feel like I have the words or way to connect to them and then connect them to my expectations or those of the other two groups I mentioned above.

And after all my longwindedness and all this attempt at translation, are they still listening? Will they believe when I try to teach them to do as I say and not as I have just done in this ramble?