EDRG 3344 Memories Blog - Grandma

My grandma's death was the memory that made me cry. I just never thought that I would lose her, she had gotten sick before but always got well enough to go home. I remember it was a few days after Christmas that my grandma was taken to the hospital, all of my family went to visit her and see how she was doing. It hurt us so much to see her sicker than she had ever been. My grandma had a hernia in her stomach that affected her when she ate, she wouldn't and couldn't eat because every time she did she got sick. The doctors said that there was nothing that they could do about the hernia, because since she was older it would cause more damage than good if they removed it. My grandma was also developing dementia, and it was developing quickly. From the hospital she was moved to a nursing home. My brothers and I would visit my grandma after school and some after work, and my mom would visit her everyday and would spend hours there. I spent my twenty-first birthday with my mom and grandma, and that is when I got my last gift from her. My grandma was still getting worse and she was moved to the hospital again. It was hard to see her with tubes of medicine and food connected to her. The doctors would talk to my mom and we all knew that there wasn't anything more that could be done for her. Her dementia was also getting worse, most times she couldn't even remember who we were. When we would talk to her we would have to tell her who we were. Even though she had a hard time remembering who we were she started to talk about things that had happened a long time ago as if they were recent. She would also tell us that my grandpa had come to visit her and would tell her to get a red dress because he was going to take her on a trip. My grandpa had died before any grand kids were born about thirty years ago. Many times my whole family including my aunt, uncle, cousins and my two older brothers girlfriends would be at the hospital at the same time. This was about sixteen of us there at once, but the doctors never complained because they knew what was coming. She was getting much worse, she couldn't take any food, and the medication was not helping at all. After talking to my mom and her brother and sister it was decided that my grandma would be put into hospice care. When she was moved into hospice one of the people in charge talked to us and told us what would start happening to her. We knew what to expect but never thought it would happen so soon.
I still remember the day that she died. It was Friday March 6, the last day of school before spring break. After I got out of classes I had my brother drop me off at home before he went to work and waited for my mom to get home so we could go see my grandma. That day everyone was there including my brothers girlfriends, my great aunt, and a few others. It was getting really late so my parents decided to send all of us kids home, even though I was tired I had this strange feeling that I shouldn't leave. All of my brothers and cousins left and I stayed there with my parents, uncle and aunt, and I sat next to my mom by my grandmas bedside. I was kinda tired and falling asleep and I noticed that my grandmas breathing was changing. Next thing I know my mom grabbed my hand stood me up and pulled me closer to my grandma. My grandma was gone, she had passed away. I started crying so much, I loved my grandma and didn't know what I would do without her. We called everyone who had just left and told them what happened. All of my brothers had just gotten home when we called but the were back in about five minutes, even though the trip usually took twenty minutes. We told the nurses and they said she was gone, and they had to call the hospice people. When the hospice doctor got there they confirmed that my grandma had passed away. My grandma died on March 6 but since she was in hospice we had to wait for them to make the call so the official date of death is March 7. After the people from the mortuary took her we all went home, that night I cried myself to sleep. I was mad at myself when she died, I wished that I could have helped her, and I was mad at myself for not being their with her earlier that day because I went home first. I thought I should have been there for her like she was always there for me.
My brothers and I were extremely close to our grandma, she took care of use from the time we were six weeks old when my mom had to go back to work, till the time we were five and six before we started kinder. She raised all of us. I didn't have any sisters so my besides my mom my grandma was someone that I could always talk to and spend time with. Almost everyday when I was done with classes I would go to her house, and we would talk and watch Gilmore Girls and Little House on the Prairie, sometime when I watch those shows now I get sad. I still cry sometimes, my grandma was one of my best friends, she took a piece of my heart with her when she died and I miss her a lot. Today was her birthday and it felt so weird and sad that I didn't have to buy her anything. A strange thing that happened when she died was that a little musical lamb that played Jesus Loves Me stopped working. We had been playing it over and over for her and once she died the music stopped playing and it hasnt worked since. My dad said she took the music with her. Sorry this was so long I guess I got carried away. All I have left to say if to those of who still have your grandparents, treasure them always, because you never know what will happen.

