What I DON'T Miss about Teaching

• Second floor classroom with no AC on any day above 80 degrees, especially when filled with 20 or so teens, some of whom are quite sweaty and a little smelly.
• Dealing with parents because it was never good news. Either I'm telling a parent her child is failing or a parent is trying to tell me off for not meeting her child's advanced needs. No one ever walks away from either type of conversation really happy.
  
• Kids using their cellphones and earphones in class. I'm glad I left before they all got lap tops and could use FB in class.
  
• Obviously, the foot tall stacks of grading.
• Spending all the day light hours at school during the winter.
• Having to rearrange my plans for a class full of students who didn't do their homework.
  
• As uncommon as it was, I still don't miss the fire alarm going off in the rain or cold.
• Having a runny noes when the room is quiet.
  
• Having to wait until in between class or even lunch or after school to pee.
• The night before grades are due.
• Hearing kids say queer, gay, retard, and the occasional racist remark.
• Long staff meetings or in service days when I don't care about the topic and have other work I'd much rather be doing, either because it is more interesting or more immediately important, or both.
• The unlucky placement of testing, bus evacuation drills, picture day, and pep rallies.

Back to School Time ... But Not for Me

All my teachers friends went back to school yesterday as my old district started the term with two in service days. Students start back Monday with just freshmen, which I always taught. Today, I went out to Margarita's after school with most of my former department plus a few extras (history teachers, guidance counselor). Due to where the empty seat was at the table when I arrive and where a high chair would most logically fit, I wound up to another mom with a 15 month old (baby wasn't with her though). We mostly discussed mom things, and I felt a real disconnect both physically and mentally from the rest of the table.

Oh, I miss back to school!

True, it was always annoying how early Walmart had to set up the school supplies, but I love the school supplies. There is something about rows of pens, Crayola markers, and colorfully covered notebooks that is ever so appealing. I could easily spend a shopping spree in Staples just for myself, not even including the awesome supplies for students. I loved getting my catalogs with posters and bulletin board themes in the mail. I'd circle everything I want, then go back through narrowing it down to a more realistic total. I loved going to Staples and browsing the teacher section, contemplating buying the colored copy paper, and looking at all the fabulously colored pens and post-its.

I also loved getting a new planner and filling it in. Looking over the student names and writing them on place cards. Writing and rewriting my plans for the first month, moving each part of the lessons around to adapt to half days, pep rallies, and extended homeroom.

I loved my classroom. I could easily waste hours creating bulletin board displays recommending books. My favorite last year as a reference book section I started highly things such as literary term dictionaries, writing guides, or books designed to give support on an author or time period. I spent so much time organizing all my handouts at the beginning of each year. Sending my copies to be made early, color coding them, lining the up for use. Actually, I loved organizing my room on a daily basis. It was a therapeutic way to end my day. Erase the board and write the next day's agenda, straighten the desks, pick up the pens off the floor, straighten the books, clean up my desk.

I loved my content, too, for the most part. Huck Finn (Mike would not allow me to name our daughter Emmeline). To Kill A Mockingbird. The Great Gatsby. My free reading program last year. And I didn't just love teaching novels. I liked teaching about essay structure, citing sources, note taking, literary terms. It was so fun when I looped sophomores and got to show them the next step after teaching freshmen for the same things for four years.

I loved the excitement of a new group of students. (Looking at their names and wondering what they will be like. Where I taught freshmen level courses exclusively except for one class one year, when I saw a familiar name, it was always a student who had failed). Starting over fresh and getting to try everything over again. In fact, the ability to always try something again and improve on it was one of my ultimate favorite things about teaching. September was really my New Years.

Really what I didn't like about teaching was discipline and the time it took me to grade so many papers. It also sucked to drive to and from work in the dark, and getting up at 530 on a winter morning, but lots of people have to deal with that sort of thing.

I do worry that I will be out of touch in many ways when I return to teaching. I will need to take one course to keep my certification. I have fears that I will mess this up somehow. Not that I'll fail the course, but that I will forget to take it, take something that doesn't qualify, or mess up the paperwork or dates. But other than just my certification, I worry that I'll be out of touch after being out of teaching for years.

I wonder if I will return to my previous school. Already, in the year I've been gone three teachers have left my old department (two asked to leave and one changed subjects) resulting in three new teachers (my friend took my position), a new librarian, a new secretary at the front desk (which is a big deal in a school) and a new principal on the way. That is a lot of change for one year. I can't even imagine how different the culture of the school will be by the time I am ready to return. I've gone back to the school several times to visit, and thus far they've been accepting of this. I always ask if I need to wear a visitor's pass, and the answer was always, no. But how much longer will that last? How long until they wonder why I keep returning? How long should I return? There are only two years of students who even had the opportunity to know me now left in the building, and my working relationship with most of the staff has lapsed.

I also worry that I will be out of touch with my content having been away from it for so long, but I don't thing that will be as big of a problem as being out of touch with new trends. I have so many education books on my to-read list, yet I haven't read one since I finished my masters. I am hoping that this blog will help inspire me to read and then write about some of those texts. Maybe I'll try starting with some that are more broad- philosphical rather than the practical application you want when in the classroom.

Don't get me wrong. I am very happy to be home with Natalie. I really can't imagine her at day care for this first year and the next few to come. I am sure that being a parent will give me a lot of insight into my teaching, even if it is just through watching a child learn and understanding how to talk to parents better. But, I am starting to feel like I wish there was a little more I could do. This conflicts with our plans for our second child of course, because anything I start now would have to end when that next child arrives. That's why something small like reading would be nice, but I've also toyed with the idea of seeing if I could somehow volunteer for our school district. I've hesitated because I'm not sure if there is anything I could do given my lack of a baby sitter. It would need to be something I could do with Natalie in tow, at home, or in the evenings after Natalie is asleep.

Classroom Librarian

Not my favorite work from grad school, but worth sharing due to the love I had for my classroom library. When I submitted this paper, I included photographs of my library. Maybe on some day when I have time to waste, I will add them here as well.

Becoming a Better Classroom Librarian:
Application Paper

Prior to taking Reading Development and Instruction, my feelings were mixed about my classroom library. The number of books in my library compared to my colleagues made me proud, yet I knew amount was insignificant if students never read the materials. Routman’s chapter on classroom libraries in her book Reading Essentials also provoked mixed feelings. Her chapter chipped away at my pride making her suggestions a little hard to except at first. At first, pointing out what I could not try due to my high school restrictions was easier than looking at what I could do. However, I want my students to be enthusiastic about reading, so I tried some of her suggestions by making a few small changes. Now, with just minor changes, I am seeing significant results.

When working on my library, I figured that I had a lot of materials; my library contains about four hundred books of various genres as well as a generous supply of magazines and back issues of the school paper. So, I decided to focus my energy on making what I had better rather than working on gathering more materials at this time. Yet, my first change was bringing in all my unused books from home. When I looked at my books as a whole, I noticed that I chose the titles much more so than the students. To address Routman's suggestions about students helping in the selection of books and the books mirroring them (p. 166), I made a plan for going to yard sales and book sales this summer to find more books for my library so that I can add more books that my students are interested in, such as series they often mention like Maximum Ride, Gossip Girl, Twilight, and Cirque de Freak. Lastly, I began using the school library and the public library and interlibrary loan to supplement my own collection based on our current unit of study, which coincides with Routman's suggestion to “rotate, change, and add so the collection based on changing needs, interests, and curriculum” (p.167).

Routman recommends that teachers critically look at the organization of their library. The majority of my books were well organized; I had sections for young adult literature, adult fiction, some non-fiction, classics, poetry, plays, reference materials, and magazines. The problem was that all of these areas were not clearly differentiated or labeled for the students. So, when I brought in the new books, I designated bins for the smaller collections of comics, poetry, short stories, children’s / picture books, and school newspapers. I made large and colorful labels for these sections to increase the changes of students noticing them and thus finding what they want.

The major focus of the changes I made to my library, were to how it looks overall. Routman asks teachers to consider: “When you walk into your classroom, does the library or book nook jump out at your, or is it all but invisible? Does your library corner look beautiful and contain an inviting display of plentiful reading materials, or does it look bland and impoverished? (p. 166). While I had a lot of reading materials, they really did not jump out to a visitor of the classroom. My classroom design has all the shelves on the side of the room opposite the door. The student desks block most of these shelves and make the books blend into the background. Now, I can not change the placement of my shelves since they are built into the walls, but I decided to work on creating displays that exposed book covers to draw attention to the library.

