Reflection 03/29/09

I wonder if what I want would be a mixture between Literature Focus and Thematic Unit? I want to have an overall theme, but I also want to read books that the whole class can discuss. How about I choose several different novels that fall under a broad topic so students can choose between the options I give them? This allows for student choice in reading groups, yet all of the books are focusing on a specific theme or author.

For example, I could choose Christopher Paul Curtis as the author. I could also choose several books connected to an overall theme such as historical fiction around a specific time period, maybe even what they may be studying in Social Studies.

Sharon Draper books, maybe? The book Holes, and others from the same author? There are so many possibilities on this topic. I really don’t know which to choose from. Because I have only started reading YA novels, (since EDU-255), I do not have a lot of knowledge of which books are appropriate to teach or if these book have been very successful in the classroom before. I know that even though I would love to do Literature Focus, I don’t believe that this option allows the students much room to decide what the class reads.

As for activities, I guess I need to decide on a topic/book first. Since I have been observing in my cooperating teacher’s class, I have been taking notes on the different novels the students read. I hope that through this class, among my other classes, I will become more schooled in the novels middle school students would benefit from reading in my own classroom.