EDRG 3321 Wed. Night - Chapter 4

In this past weeks meeting we discussed chapter four, Responding to literature. While going through the chapter we learned that when children make connections with what they are reading, the world around them almost disappears, and they are totally engrossed in the story. I am actually one of these kinds of readers, once I start reading and get into a story it is hard for me to stop. We also learned that connections children make are usually formed by their own background or schema. This means that the student come with their own personal knowledge when reading literature, and this affects how they will perceive the material. I think that as teachers we must do our best to help our students make connections in literature, as well as providing them with a positive experience with literature. Something that I liked from out last class were they activities that Professor Pickett had us do. The one that I liked the most was the story that we had to read from different perspectives. I think that this was a helpful and fun way to show us that students will not always have the same perspective on the stories that are being read. This helped me understand that children need to be guided while they are reading.

Another thing that chapter four mentioned was proficient versus poor readers. This is where they said that proficient readers always stay proficient readers, and poor readers always stay poor readers. Personally I don't believe that this is true. This is because I was a poor reader in school and I didn't learn how to read until the second grade. I was a poor reader, put I did not stay a poor reader. I liked how the book mentioned that if the reader was motivated that the teacher should help them out. I think this is something very imortant for teachers to do, even if the student doesn't seem motivated, we need to try to get them interested in reading because many times children don't seem motivated because they think that they can't read correctly or on a higher level. If they know the teacher believes that they can do it, they will start to believe in themselves as well. So I agree with the book that teachers should motivate their students in reading. This is actually something that worked for me. Since I just learned to read in second grade I moved on to third grade reading on second grade level, but my teacher was always motivating my class to read. During our free time we could read whatever we wanted and as a class we would read books that were between the third and sixth grade level. Even though the books were hard at first I felt more comfortable and motivated to read because we were reading them as a class. It was because of this teacher that I had a complete turn around in reading. I started the year on second grade level and ended on the fifth or sixth grade level. If we as teachers believe in our students like my teacher believed in me we will take them excel, even the ones who are the poor readers.

Something that I was conflicted about was the discussion we had about giving the students who are on a lower reading level, that we should give them material that is for the level they are on. An example being that if you have a fifth grader who is on the third grade level, you should be giving them third grade work, because the fifth grade work is not developmentally appropriate for them, or it the class is reading a book, give them the lower level version of the book. Personally, I think that this is a helpful thing to do for the student who are on a lower level, but in certian situations I think it may cause more harm than good. I think that you should give students the lower level work on the subjects they have the most trouble with, and give them the other work in the subjects they are better in. Another thing where I believe that it is good to let them do the lower level work is in their free reading time. When students go to the library I dont think that you should ever tell them what books they have to check out, if the kid is on third grade level they should be allowed to check out a third grade level book. The part of this that I had trouble agreeing with was that if you were reading a book or studying something as a class you would give that student the lower level version of what the rest of the class was doing. I think that sometimes this can be damaging to the student, they may feel dumb, or like the teacher doesn't believe they can read the same book as everyone else. I know that if this had happened to me in the third grade I wouldn't have wanted to read at all, becasue it wasnt even the same book as everyone else had and I would have felt like the teacher didn't think I could read with the class, so why bother.

Overall chapter four was very interesting, and I enjoyed reading it as well as the class activities and discussions. There were a lot of things that I found interesting, many things I agreed with and a few I didn't agree with. As always I enjoyed the activities that we did.

EDRG 3321 Wed Night - Author Study

This is actually a book written by Madonna. It is for ages nine through twelve. It is about a cobbler and his wife, Olga. They become heartbroken because their son Makhail had become very ill. The cobble goes to seek help from a wise old man who lives in their town. After the mans attempts to help fails he goses to seek the help of seven theives. With the help of the seven theives they find a solution to help save Makhails life.

There is a quote that I really like that is in the beginning of the book

We must never forget that hidden behind a large amount of darkness is a large amount of light.