I started revealing book covers by gathering books related to the literature circles titles the students just finished and arranging them on my “chalk” tray at the front of the room. I labeled these books either “Books your peers like” or “If you liked ______, you might like one of these.” My students definitely noticed the books. One student checked out a book the first day she saw the choices at the front of them room, and I saw several other students look at the books up close, reading the backs and such. I like having the books up front where they grab the students' attention, but I dislike having my marker tray monopolized. So, I plan on photocopying the rain gutters idea from Routman’s text (p. 78-9) and giving it to my principal with an explanation of the results I have seen so far. I hope this will persuade him to let me drill holes in the virgin walls and install rain gutters along the front and back of my room, under the white board and bulletin board.

In my first literacy class, I learned about making text sets for units, and since then I pull books from the shelves that related to our theme to create a display. However, I put these between bookends previously, but the kids never looked at them. Book spines are not interesting; they do not pull in students or catch their eye. So, I purchased twenty book easels. When I started my Huck Finn unit, I placed selected titles on the easels to display the covers. I put the rest of the theme based books in a bin in the center of the easels and arranged the books so that they could be flipped through to see the covers. This display is much more noticeable and interesting than just the book spines. When one enters the room, this display is noticed right away, unlike the shelves below. Even though no students have borrowed books from this section, I witnessed several students look at these books, which is an major improvement.

The electric pencil sharpener is located next to my unit based books in hopes of attracting the students' attention while the machine grinds away at their pencil. This time, I taped a question and answer article on the human black market to the counter next to the sharpener and placed Sold by Patricia McCormick and Dreams Freedom by Sonia Levitin on book easels around the article. I chose the topic of modern slavery because when we discuss Huck Finn my students so often refer to slavery existing “back then.” Soon after creating the display, a student, who had not checked out book from my room all year, asked if she could borrow Sold. She read it in less than a week and returned it. A few days after returning the book, she seemed very interested in Dream Freedom, while she waited for a friend who was talking to me after class. I started up some small talk with her about Dream Freedom and she left with that book that day. So, the pencil sharpener display has inspired one student to read two books in addition to Huck Finn to further her knowledge on a topic she knew little about before.

I had a few remaining book easels after creating my Huck Finn display, so I placed them around the room on different shelves of the library to display a single text from that section, much the way a regular library or bookstore does. No students have appeared to notice this change, but one of my colleagues who visits my room almost every day did. She saw Memoirs of a Geshia on one of the easels and asked to borrow it. Never before has a fellow teacher asked to borrow a book they saw in my room while visiting. So, even though no students have yet asked to check out those books, I know the book easels are drawing attention to the library shelves thus making them more appealing.

Often libraries and book stores have displays that show the recommendations or current reading lists of the people who work there. I decided to couple this idea with the ideas in Routman's chapter on sharing your reading life with students. I started small by adding stickers to the bindings of all the books I have read in my collection and hanging a mini white board on the wall that shows what I am currently reading. Next, I started to tell some of my classes about the book I was reading and how it was interesting to me. I could see the interest on their some of their faces. As the students began reading Huck Finn, I began reading Finn by Jon Clinch. This book retells the basic story of Huck Finn through Pap's point of view including filling in some gaps about Pap's past. When I told my classes about this book, I could see that some of the students found it really interesting that there was a book that explored these ideas about the text they were reading. Seeing the interest on students' faces has made me want to share with them about other books, so I have been reading other related texts while they read Huck Finn. When I first started teaching, I could not have done this because I devoted all my time to rereading the primary text the students were reading. Now that I have read Huck Finn annually for several years, I can spend time reading new books such as The Day They Came to Arrest the Book by Nat Hentoff and The Coffin Quilt by Ann Rinaldi, both of which I introduced to students today.

The biggest successes I witnessed occurred when I gave students my opinions on specific books and gear it towards what I would have wanted to know at their age. Having recently read Tod Strassser's The Wave, I was interested in reading his novel Give a Boy a Gun during April break. When we returned to school, I put it back on the tray with a post-it on the cover saying: “Mrs. Boyd read this over vacation. Fast read, but gory and violent in places.” Within ten minutes of class, a student asked what the post-it said. Within thirty seconds of me saying I thought they might like some of these books as I had them out and then dictating the post-it, a hand went up asking to put dibs on the book. When I saw this success, I got a second copy of the book and repeated; within a day the second copy was borrowed. So, I continued to label books with note cards or post-it notes to catch students’ attention. For example, the two previously mentioned books, The Day They Came to Arrest the Book and The Coffin Quilt, both have notes on them. The former book has a post-it on the cover saying, “If you are interested in book banning, you might want to read this one!” while the latter book has a note card in front of it letting students know how it relates to Huck Finn and pointing that we read a text earlier this year by the same author. I even put Alice in Wonderland on a book easel with a post-it about the Mad Hatter, since we mentioned that character in class when discussing the scene in Huck Finn where the bread with mercury in it is used to find the drowned body. These notes from me to the students are helping to convey my recommendations more clearly, thus peaking their interest in the texts.

I have also started to make more personal recommendations for individual students. In literature circles recently some of my students read Jerry Spineli's Stargirl. Two of my students expressed an interest in reading the sequel, so I located a copy and left notes in the office for the two girls who were interested. One of them came to get the book with in a class period. She finished the book in four days and passed it on to the other student today. I also recommended Sweetblood, a book about a girl who thinks her diabetes is really vampirism, to a diabetic vampire loving student. She thought it sounded like a cool concept and might check it out of the school library. A third example is another student stated she really liked Huck Finn and Ann Rinaldi's A Break with Charity. I recommended for her to read Rinaldi's The Coffin Quilt, which tells the story of the real feuding families satirized in Huck Finn, Hatfield and McCoys.

Aside from getting my students more interested in reading, these personal recommendations help me to bond with my students like Routman discussed in chapter two of her book. My husband says his favorite English teacher was a man who lent my husband his personal book about the existence of aliens, which was a topic he and his teacher sometimes chatted about together in class. My husband never forgot that teacher's attention to him as an individual. I hope that these recommendations will not only help re-energize reading for my students and broaden their interests, but also show them that I see them as individuals and care about their interest and personalities, just as my husband's teacher did for him.

These personal book recommendations also match students and books, which is another recommendation that Routman makes. One deterrents of reading for me when I was in middle school were book recommendations from the librarians which they liked, but had nothing to do with me. I loved stories, but had a hard time finding ones which interested me. I can make meaningful recommendations because I know my students both on their ability and interests. I want to continue to do this, but I am concerned that I personally have not read widely enough to reach many of my students. For example, I have not read many sports, science fiction, or fantasy books, which would be appealing to many of my male students. This is an area I want to continue to work on.

I look forward to applying some of Routman’s other ideas. One ideas in particular is to make a bulletin board of top ten books (p. 71). I am not yet ready to move fully to independent reading, but I think we could do this activity at the beginning of the year and then the end of each quarter. My students are influenced by their peers’ choices and I want to see more of that. As more students begin reading, I want to build in more class time for them to share what they are reading, which will in turn peak interests of their classmates. Additionally, I want to work on more reading time into my classes. Actual reading seems to be the big element missing in my room that libraries have because most of their reading is assigned as homwork.

Overall, through applying Routman's ideas to my classroom, I discovered that small changes can make a difference for individual students. I made my classroom library more appealing and thus drew in several students who are now more excited about reading. In addition, thinking of myself as a part librarian, I recommended books to students using my knowledge of their personality, which has also been meaningful and motivating for students. I look forward to trying more ideas in the fall which will continue to encourage my students to become enthusiastic about reading.


Works Cited
Routman, R. (2003). Reading Essentials. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Simple Fixes are a Myth: How to Help Students Struggling with Literacy

First read the following post first: No Simple Answer:Why Students Struggle with Literacy in American Schools

Simple Fixes Are a Myth:
How to Help Students Struggling with Literacy

No silver bullet will cure literacy problems. Although someone periodically promotes a new program or method claiming to end literacy difficulties, no one solution works for every student. In reality, multiple factors that affect the success of any particular child, resulting in a unique mixture of struggles and strengths. Instead of using a one-size-fits-all approach, teachers must use a variety of practices and assessments to prevent struggles and individually determine strengths and weakness. Thus, teachers diagnosis and treat reading difficulties on a case by case basis and to make reading exciting in a supportive environment for those who are progressing well.

