Comments Off on Resources for Teachers Preparing for a Diverse Classroom

By Shelbi, December 8, 2012 6:10 pm

• Flannery, M.E.  (2010).  Welcoming ELL Parents into the Classroom. National Education Association.  March 28, 2012.  From http://www.nea.org/home/37153.htm.

In this article, Flannery describes methods for increasing ELL parent involvement in the classroom. Centered around the idea that teachers, parents, students, and schools represent a team, the article offers different “invitations” for teachers to extend to ELL parents. These creative methods offer teachers unique ways to go beyond just calling or having a translator in the room at a parent teacher conference– although both of those can serve important functions to get in contact with ELL parents.

• Panferov, S.  (2010).  Increasing ELL Parental Involvement in Our Schools: Learning From the Parents. Theory Into Practice, 49, (2): 106-112.  From http://globalprojects.arizona.edu/sites/globalprojects.arizona.edu/files/Panferov%20-%20Increasing%20ELL%20Parental%20Involvement.pdf.

This article uses real case studies to document and demonstrate ways in which schools can engage ELL parents as resources in the classroom. The article specifically tackles ELL parent’s views of literacy  as well as parent to child and parent to school interactions which will contribute to school success. As a future educator, this article provides specific stories reflecting the views of real ELL parents and engagement strategies which would have been most effective in these two cases and cases like these.

• Waterman, R., & B. Harry.  (2008).  Building Collaboration Between Schools and Parents of English Language Learners: Transcending Barriers, Creating Opportunities.  The National Center for Culturally Responsive Education Systems.  March 28, 2012.  From http://nccrest.org/Briefs/PractitionerBrief_BuildingCollaboration.pdf.

This article provides information for practicing educators regarding ways to overcome the barriers in place for the parents of ELL students. The article elucidates various obstacles to these parents which all result in parents having few or no opportunities for collaboration with and in their child’s school. The authors then move to describe and recommend specific policy innovations for districts.  It is acknowledged that schools may need to introduce these new methods gradually because if implemented too quickly they may fail from lack of appropriate resources to maintain them. As a future educator I would feel comfortable referencing this article because the authors outline (in detail) 10 critical ways to increase parental involvement validated by scholarly research.

Comments Off on What is Culture?

By Shelbi, May 1, 2012 11:59 pm

Education and Culture

In their article “Understand Culture” Shelley Zion and Elizabeth Kozleski (2005) define culture as “the system of shared beliefs, values, customs, behaviors, and artifacts that members of society use to interact with their world and with one another” (p. 3). Continuing in an anthropological direction, culture is a powerful tool for survival, but it is a surprisingly delicate phenomenon which is constantly changing. For example, consider how the attitudes and values of a school may change when a new principal is hired, this new individual may make specific changes to shift the culture of a school in a different direction. But culture, as a noun with a concise definition like the one provided by Zion and Kozleski (2005), is easier to understand than its tremendous effects in the classroom. Continue reading 'What is Culture?'»

Comments Off on Critical Literacy Invitation

By Shelbi, May 1, 2012 11:51 pm

As a summation to ED 398 in the spring of 2012 we completed an Invitation for students to engage in critical literacy in our classroom.  Continue reading 'Critical Literacy Invitation'»