EDRG 3344 - Personal Writing

In class this past week we learned about personal writing. Professor Harris informed us that personal writing is writing like, text messaging, letters, blogs and so on, and it is something that you do for yourself and its not really academic. I never really paid attention to how much I actually wrote untill I learned about personal writing. Some types of personal writing that I do frequently is text, email and website, planner, post-it and to do list. Texting is something that I do often because it is an easy way to keep contact with my family, there are ten of us and we are always going in different directions, so it is an easy way to keep up with each other. I do personal writing by email, texting, and my myspace and facebook websites to keep in contact with my friends and family, both the ones who live out of state and the ones who live in Texas but I don't get to see that often. I also use a planner to help me keep things like class projects, and assignments, church events and other things in order. I use post-its and to-do list to help remind me of things I have to do during the day.

In class on Wednesday we made all about me dolls, that we put our names in and five details about something we loved. I was kind of mistaken at first and though it was supposed to be five things that we loved. Anyway in the end I decided to write why I loved shopping because shopping is the way that I get the other things that I like.


Shopping is such a fun thing to do
There are so many things I like to buy
Books and magazines I love to read
Scarves, hats and jackets to wear in fall and winter
Cd's from all my favorite artist
Shopping is something I do to bond
Hanging out at the mall with my friends
Or spending the day out with my mom
Walking, talking, and laughing
Going from store to store
Trying on clothes, shoes, and accessories
Shopping is a fun thing to do

EDRG 3321 Wed. Night - Author Study

Author Profile

Shiloh is another book by the author Phyllis Reynolds Naylor. The main character of Shiloh is Marty Preston, a young boy who lives in West Virginia. One day Marty finds a dog in the hills by his home, that he that he thinks is abused by his owner. Marty's parents make him return Shiloh to his owner Judd Taverns, but Shiloh returns to Marty's house looking more abused than before. Instead of returning the dog for a second time, he names the dog Shiloh and begins to steal food and sneak him food, while keeping him hidden in the woods. Marty also decides to keep Shiloh a secret from his parents so they wont make him return the dog to Judd. Throughout out the story Marty's lies begin to pile up as he struggles with what is right and wrong and Judd gets closer and closer to finding Shiloh.

I think that this is a good book to use in the classroom because it shows how Marty struggles between what is right and what is wrong and many times this is something that children go through.

This is one website that I have found useful while researching children's authors. http://www.scholastic.com

EDRG 3321 Wed. Night - Chapter 3

The emphasis of chapter three is placed on comprehension and vocabulary. While reading our textbook we learn that comprehension is the process of understanding or making meaning from what we are reading. I liked that the definition of this was making meaning from print. This means that if there is not any comprehension that there is only a decoding of print as opposed to actual reading. I think that the definition goes with the quote in the beginning of the chapter. This quote was first we learn to read, and then we learn from reading.

Something that I never really thought about was the fact that we must have some prior knowledge to truly understand what we are reading, and that if there is not any prior knowledge present there is little to no comprehension. This is because is there is no prior knowledge the reader doesn't have any information to associate with the new information. I also enjoyed learning about the Transactional Theory of Comprehension, which discussed how every reader reads differently, and reads for different reasons. Under this theory there is aesthetic reading and efferent reading. Aesthetic reading is reading for fun or pleasure and is not very complex, while efferent reading is done to gain important knowledge and requires more work than aesthetic reading. I think that it is important to allow both types of reading in the classroom, because if you don't you may turn children off to reading. I also believe that when you are doing aesthetic reading in the classroom the students should be allowed to read what they chose.

Something that I found interesting in class is when Professor Pickett told us about how our brain actually reads ahead of us and this is something that helps us read with ease or fluency. I found this to be very interesting information, before I heard this I never really thought that our brain did that, I just thought our brain read along with the actual word we were on. I also enjoyed learning about reading and retelling. This is when you have the students retell or summarize what they or the teacher have just read, and where you gain insight to their listening skills. Something that I liked on Wednesday night was the retelling activity we did by making presentations on the books that we read. I found it interesting to see how everybody took the templates that Professor Pickett gave us and made them there own so they could retell the story in a creative way. This is something that I would do in my future classroom as a way to let the students to be creative and show their comprehension of what they have read.