PREVENTION
Scientific research shows that some reading problems start with a lack of exposure to language before arriving at school (Lyon & Chhabra, 2004). Thus, one way that educators can alleviate literacy struggles is to inform parents that surrounding their children with language and print will have a huge impact on their later success. Shaywitz describes in great detail in her book Overcoming Dyslexia how parents can simply and easily interact with their pre-school children to increase their understanding of language. Activities such as reading to one's child, singing nursery rhymes, and playing with words like rhymes or alliteration are simple and fun, yet raise the child's awareness of print and phonics (Shaywitz, 2003). We also discussed in class the importance of teachers and parents working in unison, but this can be a challenge when families hold different values in literacy compared to teachers who are usually “super-literate” (Note 1). Sadly, some families suffer from economic or social problems that limit their ability to preform such activities with their children. In these cases, the larger systems of society needs to create programs that result greater equality between all families.

Additionally, teachers can prevent reading problems by creating supportive and caring classrooms that instill curiosity, passion, and expression in students. In these classes, a child's love for learning motivates him while the teachers encourages and supports (Kohn, 2004; Kohn, 2005). When these elements are absent some students lose interest in literacy and fall behind because they no longer practice the skills they have or fail learn new skills to move them along. When problems cannot be prevented educators must then assess with a purpose of determining strengths and weaknesses.

ASSESSMENT
In order to determine the strengths and weakness of students, teachers, and curriculum, assessment's purpose must be to improve teaching and learning. Educators need to remember assessment's huge impact on the lives of students in terms of their motivation, self-esteem, educational opportunities, and understanding literately. The International Reading Association (IRA) and National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) (1999) developed eleven standards to guide teachers, administrators, and other community members in developing assessments that evaluate as objectively as possible.

IRA and NCTW assert that assessment must revolve around the student and “encourages students to reflect on their own reading and writing in productive ways, to evaluate their own intellectual growth, and to set goals” (IRA & NCTE, 1999). Students who must relay on others, such as teachers, to show them their progress in learning,are not becoming citizens who can make the choices adults face from day to day. Additionally, assessments that mandate curriculum are detrimental to learning because the assessment creators leave teachers and students out of the planning. Instead, school communities need to shape curriculum and assessment together with a focus on the needs of the students in that community. For example, a case study explains teachers changing an assessment into instruction if that action suited the child's needs; however, when high stakes tests are used teachers cannot pull a student from the test if he needs more instruction or practice (IRA & NCTE, 1999). Furthermore, we looked at an examples of commercial tests in class and saw that all were false reading situations and that some, such as the blending test that really assessed segmenting / spelling, were not valid assessments (Note 2). Even without these flaws, assessments that do not place the needs of the students first do not give teachers the picture they need to determine the correct intervention.

Teachers should not evaluate students with just one type of assessment because “only some aspects of reading and writing will be captured in any given assessment situation” and that “any one-shot assessment procedure cannot capture the depth and breadth of information teacher must have available to them” (IRA and NCTE, 1999). Reading is complex so a teacher needs to see the full student to discover the root of problems and only one type of test will not give the breadth necessary for such a rounded picture. IRA and NCTE believe that “the most powerful assessment for students are likely to be those that occur in the daily activities of the classroom,” and thus recommend detailed notes of observations and student conferences as well as portfolio work instead of high stakes multiple choice standardized tests. Additionally, information that assesses students should not just come from classroom teachers, but instead should include the perspectives of the student, parents, administrators, and other school community members who interact with the student in order to achieve the most accurate understanding of the student's abilities (IRA & NCTE, 1999).

When assessing, it is extremely important that assessments are “fair and equitable” for all students. Students with varying ethnic, gender, nationality, religion, socioeconomic, sexual, mental, and physical characteristics must all receive equal opportunities for success on assessments (IRA & NCTE, 1999). Particularly, educators must ensure that assessment does not penalized students because of their disabilities or differences, yet these students receive no advantages that allow them to achieve more than they are capable (IRA, 2000). Specifically, individuals make different meaning of language based on their unique experiences and backgrounds, so it is crucial for school communities work together to eliminate problems with assessments that relate to narrow interpretations of language (IRA & NCTE, 1999). “Once students are assigned to systematically different curricula, uneven access to subsequent experiences and jobs becomes not only a possibility, but a probability” (IRA & NCTE, 1999), so equality and fairness remains crucial in determining a student's future path including perceptions of literacy.

Also, when choosing assessments and materials that teachers and administrators use scientific research (Lyon & Chhabra, 2004). Yet, just because something totes the term “scientifically based” teachers still need to be critical. Many resources claim research, but when examined closely the researchers misinterpreted the data or poorly conducted the study (Arllington, 1997). Similarly, teachers should choose prepackaged materials carefully. In fact, experts recommend modifying materials according to the student's needs in order to recieve the best results (Kress). Lastly, teachers should be highly wary of allowing a machine to do the work for them (Aim; Kress). Kress states this sentiment as follows: The data collected by computer programs is “of value as a part of the collection of data that clinicians and teachers consider in placement and other instruction decisions; its difficult to see how they can ever become the single – or even major – informant of such decisions, however.” As one adult enrolled in a literacy program put it: the computers can't care nothing about you (Amoroso).

Some assessments in addition to conferences, observations, and portfolios are running records, miscue analysis, cloze activity, and oral reading analysis. Yet, each one of these assessments has specific uses, so teacher must decide which assessment will gather the information they seek. For example, during a miscue analysis the teacher notes the errors a student makes while reading orally and then analyzes the mistakes to discover why the student made them. This assessment allows teachers to determine what skills, mostly dealing with decoding, need working on to help the student move past the types of mistakes present during the oral reading. Meanwhile, a cloze activity investigates more closely how a student uses the context of a passage to determine missing words in a short passage. The cloze activity assesses a student's vocabulary and comprehension instead of decoding (Steineger, 1998). Thus, if a teacher wants to know specific information about a student, the teacher needs to choose the assessment that will give that information or it will be a waste of time. Moreover, for the teacher to learn about decoding and comprehension, the teacher must preform both assessments, which demonstrates that multiple assessments provide a more accurate picture of a student's abilities.

INTERVENTION
Lyon and Chhabra (2004) state that “the majority of children who enter kindergarden and elementary school at risk for reading failure can learn to read at average or above average levels – if they are identified early and given systematic, intensive instruction” in the major components of reading. Shaywitz (2003) agrees and promotes explicit, systematic phonics intervention for struggling readers, particularly dyslexics. She details the activities students should work on at school and reinforce at home at all ages in order to become fluent readers (Shaywitz, 2003).

On the other hand, some experts disagree with the idea that phonics is the best approach, even though it is endorsed by the National Reading Panel. Allington (1997) believes teachers have been misled into thinking that phonics must be taught in a “direct, systematic, and sequential” manner. Other experts, such as Nancy Atwell agree that phonics is not the only approach. Atwell (2007) believes that reading workshops provide the best methods for teaching all readers. Her whole language approach allows students to choose their own books and spend copious amounts of time reading. Unlike phonics, this approach is not systematic; instead, students are taught skills as needed through mini-lessons. Atwell's approach workshop approach is based on student choice breading joy in reading (Atwell, 2003).

I personally believe more in Atwell's approach than Shaywitz for several reasons. First, students with no interest in reading have a much greater change of struggling, and Atwell's methods keep students engaged by letting them feel the joy of reading. I have witnessed this with my own students; when they are not interested in an activity, their motivation and understanding drops. Secondly, in class, we looked at various phonics exercises and even though most of the class could not preform these tasks easily, we all are accomplished readers (Note 3). To me, this experience demonstrates that systematic teaching of phonics does not equate reading. Lastly, I believe in whole language more than phonics based on my personal experiences with dyslexia. Shaywitz states that explicit phonics remediation is the only answer for dyslexia, yet I have no memory of receiving such intervention after my diagnosis in the second grade. However, I was immersed in literature through my family and other school experiences.

No matter the approach statistics show “failure to read by nine years of age portends a lifetime of illiteracy for at least seventy precent of struggling readers” (Lyon & Chhabra, 2004). Thus, teachers must assess students often and deeply so that problems can be discovered in the early grades so that intervention can start.

Even with all these methods of prevention, assessment, and intervention, many students arrive at the secondary level struggling with literacy. Older students build up years of failure and anxiety over reading; additionally, when part of a heterogeneously grouped classroom setting, teen readers have their social standing to protect. Thus, the approaches that work for younger readers do not necessarily work for older students. Teachers can try organic primers and working with multiple literacies as alternatives.

