Our blog host this week is Christine Hartzman. Christine's post focuses on Chapters 7, 8, and 9.
STRENGTHS: Confidence, Courage, Hope As I continue to read Every Child A Super Reader, it is not only about teaching readers, but also a book about teaching and raising a SUPER HUMAN. Each of us has needed one of the strengths either as a child, teen or adult in various situations. We have all had experiences where we were struggling and had to call upon the kindness of friends or felt the need to belong to a community. There have been plenty of times where one needs the courage or confidence to try something new or go out on a limb. Yes, we are targeting “readers” in this text, however, I am taking things away for my current class, my future classes, and my own life. The following are my “A-HA” moments in reading: Chapter 7: CONFIDENCE We have all met a student who lacked confidence in a subject area: reading, math, physical education, art, or music. My question has always been the same, “How do we help a student grow to become more confident?” In nt experience and in reading the text, I am closer to the answer - books, books, and more books. In reading, students can see characters or everyday people build the confidence that they need to grow and overcome a challenge. As teachers, we can model and practice growing confidence through speaking and listening to our students, but also practicing these skills through the partnerships and classroom community will provide opportunities to make this strength a habit. Chapter 8: COURAGE My Golden Line for chapter 8 is located on page 109, “Risk taking begins with a decision to act, and courage provides the inspiration to act. According to Michael Agar (1994), being courageous rewards individuals from living a life of “being” to a life of “becoming.” Recently, I have trained to become a Barre instructor. It has been many days, long hours, countless classes and more practice to follow. Some people have asked why I have decided take on this extra responsibility as well as time commitment to my already hectic schedule. It may not make sense to everyone, but I wanted to take a risk and try something new to show my students that taking risk and courage do not stop because you become an adult. I want my students to know that we can all learn and grow at any age. Chapter 9: HOPE My students love when we use song lyrics in the classroom. As an ELA teacher, I use songs for analysis, connections,or compare and contrast. In MATH, I play a motivational song before a quiz or test that will create a mindset of YES, I CAN! Therefore, I will share three of my favorites songs of HOPE:
Share an example, a golden line, or a tip on how you can develop the above strengths with your students.
6 Comments
Lisa
11/28/2017 05:04:45 pm
Firstly, Christine - I really enjoyed your post. I love how you summarized this book as raising "super humans" as well as super readers! I couldn't agree anymore, especially after last weeks chapters of kindness, curiosity, and friendship!
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Jennifer
12/2/2017 11:54:23 am
Christine - Great post and I totally agree that this book is really about raising super HUMANS, not just super readers! Loved the songs - great idea!
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Laura
12/10/2017 06:11:34 pm
I agree with Christine that these strengths go beyond creating super readers, to creating "super humans." If we can all teach our students these strengths there isn't much that they cannot do in their lives. Confidence, courage, and hope are special strengths that will propel our students farther in their school and work careers. Confidence can be developed after reading a hard text, courage can be developed to pick up that difficult text and discuss it afterwards, and hope can be developed to believe that difficulties with reading can be overcome.
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Emily Reed
12/26/2017 06:49:08 pm
Super Readers and Super Humans.
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Marge
12/27/2017 05:49:27 pm
My Response:
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Gretchen
12/29/2017 06:08:02 pm
I agree that these strengths not only apply to reading, but to life! I think these last three are the most difficult. While it was easy for me to think about how I incorporate friendship and kindness in my classroom, these are not.
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