This chapter had a lot of information on understanding comprehension, and how to approach and teach it in the classroom. I found all the information useful and important things to take into consideration when I have my own classroom. Reading is one of my favorite things to do, and I believe that it is important to teach children reading and how to comprehend what they have read. I also think that the quote that first we learn to read and then we read to learn is true. This is why we need to use the information we learned in this chapter in our classrooms, so that we can help students understand what they are reading. If we teach students how to comprehend what they read it can help make reading a more enjoyable experience for students.

EDRG 3344 If I won...

If I won the lottery I would be so excited I would probably freak out. If I won the lottery I would try to be as responsible as I possibly could. I would also be smart with my winnings so I would not blow it on useless things.

The first thing that I would do would be to give some of the money I won to may parents so they could pay off some bill and cars. The next thing that I would do is pay off the student loan that I had to take out so I could attend A&M San Antonio for a year. I would try and help my oldest brother with money and I would give my other older brother some money to help pay off his college loans. Since there are seven kids in my family I would also give my parents money to put towards my two youngest brothers college education.

Instead of spending money on an apartment I would stay living in my parents home if or at least while I was still in school and I was still in my early twenty's. If I was already out of school or older that's when I would use some money to get a nice but reasonably priced apartment. I would also keep the car I currently have until the time came that I actually needed a new one.
Something else that I would do is donate money to the Samaritan's Purse organizations and donate shoe box gifts to the Operation Christmas Child Program. Operation Christmas Child is a program from Samaritan's Purse where you fill up shoe boxes or plastic containers with school supplies, toys, candy, books, and other items to get sent all over the world. Samaritan's Purse is one of my favorite organizations so I would also give money to their World Medical Mission, their Children's Heart Project, and their Food and Water fund. I love to read and think that it is something very important for children so I would either donate money to school library's or buy books and donate them to schools.

Other than doing those things I would not spend my money on useless or pricey things that I did not need. Something else I think I would do is put some money in investments. I would also put some money away to start college funds for my future children as well as putting some money away for retirement. I would put half of what was left of my money in a checking account and the other half in a savings account and start building on both.

EDRG 3344 M&W chapter 3 blog

In class on Monday we learned that writing is a process. Our textbook states that the focus in the writing process is on the students and what they think and do as they write, and that it is writer centered. In class we also learned that there are five stages in the writing process. These stages are prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing.

The Writing Process

1. Prewriting

Prewriting helps to organize your thoughts and is where you make sematic maps. Our textbook sates that during the prewritng stage students will choose a topic, consider the purpose, form and their audience. They will also generate and organize their ideas for writing. This is where the sematic maps come in. Some key features in prewriting are for students in engage in rehersal activities and to identify their audience and purpose for writing.

This is an example of a sematic map that I found on the internet. We also did an example of a sematic map in class using plants as the main topic of a narrative story. Prewriting is a very important stage in the writing process, Murray (1982) believes that about 70% of our writing time should be spent on the prewriting stage.

2. Drafting

Drafting is the stage where students get all their ideas down on paper. During the draftings stage the emphasis is placed on the content of the paper instead on the mechanics. This is why papers written during the drafting stage are commonly called sloppy copies or rough drafts, and they are usually messy. When students write during the drafting stage emphasis is placed on content instead of correct spelling and neatness.

3. Revising

Revising is the stage where were students can change/add or delete any sentences, content or ideas. Students make four types of changes -additions, substitutions, deletions, and moves- as they revise (Faigley & Witte, 1981). This is where they will clarify and refine ideas in their paper. In our textbook we learn that the word revision means "seeing again", and that this is the stage where the writer sees their paper again with help from classmates and their teacher. In class we discussed that in this part of the writing process we have writers workshops or conferences with either partners or in groups.

4. Editing

Editing is the stage where you put your writing in it's final form. Every stage before the revision stage content is what the focus was on, but during the revision stage the focus changes to the mechanics. During the revision stage the goal is to make the writing "optimally readable" (Smith, 1982). This is why duirng the revision stage students make corrections to the mechanics of their paper. These mechanics are the conventions like spelling, capitalization, punctuation, and sentence structure. This is also a part of the writing process when we have writers workshops or conferences with either partners or in groups. Something that may help students during the editing stage is a proofreader's mark page and an editing checklist.

