Memo #6

As I finish my I-Search research and interviews, I seem to be at a point of uncertainty. When I started this project, I was so excited about teaching across the curriculum, and helping students learn through writing. However, as time has gone on, I have realized that teaching across the curriculum may be an empty dream. There is a lot of research and evidence out there to prove that teaching across the curriculum works and that it's a great thing! However, the practicality of this seems to be few and far between. My research has shown me that, although teaching across the curriculum works, it rarely happens. Teachers are dealing with a lot already, it's even harder for them to incorperate writing into their lesson plans. They don't have time to grade all that writing and help their students develop writing skills, on top of everything else they already do. Even if a teacher wants to incorperate writing into their curriculum, the system doesn't seem to be working to teach these teachers how to do that. I though maybe there would be writing in at least science classrooms, but there I was easily proven wrong. When looking at the CCSS, there are so many oppurtunities for students to write in the classroom; however, a teacher could easily get away with not having their students write at all. There are no writing standards for classes that are not English classrooms. Students are not required to keep math journals or write lab reports. Thus, students can easily go all day without writing more than a few words.

This really frustrates me. How are we supposed to be moving forwards with reading and writing if we make no effort for our students to read and write? How are we supposed to help improve their scores in math and science if they don't know how to read or write in these areas? Why is Obama focusing on Science and Math without taking Literature and Reading into account? It seems like we are running on a hamster wheel; coming up with great ideas to help our students learn, but then not bothering to put them into effect.

This I-Search has definitely increased my uneasiness of becoming a high school teacher. There is so much I question now, and every day I realize how more and more broken our education system is. I'm questioning whether it can ever be fixed.

Memo #5

After doing the Mind Map assignment last class, I have a pretty good idea of what I still need to get done. Mainly, a lot of research. I want to do a lot of research mainly on CCSS and STEM, as they are the two curriculums that are in place and control what are kids are studying and what are teachers are teaching. So how much control are they having over including reading and writing in Math and Science classes?

I also need to follow up with my teachers. I am probably going to have to do that over phone call, seeing as my schedule and their schedules are highly conflicting. Hopefully, I can look more into what is going on in our schools, and ask them more in-depth questions about what changes they hope to see in incorporating reading and writing into math and science classrooms.

It's a short list of what still needs to get done, but at the same time it's still a lot.

Memo #4

For my primary research, I interviewed three teachers, an English teacher, a Math teacher, and a Science teacher to ask them about teaching across the curriculum. My English and Math teacher were not able to meet up and so they have emailed me answers to some questions and I'll be following up with them later. On Tuesday I should be interviewing my Science teacher face to face.

My English teacher told me that it's obvious that we should be teaching reading and writing across the curriculum due to the fact that if we want students to become good at something, they need to practice it a lot (as in more than just a lot in English class). She told me that teaching across the curriculum could be achieved simply through focus, meaning the teachers and the administration has to take time to focus on incorporating reading and writing into non-English classrooms. She told me that the Common Core does have actions in place to increase reading and writing across the curriculum, but she thinks that we still need to increase the amount of reading and writing in math ans science classrooms.

My math teacher told me that his students rarely write, and when they do, it's not much more than a couple of sentences. The amount of reading that his students does varies based on their level; the more advanced the students are, the less reading they do. He goes on to say that he believes that writing can help in the classroom because if a student can write about the topic, then they fully understand the topic. He believes that reading and writing should be increased in the math classroom, but he's not sure how to do it; he says that he feels he needs a trainer to show him how to better incorporate reading and writing in the math classroom.

Some follow up questions that I want to ask the math teacher is: what are some ways that you think you could possibly increase reading and writing into the classroom? Why do the students on a less-advanced level read more? How does it help them? A question that I have for my English teacher is: how do you feel about Obama's new STEM program, that focuses heavily on Science, Technology, Eningeering, and Math? I may ask this question of my math and science teachers as well.