Organic primers are stories created by teachers that illicit emotional response from the student. To creat an organic primer a teacher must get to know the student to learn what he values. The primer increases in length and complexity, yet that still uses comfortable dialogical language and structures. These primers are meaning to the student because they connect to him as an individual and because the teacher makes it especially for the student (Amoroso; Note 4).

For students who have struggled for years with literacy, an affect intervention might move away from print and allow the student to explore other media. One study described students who created projects which started with non-print literacy and then branched to print. These multimedia projects increased literacy skills because the students were passionate about the topics they chose and thus were excited to learn more and to express that learning (O'Brien, 2003).

CHANGING TEACHERS
To help students struggling with literacy, teachers, one of the many causes of this struggle, need to change. First, teachers need more training during their pre-service and professional development time that will help them meet the realities of teaching. Almost half of the states do not require elementary teachers to be trained in teaching reading (Birth of a Syndrome). This needs to change. Aim discusses “unrealistic readability levels and limited comprehensibility of texts due to concept loading and related problems,” and then describe an instance where a history teacher's students struggled with the textbook. This teacher, much like myself when I started teaching, did not realize that the students had difficulty navigating the text structures (Aim). If this teacher received instruction on reading, particularly that of textbooks, he could have helped his students understand the text starting the first time they picked it up. Thus, all teachers, not just elementary or ELA teachers, need to understand how one learns to read and how to support students in reading the materials for their particular subject. Simply put, the more knowledge teachers have about literacy, the more productive their assessments and interactions with students will be (IRA & NCTE, 1999).

Pre-service experiences also need to show teachers how to avoid practices that negatively affect their students such as classroom environments that value some students above other or that lack passion and curiosity in the content. Stienger (1998) explains that “the goal is to create readers who challenge themselves to read frequently and who tackles books above grade level.” To met this goal, teachers need instruction on how to center the materials and methods they use around the interests and needs of the students, particularly when it comes to reading materials. Students should use texts that grab their attention and make them excited to keep reading. For example Stienger (1998) describes the drastic increase in interest and motivation from a lesson using a basil to a lesson using a rich literary text. In fact, the organic primers and multiple literacy projects described above are also based on this same principal that the reader should be central to choosing the text and methods.

Teachers of all subjects should also be taught about writer-based prose. When students begin to write, they pull their knowledge or memories to the surface to get them on the page. They often use words that are “saturated” in meaning for them, but not the reader, or the student may list instead of going into detail. The writing may also have grammatical mistakes, particularly with run-on sentences, because they try to get the ideas on to the page so quickly (Newkirk). Teachers instruction on this topic to understand how to not be harsh with such efforts and instead encourage the students to revise.

Lastly, a most crucial change requires teachers to bring more strength to their profession. Government or district educational policies limit teachers' ability to teach using their knowledge of their field and students. IRA and NCTE (1999) state that teachers must show how assessments “benefit and do not harm individual students.” Additionally, they assert that “assessment information should not be used for judgmental or political purposes if that use would be likely to cause harm to students or to the effectiveness of teachers of schools” ( IRA & NCTE, 1999). Currently, government and districts use high stakes assessments in just this way. These assessments determine the effectiveness of schools and teachers, which is then linked to funding. Teachers need to fight against such practices because this type of assessment does not improve learning and teaching. So, tests such as the MEA, the NWEA, and the SAT that are “group administered” and “multiple choice, machine scored tests used to hold teachers accountable” need to receive less value in the community because they do not “stimulate reflective teaching and learning” ( IRA & NCTE, 1999). Assessments like these cause teachers to devalue their own knowledge about literacy development and make teachers and students feel like assessments are “done to them rather than something in which they are involved” (IRA & NCTE, 1999). As stated above, teachers need more training on literacy so they can use their knowledge to end destructive practices. Teachers need the power of being informed so that they can speak up for the needs and best interests of their students instead of just following orders.

CONCLUSION
Illiteracy is often like the hydra Hercules fought as part of his labors. The simple solution to cut off the beast's head only reveals more struggles in its place. In comparison, educators can not seek the easiest solution, but rather must assess literacy problems more fully. The solution to literacy struggles is multifaceted to address the many causes of illiteracy and aliteracy. Prevention is furthermost, followed by fair, varied, and valid assessment of the student as a whole. After strengths and weakness and causal factors are determined, the teacher chooses an intervention that works best for the student addressing his academic needs as well as other mental, emotion, and social needs. Only with a multifaceted approach centering on the student as a whole can we overcome literacy struggles.

Notes

1. EDU621Understanding Literacy Problems at USM in Lewiston, ME. July 25, 2008.
2. EDU621Understanding Literacy Problems at USM in Lewiston, ME. July 25, 2008.
3. EDU621Understanding Literacy Problems at USM in Lewiston, ME. July 24, 2008.
4. EDU621Understanding Literacy Problems at USM in Lewiston, ME. July 24, 2008.


Works Cited

Aim, R. The educational causes of reading difficulties. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621
Understanding Literacy Problems Web site: http://www.usm.maine.edu/%7Eamoroso/edu621/causes.htm

Allington, R. L. (1997, Aug/Sept). Overselling Phonics. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621
Understanding Literacy Problems Web site:
http://www.usm.maine.edu/%7Eamoroso/edu621/phonics.htm

Amoroso, H. On becoming literate: personal perspectives. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621
Understanding Literacy Problems Web site: http://www.usm.maine.edu/%7Eamoroso/edu621/personal.htm

Amoroso, H. Organic primers for basic literacy instruction. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621
Understanding Literacy Problems Web site:
http://www.usm.maine.edu/%7Eamoroso/edu621/organic.htm

Atwell, N. (2007). The Reading Zone. New York: Scholastic.

International Reading Association, (2000, April). On Assessment for Children in Special Education
Experiencing Reading Difficulties. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621 Understanding
Literacy Problems

International Reading Association, National Council Of Teachers Of English, (1999). Standards for the
Assessment of Reading and Writing.IRA/NCTE Joint Task Force on Assessment.

Kohn, A. (2004, Nov). Challenging students ... and how to have more of them. Retrieved July 10, 2008,
from Alfie Kohn Web site: http://www.alfiekohn.org/teaching/challenging.htm

Kohn, A. (2005, Sept). Unconditional teaching. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from Alfie Kohn Web site:
http://www.alfiekohn.org/teaching/uncondtchg.htm

Kress, R. (1988, Nov). Remedial reading: some caveats when applying two trends in diagnosis.
Retrieved July 10, 2008, from Eric Digest Web site:
http://www.indiana.edu/~reading/ieo/digests/d31.html

Lyon, G.R., & Chhabra, V. (2004). Science of reading research. Educational Leadership. 13-17.

Newkirk, T. It's dirty to keep yelling digression . Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621
Understanding Literacy Problems Web site:
http://www.usm.maine.edu/%7Eamoroso/edu621/digression.htm

O'Brien, D. (2003, March). Juxtaposing traditional and intermedial literacies to redefine the
competence of struggling adolescents. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from Reading Online Web site:
http://www.readingonline.org/newliteracies/lit_index.asp?HREF=obrien2/index.html

Shaywitz, S. (2003). Overcoming Dyslexia. New York: Random House.

Steineger, M. (1998). Creating eager readers. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from Northweat Education
Magazine Web site: http://www.nwrel.org/nwedu/fall_98/article7.html

No Simple Answer: Why Students Struggle with Lireracy in American Schools

No Simple Answer:
Why Students Struggle with Literacy in American Schools

Reading: perhaps the most complex cognitive function humans preform. Thus, why are we surprised that a percentage of people struggle to become fluent and purposeful readers (Tufts University, 2001; Lyon and Chhabra, 2004; Shaywitz, 2003)? Over the years, society dedicates significant time, money, and effort to discovering why some children learn to read and write easily, while others stagger on their journey to literacy. Current literature on literacy depicts classroom teachers as the strongest cause of students' struggles; however, literacy problems also steam from the learners, their families, governmental and district mandates, and teacher education programs.

THE TEACHER
Teaching combines art and science; this potent mixture requires emotion. While some teachers elevate self-esteem over learning, emotion in the classroom remains crucial for high student success. When teachers lack an emotional connection to their students and in turn disvalue the emotions of their students, then literacy problems ensue. Emotion in the classroom affects literacy success by ending conditional teaching and driving teacher and student passion and curiosity.

