Our Assignment Packet

I really enjoyed looking through the packet of Gods’ Man assignments. It really helped me get a sense of where I was in my own assignment in regards to everyone else. But more importantly it was really inspiring. Some of the assignments you guys thought up are cooler than anything I’ve done in some of my past high school classes. They were all fresh ways of looking at a book and having students really embody the story.

Some of the assignments that really stuck out to me was Jessica’s rewind dniwer assignment where she has her students read the story in backwards order and write a story based around Gods’ Man. This is something very simple but mind blowing to students, including myself, who just read in normal order everyday of their lives and never question it. Taking a story in backwards order can be powerful and implants an idea of reading other things backwards too. So not only is Jessica having students be creative and write something, she is showing them other ways to look at texts. This reminded me of an exercise in Kelly Gallagher’s book Write Like This where he has his students write reverse poems that mean one thing one way and something completely different the opposite way. 

I also really enjoyed Nathan’s assignment, primarily because of the way he wrote it. It was really enthusiastic and boarded on corny at moments and that something that will get students to do it. In a way Nathan is modeling an attitude that can and will infect his students. In his assignment, Nathan asks his students to pick three characters, “furniture counts too” and write a background on them. He also provides an example of this by using himself. This attitude makes students excited or if they are stone hard rebels, it makes them laugh enough to humor you into doing the assignment. It also opens up a connection that would make a student feel left out if they did not complete the assignment; who would want to miss out on the fun. 

Jocelyn’s piece was also very audience appropriate. I really liked how she had her steps clearly written out and the requirements she was looking for clearly defined out on a page. More times than none students ask themselves, “Well what exactly is considered clear language?” Jocelyn leaves no room for confusion. Her visual example and the breakdown of it is the cherry on top and something that I know I personally would use when doing the assignment. 

In terms of rigor and audience, I feel as though the majority of my fellow classmates were spot on. Most of the assignments don’t seem too difficult and all of them have an element of creativity and fun to them. It was refreshing to see assignments that focused more on the creation of something art like rather than an informative essay. That was one other thing I noticed, we all seem to assignment some sort of essay at the end but they are all pretty low stakes. This is amazing to think about. Maybe our generation of teachers will put an end to the essay heavy tasks in a back lash to our own horrible experiences with them.

A theme I saw throughout most of the assignments was a listing of steps. I personally did not write out a list of steps and going through and seeing it in action makes me realize I need to. It’s just so much clearer for students to grasp what the teacher is asking of them. It’s also a way for students to feel as though they are progressing along the work by being able to check off steps. In this fashion, students build momentum and may even start to work more productively or quicker. Each step completed is a small victory. I also realized I didn’t put any Common Core standards on my sheet, which I did for my revision.

Overall, the packet really got me excited. At first I was dreading going through because I really don’t have a high opinion of my “teachery” work. But seeing everyone’s and mine together made me feel like as a class we’re all kind of connected. We all strive to do something different in teaching and all share the thirst of a common goal.