Memo #3

For my primary research, I plan to interview three teachers and pass out a questionnaire to multiple classes. I would like to interview a math teacher, a science teacher, and an English teacher, all three from Coventry High School. I have specific questions that I would like to ask each teacher pertaining to their subject, although the questions are generally similar. ENGLISH TEACHER: 1. Do you believe in teaching reading/writing across the curriculum? 2. How do you believe this can be achieved? 3. Are there specific actions in place to achieve teaching reading/writing across the curriculum at this school? SCIENCE TEACHER: 1. How often do your students write in class? 2. How often do your students read in class? 3. Do you think that reading/writing in the science classroom is helping students? In what ways? 4. Do you think that we need to focus more on students reading/writing more in non-English classrooms (science, math, etc.)? 5. How do you teach reading/writing skills in a science classroom? MATH TEACHER: 1. How often do your students write in class (as in sentences, paragraphs, etc., not formulas)? 2. How often do your students read in class? 3. Do you think that reading/writing can help students in a math classroom? 4. Do you think that we need to focus more on incorperating reading/writing into math/science classrooms? STUDENTS: 1. How often do you read/write in your math class? 2. How often do you read/write in your science classroom? 3. Do you feel writing assignments help you learn better? Why/why not? 4. Do you think that reading/writing should be incorperated in math/science classrooms? Hopefully, I will be able to think of a few more questions to add to the questionnaire, along with follow-up questions that I will have in the interviewing process.

Memo #2

As I started my research, I honestly had some small panic attacks. I really didn't think that I was going to find any research, to support or negate my thought that writing could help students learn science and math while helping develop their writing skills. However, I was (extremely) pleasantly surprised to find a lot of research in this field. There were teachers who had written about lesson plans that they have done to integrate writing, there was writing on ways that students have developed writing skills in the classroom, and there was actual scientific experiments to see whether students would learn from writing in their science and math classrooms. For example, in the article "Integrating Writing into Mathematics Classroom to Increase Students Problem Solving Skills" one group of students solved math problems the way they were taught in class, and other students wrote about their problem. Results found that if students wrote about their problem, their problem solving skills increased (they were more likely to get the problems right) and they had better writing skills. In the article "Writing to Learn by Learning to Write During the School Science Laboratory: Helping Middle and High School Students Develop Argumenative Writing Skills as They Learn Core Ideas" students were tested at the beginning of the school year, the middle of the school year, and the end of the school year on their writing skills and science knowledge. In the mean time, the students conducted science experiments and intensive writing projects. At the end of the experiment, it was found that the students developed a lot of writing skills and scientific knowledge due to their intense writing projects. This means that, through my research, I have found that writing is a two-way street; students can learn their subjects more intensely while also developing their writing skills. Through all of my research , I did not exactly find a scholarly leader in this field, but instead something a little bit differently; most of my sources all cited the same site: the National Research Council. I have gone onto their site, but have yet to find anything to aid in their research (yet). Their site is very large and very hard to navigate, and so I may be able to eventually find something that will support my current findings (or maybe argue against my findings!) but so far, I have not found much.

Memo #1

As I was looking for topics on which to conduct my research, one thing kept returning to my mind; democratic schools. Democratic schools revolve around the concept that if students are very interested in the subject that they are learning about, then they are much more likely to want to learn about the subject and are more likely to do better in this subject. To combine this thought with writing, my question is; can we use writing to help students learn better and become more interested in the subjects that they are learning about? Something that schools are always trying to do is get students to be more fluid in their reading and writing skills. Thus, it makes sense that we try to incorporate both reading and writing into subjects like history, science, art, and maybe even math. But can having to incorporate reading and writing be a two-way street? Can we get students to improve their reading and writing skills while also intimately learning about subjects like science and history? I personally have spent hours upon hours reading and writing, not just about subjects that I am personally interested about, but also subjects that pertain for school. Even though I have been out of school for three years, the things that I remember the most out of all of the hours and hours of class time that I have had, is the things that I was allowed to write about, mainly creatively. Creative writing projects have helped me remember about women on the battlefield in World War I, and exactly the science behind the Titanic sinking. Reading creative stories about chemistry has helped me remember how covalent bonds work. Doing lots of writing in school across different subjects has also helped me be able to explore different writing styles and be able to learn how to write about multiple subjects. Having our students being able to read and write well is something that we are constantly working on achieving. So is it true that incorporating, say, science and writing, lead to better reading and writing scores on standardized tests? Will reading and writing help students learn science better than if they just had a teacher lecture at them or do the activities that they were doing before? Hopefully, by the end of this research session, I will be able to say for definite whether reading and writing can be a two-way street with other subjects like science or history. I hope to work with students and teachers from Coventry High School. I would like to interview teachers on how much writing they assign to their classroom, why they assign that much writing or that little writing, and if they think that increasing writing in all areas of school helps students learn more. I hope to pass out a questionnaire to students asking them about their writing experiences in school, if they would like an increase in writing in their classrooms, and if they think writing helps them learn better. Other things that I may have to consider is that maybe teachers don’t like adding writing to their classrooms, or are reluctant to add it to their classrooms because they don’t know how to teach or grade writing. Or perhaps teachers are unable to add writing to their curriculum due to the fact that they have to spend their time teaching to the test or doing other things that schools require them to spend time on.

Video

Memo #1