A teacher's stance on emotions influences the type of environment that teacher creates for her students. Cambourne (2002) defines an environment as a place, the people and objects that inhabit the place, and the routines that occur in that place. The individual lessons, or ìepisodes,î in the classroom ìpermeateî the classroom setting, which ìcan flow back and forth into the episode, thus shaping it and vice versaî (Cambourne, 2002). Thus, lessons shape the environment and the environment the lessons. Emotion heavily dictates the objects and behavior found in a classroom. Just like missing books and pencils, teachers failing to include emotion in a classroom affects student literacy.

Teachers attempting to create a warm learning environment sometimes do so in a flawed manner. Instead of unconditional acceptance, these teachers project that they value ìgoodî students more than those with low scores and less obedience. If the teacher's acceptance depends on certain scores or behaviors, then the students feel that their teacher does not value them as they are (Kohn, 2005). Studies note correlations between negative moods, such as sadness, to poor performance on academic activities as well as students responding to the mood of the teacher (Coles, 1999). Aim further explains by quoting ìchildren 'respond most often not to the activity but to the feeling that the adult displays about them in the course of asking them to do whatever it is the adult has in mind.'î Thus, conditional acceptance of students contributes to poor gains in literacy or any subject.

The practice of valuing a student based on scores or behavior prevents the teacher from seeing her student as whole, complex person with unique needs, backgrounds, and problems. As discussed through various case studies in class, the teacher needs to see the whole child or they do not get an accurate picture of the root of a student's struggles. ìPigeon holingî students with labels or tracks also affects students. When the teacher or librarian only allows a child to read materials at his ìlevelî despite intense curiosity or interest, the adult succeeds in diminishing that child's love of learning (Note 1). The most potent example described a little boy who was not making progress because he never finished his classwork. This child's teacher did not perceive him as a whole person and did not know how interact with him because he did not fit her ideas of what a good student should be. Additionally, this teacher would always talk to the strongest students first, which projected that she valued only students who were not struggling. If teacher had connected with him, she would have learned that he was being emotionally ignored because a of a new baby in the family (Note 2). Even though this example depicted a second grader, adult learners feel the same. Comments from individuals in adult literacy programs also reflect difficulties based on teachers not seeing the student as a whole individual (Amoroso). Thus it is important for a teacher to see a student as a whole person, not just a score.

When a teacher sees students as multidimensional individuals, she seeks out and reacts to her students' learning interests and their opinions on the content and teaching methods. In contrast, when teachers ignore the natural passions and curiosity already present in the students, the students suffer. Teachers who lack flexibility in how and what they teach set their students up to struggle by not including the students in the planning. Moreover, when teachers react negatively to how students react to their curriculum, the problem is compounded. An excellent example of a teacher ignoring student interests and student reactions to curriculum and methods deals with ìThe Rime of the Ancient Mariner.î An inexperienced eighth grade teacher introduced this challenging text and expected the students to be excited about discussing the ìmystical and metaphysicalî properties of the piece. The students rebelled against the assignment because it was too difficult and boring. Instead of fixing the error and reacting to the students, the teacher made the students memorize the first twenty stanzas of the poem! (Aim). Those students must remember this canonic work with grimaces since their teacher killed any possible curiosity or interest they could have in the poem.

A participant in an adult literacy program summarized the importance seeing student unconditionally as whole individuals through this advice: Just don't have the students in your class to learn but take an interest in what the problems are and what they're interested in learning. What you can do to make things better for them and get them interest in things they want to do. Help them to understand what they are doing and to like it because some teachers will if you don't want to do this I don't care if you are in my class. For a lot of people they don't want to hear this. They are fighting back and saying I don't understand this and I don't want to do this. When they are really asking for is in other words please help me, but I don't know how to ask you for it. Take an interest in them and show them what to do (Amoroso).

Even when teachers see students as complex beings, other poor instructional practices rob students of the passion and curiosity these teachers want to inspire. One pitfall of teachers is overusing purchased materials that claim to address all the needs of the students. Teachers think using a prepackaged system saves time and energy, but really these stiff programs do not addressing the individual needs of students. Another common mistake, which sometimes results from packaged materials, is inflexibility in pacing through adherence to the idea that simple concepts must be master before complex. Many students become bored and frustrated working on these simple skills and thus the teacher deprives students of the exciting challenges resulting in slow and dull classes (Note 3). Lastly, too many worksheets or isolated practices never show the students how the skills connect in real reading and writing situations. For example, Aim describes a classroom where phonics explicitly taught in the early morning, yet, come reading time, those skills were not applied. Thus, these students were left on their own to make connections between the phonics skills and the reading.

Passive teaching springs from a reliance on workbooks and scripted lessons. First of all, students need skills modeled (Kohn, 2005). Without modeling, students never see how a literate adult puts all the pieces together when reading or writing. When teachers write in front of students or do read-alouds, not only do students get a clearer picture of how to do the task, but students also see skills in practice. Furthermore, seeing skills implemented in real world situations shows validity in learning the skill. Additionally, an enthusiastic teacher increases the students interested in the content. When teachers are cold distributors of bland facts, then the passion and curiosity in students dies. Coles (1999) describes this as a ìstolid emotional stateî in the classroom and adds that when students are left to ìdraw solely up on their own motivation, they are unable to sustain a commitment to learning.î Worksheets rarely, if ever, display a teachers love for learning and thus do not inspire passion in students.

On a deeper level, telling, instead of showing and doing, harms students because it hammers out students' ability to think independently (Kohn, 2005). A child loses his natural curiosity when he realizes that to do well he simply must memorize facts and do exactly what the teacher says. Students instead need to question and challenge in order to be real problem solvers and to have real interest in what they are learning. Kohn proclaims, ìWe should reject a focus on right answers and conventual methodsî and instead ìask probing questionsî and provide in ìevery lesson ... chances to wonder, to argue, to criticize the text and what the teacher has said.î Instead of memorizing ìrightî answers, students should be lead to form their own opinions and understand how they came to them (Kohn, 2005). However, challenging authority does not fit into many teacher's plan and thus the students lose their passion and enthusiasm.

For all these reasons, teachers make a large impact on students' learning and thus impact if a student will succeed or fail. However, the teacher is not the only factor in a student's literacy development. No matter how connected and enthusiastic the teacher, other factors contribute to a student's success with literacy.

THE STUDENT
Many believe that students struggle due to learning disabilities inherent in the individual's brain from birth. On such disability is dyslexia, a condition where brain does not connect sound and print as easily as the average person. This results in slow, labored reading (Shaywitz, 2003). Even though dyslexia relates directly to the learning of how to read, it is not the only learning disability that affects reading. Other mental, social, and behavior disabilities can influence how a student learns. However, not all people accept learning disabilities and instead think that other factors, such as schools and family, situations contribute to these outcomes (Birth of a Syndrome). Some educators even believe that gender determines how successful a student will be with reading.

As a high school teacher, I find it difficult understand why my students struggle with reading when they have had nine years schooling before arriving in my class. Secondary teachers often jump to the conclusion that struggling students are lazy, disorganized, disrespectful, valueless, unmotivated, or unintelligent. However, factors students encountered over the years cause these symptoms or defense mechanisms. O'Brien (2003) describes this phenomenon: ìAs a result of early identification, labeling, and prolonged placement in corrective programs, the stigmatized students develop early, profound, negative perceptions about their ability. The tragic irony is that we are so preoccupied with fixing deficit skills that we ignore this syndrome of diminished self-efficacy, attribution of failure to factors students perceive as being beyond their control, and learned helplessness.î Most of the behaviors I see at the secondary level are a result of years of struggle with reading and the students have masked their immediate problems with reading and confidence with different behaviors.

However, not all students who fail my class have a problem reading. Instead, they are aliterate. They can read, but they choose to do otherwise. Unlike the student described above, the student who can read well, but chooses not to do so, is more of a challenge for a teacher because there can be so many reasons why the student is not reading, some intrinsic and some not. One outside factor that can thwart a teacher's efforts against aliteracy is the student's family.

FAMILY
Family affects literacy just as teachers do. Scientific research shows that the family environment a student spends the formative years before school even starts has a huge impact on literacy achievement. Students from ìdisadvantaged environmentsî show lags in literacy development very early which grows as their more wealthy peers advance. One reason for this discrepancy is children on welfare speak and listen to their parents far less then other economic groups (Lyon and Chhabra, 2004). Thus, being part of a particlar family and that family's economic status can affect a student's gains in literacy.