5. Publishing

This is the stage where students will bring their writing to life. They will do this by either publishing or sharing them orally with an audience. In class we discussed that publishing can be putting the students work on walls and giving it social justice. In the publishing stage students will make a final copy of their writing and will share their writing with their class, parents and sometimes other community members.

EDRG 3321 Wed. Night ch.1-2

Chapter ones main focus was based on the notion of what children's literature is. Something I liked was the quote by Dick King-Smith,"A teacher's most important role is first to teach the art of reading and then to foster in every possible way a child's enjoyment of books." I liked how the textbook referred to literature as the backbone to the reading program. This is something I believe to be true, if we give our students a love of literature and reading, it will not only help them in reading, but other subjects as well. Our textbook stated that teachers from kindergarten through the eighth grade set the stage for students having good reading and writing experiences. They do this by introducing different types and genres of literature to their students. I believe that this is very important because you can't constrain children to only one genre. The transformative experiences was another subject matter that the textbook mentioned. It is good to find books that the children have the opportunity to apply some background knowledge of their own. I think that this is one of the many ways that children can truly enjoy literature.

Chapter two focused on culture and what a teacher must be aware of in order to be effective in their classroom. Two cultures that were mentioned are surface culture and deep culture. Surface culture is what is apparent like what you wear or eat, or that holidays you celebrate, while deep culture refers to characteristics, values or beliefs that are not always apparent. Something I liked was the culturally responsive model that is used to help schools. I also liked how the textbook stated that stories mean different things to different people, and I believe that this is an important thing for teachers to understand.

Author Profile:
The author that I have chosen to write my author profile on is Phyllis Reynolds Naylor. I chose her because I found her books to be funny, and entertaining, many having characters of storylines that children could relate to. I also think children would enjoy reading her books, which range from kindergarten to sixth grade level.

This is one of the books by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor titled "Roxie and the Hooligans." The book is about Roxie Warbler, a young girl who is constantly teased by a group of hooligans lead by Helvita Hagus. One day Roxie is chased into a dumpster by the hooligans who fall in after her. She finds herself trapped in the dumpster with them as it is tossed into the ocean. They make it to an island that they later find out is housing two theives. The Hooligans are afraid of the theives, so it is up to Roxie to save the day, defeating the theives and helping the hooligans to safety.

EDRG 3344 chapter 4 blog

A circular story is a story that starts with one scenario and also ends with the same scenario. A circular story may start with one thing which then leads to another things. A circular story circles around to end up with the same thing as it started off with. "An example of a circular story is "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" (Numeroff, 1985). In this story a child starts off by giving a mouse a cookie, the mouse then wants a glass of milk, followed by a straw and a napkin as well as other items. This continues on until the mouse finally gets another cookie. Today in class we read "If You Give a Pig a Pancake" (Numeroff, 1998). This book is another example of a circular story. The pig starts off getting a pancake and then wants some syrup, the pig keeps asking for things till he eventually ends up right where he started and has a pancake.

Before we read this book in class we got to use some bubbles, that we later found out tied in with the story. There were also some pancakes and syrup available for anyone who wanted some. I think that doing this would also be a good way to use a circular story in the classroom. For example if you were to read "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" to a class you could take some cookies and milk for the students. Something I liked from our textbook was how Mrs. Kirkpatrick used the circular story in her classroom. First of all she kept regular and irregular sized copies of "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" for her classroom, also before she read the story to her students she let them sample cookies and talk about their favorite cookies. This is something that I would want to try in my future classroom. Another thing I think you could use for a circular story is the activity that we did in class today. I really think that having the students write their own circular story would help them truly understand what it is.
Some ways that you can make reading fun in the classroom is to do things like role playing, or putting on plays about the book you are currently reading. When I was in elementary and middle school many of my teachers had the students do activities on the books we were currently reading as well as our favorite books. One thing that we did was to write our own version of our favorite book, or an assigned book. Other things that were done were presentations or story boards. In one class I remember that we had to read a book and make a short presentation on it but in addition to that we would have to take items to that related to the book we were doing the presentation.Other times we would have to make something that related to the book like a puppet, clay model, or whatever else we could think of. Many of these things did make reading fun and I think that they still would, because even if a student doesn't like to read if they do something like this they get to express their creativity.