Family also affects literacy through how much exposer to the world and print a student receives from his family. ìReading is a psychological guessing gameî where we combine our prior knowledge of the world and the patterns of language to create our guesses. When children lack prior knowledge, reading becomes more difficult. We experimented with this in class by looking at phrases quickly on the overhead. When we knew the phrase due to our prior knowledge, we could easily figure out the end even if we did not technically have time to read it. However, when the prior knowledge removed from the equation, it became almost impossible to guess the next words, which required the reader to slow down and focus more (Note 4). Thus, the more one knows the easier the reading. So, students whose families expose them to more language, more books, and more experiences bring more prior knowledge to the table and thus make learning to read easier.

Learning disabilities are frequently diagnosed, which some see as a panacea to all reading problems. Some parent pressure educators into diagnosing a learning disability even though labeling a child with a disability can provide an excuse or the wrong intervention for the child. Some parents want every problem to be a learning disability and not a sign of rebellion, clashing morals, or mental illness. For these reasons, ìparental advocacy groups have remained the strongest force in keeping alive the concept of learning disabilitiesî (Birth of a Syndrome). It is unclear how often parents pressure educators into false diagnoses since sources conflict; some believe few students have real learning disabilities while others contend that no parents tries to push a learning problem on to their child (Birth of a Syndrome; Shaywitz, 2003). The division over learning disabilities among educators also hinders reading development because it sends mixed messages about the root of the problem resulting in confusion and second guessing instead of successful intervention.

GOVERNMENT AND DISTRICT ADMINISTRATION
Often teachers give into poor practices, such as passive teaching, condition teaching, or labeling students, because of outside pressures. Some pressure comes from parents, but the government's laws about education and the local administration's implementation of those laws can create an environment where teachers have little flexibility in curriculum, pacing, or methods. If a district values the scores of a student more than the student, then it is hard for the individual teacher to not do the same in their classrooms. Furthermore, the policies, procedures, and restrictions some districts put on teachers limit their ability to break away from isolated skill practice or dull distribution of facts (Kohn, 2005). In such ways, it is the government and district policy makers who affect students' literacy achievement through affecting how teachers are able to teach.

TEACHER EDUCATION PROGRAMS
As we discussed in class, there is often a mismatch between training of teachers and reality (Note 5). My own experiences with teaching coincide with this critique of pre-service training. No one can be fully taught how to be a teacher; one learns to teach by teaching. Yet, my minor in secondary education needed more training on creating lessons that would transfer my passion for literature and writing to my students. My education also lack how to help my struggling readers progress. I received no instruction on how one learns to read nor was I required to reflect on how I read. Instead I was taught how to move them through Massachusetts state curriculum. My lack of training in these areas drastically affected the students my first year of teaching. My students were confused and disinterested in reading and writing and did not make much progress. Surprisingly, I am not alone in feeling unprepared because ìonly twenty-nine states required elementary teachers in training to have course-work specific to reading instruction, and even in those states only about twelve hours of graduate training is mandatedî (Birth of Syndrome). Students already battle so many causes of reading failure that it is ludicrous not to train teachers about these factors, how to overcome them if possible, and how not to be a cause for literacy struggles oneself.

CONCLUSION
No one cause can simply explain why any particular child struggles to gain literacy. Students arrive in Kindergarden with varying language skills, which sets some students behind. Others have learning disabilities that affect how their brains process. However, a student can also lose interest in reading and writing when a classroom is void of caring, support, passion, and curiosity. A teacher's lack of connection with her students or harsh district or government mandates that dictate a teacher's practices create these uninspiring classrooms. Students who encounter more than one of these factors have a greater risk of struggling with literacy.

Notes
1. EDU621Understanding Literacy Problems at USM in Lewiston, ME. May 17, 2008.
2. EDU621Understanding Literacy Problems at USM in Lewiston, ME. July 25, 2008.
3. EDU621Understanding Literacy Problems at USM in Lewiston, ME. May 17, 2008.
4. EDU621Understanding Literacy Problems at USM in Lewiston, ME. May 17, 2008.
5. EDU621Understanding Literacy Problems at USM in Lewiston, ME. May 17, 2008.

Works Cited

Aim, R. The educational causes of reading difficulties. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621
Understanding Literacy Problems Web site: http://www.usm.maine.edu/%7Eamoroso/edu621/causes.htm

Amoroso, H. On becoming literate: personal perspectives. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621
Understanding Literacy Problems Web site: http://www.usm.maine.edu/%7Eamoroso/edu621/personal.htm

Allington, R. L. (1997, Aug/Sept). Overselling Phonics. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621
Understanding Literacy Problems Web site:
http://www.usm.maine.edu/%7Eamoroso/edu621/phonics.htm

Birth of a syndrome. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from Audiblox Web site:
http://www.audiblox2000.com/book2.htm

Cambourne, B. (2002). Conditions for literacy learning. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from EDU621
Understanding Literacy Problems Web site:
http://www.usm.maine.edu/%7Eamoroso/edu621/br.htm

Coles, G. (1999, March). Literacy, emotion, and the brain. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from Reading
Online Web site: http://www.readingonline.org/critical/coles.html

Kohn, A. (2004, Nov). Challenging students ... and how to have more of them. Retrieved July 10, 2008,
from Alfie Kohn Web site: http://www.alfiekohn.org/teaching/challenging.htm

Kohn, A. (2005, Sept). Unconditional teaching. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from Alfie Kohn Web site:
http://www.alfiekohn.org/teaching/uncondtchg.htm

Lyon, G.R., & Chhabra, V. (2004). Science of reading research. Educational Leadership. 13-17.

O'Brien, D. (2003, March). Juxtaposing traditional and intermedial literacies to redefine the
competence of struggling adolescents. Retrieved July 10, 2008, from Reading Online Web site:
http://www.readingonline.org/newliteracies/lit_index.asp?HREF=obrien2/index.html

Shaywitz, S. (2003). Overcoming Dyslexia. New York: Random House.

Tufts University, (2001). A "high wire balancing act". Retrieved July 10, 2008, from Tufts University
E-News Web site: http://enews.tufts.edu/stories/013002ReadingAndChildren.htm

Teaching Writing

Over the last year, the work of Nancy Atwell and Vicki Spandell have made a large impact on the way facilitate writing for all students. Matching their discussions on writer's workshop with my knowledge of writing development and the writing process allows me to create a writing program, with instruction and assessment, for all abilities and needs.

I teach mainstream freshmen at all abilities levels, so I see a range of ability and need in my classroom. Writing develop has five stages: emergent, initial, transition, basic, and refinement. However, my students mainly fall into the description of basic and refinement stages of writing development. My students are knowledgeable and capable of various prewriting strategies and are capable of revision and editing. (That's not to say that all students preform these tasks unless I pressure them to do so). My students also tend to write drafts that require several sittings to complete and they use focused questions from me and the writer when they do formal peer conferencing. Most of my students also love to receive feedback on their writing, whether from peers or from me. Many of my honors students exhibit traits of the refinement stage such as writing differently than they speak, writing for many different purposes or from different points of view, and high mastery for grammar and mechanics. Meanwhile other students, usually those not in honors courses, have some traits of transitional development, such as thinking revision is redoing their work, trouble editing, and stories that cover all points of the plot equally.

With such a wide range of students, it is important that I design a program that reaches all students. I've implemented a writing workshop in my classroom and have found that its flexibility meets the range in students needs better than my previous writing program. This program also has the ability to meet the needs of ELL students, although I have not yet had an ELL student in my class.

I see my students for eighty minutes every other day. Using Atwell's suggestion that students are more likely to read at home than to writer at home, I structured my class-time to have a block of thirty minutes of writing time at the end of every period. First of all, this structure created predictable writing time as recommended by Regie Routman in Writing Essentials (2004). My students know that they are expected to write every class, so they easily transition into this activity and are used to the types of activities they can preform during this time. They know they can work on any stage of the writing process of a piece, or they can refer to the menu on the board if they need more specific direction. This helps to meet the different abilities in the classroom. Students can work at their own pace and focus on their own areas of need during writing time. For example, a student who needs extra time to process can take longer drafting a story than a student who needs to spend more time on editing a final draft. Likewise, this class structure allows ELL students the opportunity to do activities such as having stories scribed, tape recording and playing back stories, working on phonics and vocabulary, or using pictionaries, which might otherwise interfere with or stand out in a class where all students were working at the same pace on the same step.

Other than the ten to fifteen minutes of required silent time, students are allowed to talk during our writing time. As Routmen (2004) summarizes: “A community of writers who share ideas and respond helpfully to one another makes it easier and more enjoyable to write.” Often, this social interaction takes the form of conferencing. Some conferences are very informal. I often see friends swap notebooks and read each other's work, more to share an idea or receive affirmation than to ask for deep criticism. Other times, a small group of students will sit discussing one students topic in-depth for several minutes. I've also observed students asking each other for quick help or criticism, such as how to spell a word, a synonym, or to read a line over to see if it “sounds okay.” When I started writing workshop, I was weary of this aspect of the program; I thought no writing would occur and students would always be off task. While there are still talkative students and students who avoid work, from observing my students I've seen that pretty much all students do write every class period and the social interaction provides them with support. The social interaction in the classroom also helps ELL students. These students not only receive greater exposure to language being used, but they can use their peers as a resource; as Routman summarizes Freeman and Freeman (2002), Krashen (2003), and Knapp et al. (1995) in Writing Essentials: “English Language Learners ... are more apt to succeed when they are immersed in a challenging curriculum and give lots of opportunities for scaffolded conversations and shared experiences.” Kagan and Holt also argue that working collaboratively helps to build self-esteem.

During writing time students can also conference with me, which is advocated by Atwell (1998), Routmen (2004), Graves (1994), and Calkins (1994). I typically see two types of conferences: students who want help getting started and students who want help polishing a draft. In general, conferencing allows me to get to know my students personally and as writers. I am able to validate their attempts, respond to their content as a reader, and offer guidance about what next steps to take next. Also, teacher conferencing is a great opportunity for me to individualize instruction for the various ability levels and needs in my classroom. For example, one conference may focus on helping a student notice places in a story where the reader wants more detail and I can talk to the student about exploding the moment, as Barry Lane puts it in After the End (1993). Then the next conference, might focus on word choice in a persuasive essay and helping the writer to see how specific word choice can turn off or sway the reader. Preforming these lessons as a full class would not be as effective as giving the information to individual students through a personal conference dealing with their specific piece of writing. Having time built into class for conferencing with me is an additional way I can support an ELL student. During conferences, I can help build prior knowledge, make connections between new and old information, and classify information about various areas of language depending on the students literacy level in English and their other language(s). Conference time can also be a time where I could scribe for a student who has developed Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills, but not yet Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency.

The ability for students to conference with me and peers during their writing time fits into one of the major principles of my writing program, which is also part of our school and state curriculum: Writing is a process consisting of prewriting (or planning), drafting, revising, editing, and publishing (Routman, 2003; Calkins; Graves, 1983). My students have received instruction on the writing process before entering my classroom, but we are always going back to the process to define its steps and discuss how to use them. Where I used to just lecture about the steps, I've since learned that modeling of the steps works better to illustrate how to use them, which Vicki Spandell, Nancy Atwell, Katie Wood Roy, and Linda Rief advocate. Earlier this year, I took my students through the steps I used to write a poem. I shared with my students how I got the idea for my poem while I was driving, so when I got home, I rushed to map out my thinking. I then explained how I zeroed in on one idea and how I decided that a poem would be the best genre to use for my idea. The lesson ended there that day, and I asked students to think about how they narrow down a topic and chose a genre while they worked on their prewriting. Another day I showed my students my first draft of the poem. I showed them how I didn't worry too much about the structure, grammar, or spelling because I wanted to get the ideas down. Still another day, I showed them the changes I made through three drafts of my poem and did some additional revision out loud while they watched, and then we discussed the different types of things one can do while revising a poem. These short lessons on the writing process help students in a few ways. First, they allow them to see how the steps are used on a real piece of writing. Secondly, the students saw my life as a writer, particularly how I choose topics that are from my deepest interests (Graves). Lastly, they allow me to start the gradual release of responsibility process with these writing skills. For example, after the lesson where I shared my revision, I asked students to share in the demonstration and provide their input on what to revise in a different draft.

One of the most important elements of my writing workshop design is choice as endorsed by Atwell, Graves, and Routman. For me, reading Vicki Spandell's chapter on “The Right to Choose a Personally Important Topic” in The Nine Rights of Every Writer (2005), helped me to see why choice is so important for students while still explaining that there a balance still exists between choice and necessary content writing. Now, my students chose their own topics and to try different genres. For most students, the choice is their favorite part of my class. These students are excited to work in their favorite genres and to try new ones, or they have a wealth of subjects to explore through writing. However, there are many students who find such choice overwhelming. I often conference with these students about how I choose a topic. We discuss what they know a lot about or if there are important life experiences they want to share. Or, we might begin by looking at the list of genres posted in the room and seeing if one sounds more interesting than the others. Choice is another element that supports writing for ELL students. Allowing such students to chose a topic about which they already have knowledge can make writing much less daunting than processing new material and writing in a new language at the same time. Also, just as with other students, choice can be a motivator.

The writing workshop easily matches many of the elements of my school curriculum. For example, I can easily work on grammar and conventions with students individually, or when I see a persistent problem with all students, as mini lessons for the whole class. These items of the curriculum easily fit into the local, state, and national assessments we participate in such as the NWEA, the SAT verbal section, and local assessments that evaluate student writing. Another large area in the freshmen curriculum is achieving deep revision versus surface revisions, and is highly supported by Donald Graves and Barry Lane. The workshop format allows students ample time to rework their pieces alone and with support from peer and me; additionally, I am able to give multiple mini-lessons on the topic and foster gradual release of those skills.

However, other aspects of the writing workshop do not directly address our assessments. So, there are times when I must suspend student choice for us to work on types of writing they will need to do for assessments. The timed essay portion of the SAT and literary analysis essays needed for AP courses are perfect examples. Students do not elect to do these types of writing on their own; in fact, most of my students have never done them before. So, at certain points in the year, we suspend choice and the students work on these types of writing. However, as much as possible, the rest of the structure of writing workshop is kept the same. For example, students still use social interaction while writing their lit analysis essay and I still model the steps of writing a timed piece.

The writing workshop also allows me to foster the connection between reading and writing that Allington and Richard Gentry promote. Not only do my students receive time to read and writer every class period, but there are several other opportunities for them to connect being a reader and being a writer. I encourage students to emulate the craft of the writer's whose work we read, such as using the literature and poetic devices we study in our class discussions of literature in their own writing. But perhaps the most common connections is when a student asks me about trying a new genre. Many students wrote children's books this year, but were unsure of how to start since they hadn't read one in years. Similar situations happened for students writing book or movie reviews, pamphlets, sports articles, or various types of poems. When students come to me with these concerns, my first advice is to look in the classroom library for examples of the type of writing they want to try and read them critically. I tell them that those examples are the templates and directions for trying that genre on their own. The ELL student is also helped by the connections formed between reading and writing through using a workshop design. Having time to read at the beginning of class as well as allowing reading as part of processing for writing increases ELL students exposure to print.

Reading Failure

The best way to reconcile conflicting points of view when designing effective reading instruction for all readers is to realize that multiple factors are always at play when dealing with humans, and so no one answer will work for all children. Different types of practitioners and researchers find the root of the reading failure in different areas because of the focus of their study. Those who believe that reading is a series of developmental stages believe the cause and solution for reading failure can be found in those stages; meanwhile, those who focus on neurology or school structures find the problem and answer in those areas. I believe that these areas often overlap. First of all, in any given classroom, students' causes for reading failure will come from different factors because of their individual experiences and make up, thus it is a foolish idea to try to have one solution solve all reading failure. However, sometimes it is often a combination of different areas in one student that creates the reading failure, so it is also wise for the teacher to try multiple approaches toward individual students as well as the class as a whole.

There are five stages of literacy development: emergent (preK - K), initial (1-2), transitional (2-4), basic (4-6), and refinement (6 and on) (O'Donnell and Wood). As a secondary education teacher in a school that provides pull out services for students who are below a third grade reading level, I do not encounter students in the emergent or initial stages. However, I do often encounter students stuck in the transitional stage; in fact, this is the stage students in general most often get stuck. These students are able to read independently and know many sight words and word identification strategies, but still need to work on fluency and comprehension. These students are often good at “fake reading” as Tovani calls it in I Read It, But I Don't Get It (2000); they manage to get by without reading. Other high school students become stuck at the basic stage. While these students can read fluently and read a wider range of materials than transitional readers, they still struggle with comprehension, deeper vocabulary understanding, and metacognition. In my classroom, often these students are “word callers” who can read out loud beautifully, but have little understanding of what the passage means. Or, these students may not know how to tell when they are stuck or get unstuck while reading.

Those that believe developmental stages can diagnose all reading failure believe students become stuck in a stage for a variety of reasons, all of which relate to the students prior experience or knowledge. One of these reasons is socioeconomic factors, such as described in Lawrence Hardy's article “Children at Risk” (2006). Students who live in poverty often have reading failure. One reason is that students living on limited means are not exposed to as many life experiences. For example, a student who lives in poverty might not go on outings to zoos, parks, or museums that other children do. Similarly, children living in poverty may not go on vacation and thus would not know about other places, be them geographic locations such beaches, farms, or cities, or other states or countries that wealthier families could visit; impoverished children would also lack on knowledge about travel such as how an airport works or what a passport is. Furthermore, students who live in poverty may also not get the direct literacy instruction from their parents that other children receive. Such students' parents might not have the money to afford books, the resources to go to a library, or the time to spend reading to or with their children. The lack of these experiences can affect a student drastically once he or she enters the classroom affecting his or her readiness to read or his or her ability to understand the content of what is read.

Poverty is not the only way that students might lack prior knowledge. As Mary Pipher explains in her book Middle of Everywhere (2003), students from other cultures, primarily immigrant families, can lack cultural knowledge that affects their developmental stage in literacy. While language is a barrier, cultural knowledge extends even further. For example, if a students comes from a country with a different climate, that child might not understand have trouble understanding books in a unit on seasons changing or snow. This can extend to all sorts of aspects of culture including how a story is structured because different cultures share information with different organization. While in America we usually tell a story chronologically or share information in a direct fashion, other cultures are elliptical or work backwards. Lacking knowledge about American culture thus can also cause a student to become stuck at a developmental stage until these gaps in understanding are closed.
Another aspect that can affect a students progress through the developmental stages can be the values held in the students home, which could be due to a different culture or not. If parents or other families members do not value education or literacy, then it is very probable that these values will pass to the children in that family even if not directly taught. In my practice, I see this most often through male students who don't see the value in reading because they intend to enter the family business such as farming, lobstering, or mechanics. These students lose interest in reading after the novelty wears off and the reading gets more difficult.

There is also an emotional component to literacy. Years of failure can create emotional problems for students as Tovani describes in the first chapter of I Read It, But I Don't Get It entitled “Fake Reading.” She describes all the negativity that her students bring to yet another class designed for poor readers. Furthermore, in “Emotions, Cognition, and Becoming a Reader” Carol Lyons explains the affect that emotions have on learning and reading. She describes that there are chemical reactions in the brain that occur based on our emotions and those reactions then affect our learning. Ultimately, negative emotions can chemically prevent ideal conditions in the brain for learning, including reading (Lyons, 1999). Gerald Coles in his article “Literacy, Emotions, and the Brain” agrees that emotion is an important part of literacy instruction, but he asserts that students struggle because our instruction is void of emotion. We still teach children the Puritan work ethic that hard work is more important than happiness and then expect students lacking in confidence and motivation to sustain their own learning (Cole, 1999) Alfie Kohn (2005) explores emotional factors of teaching in an article entitled “Unconditional Teaching” discussing that we teach children that they are accepted only if they do well academically or behaviorally. All of these discussions suggest that emotion can play a large role in a student's prior experience with school and reading causing a student to stall at a developmental stage.

However, one of the biggest factors that has affected a students prior knowledge and experience upon arrival in my freshmen classroom is experience with school and teachers. While some practitioners believe that teachers and schools can be the root of reading failure, I believe that it is more accurately put that teacher methods and school structures can negatively affect a students' experiences and knowledge base thus causing that student to become stuck at a stage for one or more of the reasons stated above.

There are many teaching methods and school practices that can negatively affect students. One huge problem with teachers is a lack of necessary training. When I think of my own undergraduate education, I did not receive any instruction on literacy in terms of metacognition, assessment, writing process, ELL, and many other areas that directly affect my daily instructional decisions. Poor teacher training can lead to any number of methods that could lead to reading failure including relying on only canned prepackaged reading programs or not reading research data critically. Another problem steaming from school can be a lack of balance. Schools might not offer enough choice in reading materials, causing students to become unengaged with texts they can't relate to. Or, a school might spend too much time preparing students for assessments such as standardized tests instead of providing reading time or authentic literacy experiences. Schools might put too much attention on phonics or whole language instead of balance of the two as recommend by Gerald Coles, Marie Clay, and recently the National Reading Panel; thus only some learners reached, leaving others behind. The use of tracking or pull out classes could emotionally affect students. I can remember knowing I was in the lowest reading group in first grade how that felt. I can only imagine how much worse it would have been to pulled out of story time, music or art to get further reading instruction.
Sometimes the belief that neurological factors are the root of reading failure leads to some of the poor teaching practices listed above. Psychologists and medical doctors often believe that reading failure comes from problems within the brain that cause the student to have difficulty with word recognition, decoding, or spelling. In her book Overcoming Dyslexia (2005), Sally Shaywitz explains the differences between a dyslexics brain versus an average reader. To overcome these problems, she focuses strongly on a phonics approach asserting that there is a one best approach to phonics (unlike Patricia Cunningham in Phonics They Use (1995)). While Shaywitz also discusses other ways to help dyslexics that include approaches found in whole language practice, schools can read Shaywitz push for phonics done a certain way as a solution to reading problems and create imbalanced programs. From my own experience with dyslexia, I know that it was not phonics instruction that made me the reader I am today. Quite the contrary, a combination of the phonics instruction at my school coupled with strong value education in my family, frequent trips to town and school libraries, and frequently being read to by teachers and my father kept me interested and invested in reading more than any phonics solution alone could. So, teachers and schools must be careful to read research critically to avoid implementing imbalanced programs which negatively affect students school experiences.

Thus, instead of taking one approach to reading failure, teachers and schools must be prepared to deal with multiple causes. Developmental stages can be affected by teaching methods, and teaching methods can be dictated by beliefs on neurology. Schools must realize that reading failure has no panacea and teachers should be trained to attack it on all front. For this to work, teachers must be well trained in literacy and then must get to know their students. Teachers need to use a variety of assessments that allow them to know their students on multiple levels so that they can decided what the cause or causes of reading failure could be, because there is no one cause for all children. This preparation coupled with principles presented in question one such as student engagement through time, choice, and social interaction with reading; using gradual release and the principles of comprehension; and enthusiastic teachers who share their literacy lives and create rich print environments will create reading instruction where all students succeed.

Creating a Program of Studies

As a high school English Language Arts teacher, I am responsible for creating a literacy program for my students. Underlying principles guide my choices on instruction, materials, assessments, and organization / environment. I teach high school underclassmen who range from the transitional to refinement stages in their literacy development. My school practices heterogeneous grouping for all students except those considered “advanced,” so my class periods are made up of individuals with a variety of needs. The principles that guide me in creating and maintaining my literacy program allow me to meet the needs of all these students.

One of the most important principles that guides my instruction is the concept of gradual release as described in Regie Routman's Reading Essentials as the “optimal learning model” and also called “zone of proximal development” by Vygotsky. Gradual release, which is also supported by Debbie Miller, starts with teacher demonstration, then moves to demonstration shared by teacher and student. Next, students partake in guided practice where the teacher assists the student before moving on to independent practice, the final step where the student preforms the skill alone. I use this principle to guide my instruction often with reading and writing. For example, even though my students are older, I still preform read alouds to illustrate how I make meaning from text or how I take notes on a text. During the writing portion of my class, I often share with my students how I gather ideas, form a paragraph, or revise. After modeling, I can then ask students to collaborate with me by adding their input while I lead and explain as necessary. Then it is time for the students to try this work on their own. As they work, I move around the room observing and helping. Most recently, guided practice in my classroom focused on finding subjects and predicates in sentences. I often redirected students when they asked for affirmation by asking questions like “Can you do that word? Is it an action?” or by re-explaining how compound subjects and predicates are linked together with “and.” After guided practice, my students are ready for independent practice, but the length of time it takes to get to this stage varies from student to student and skill to skill. By using flexible grouping during class work time, students are able to work on different stages of gradual release simultaneously (Tomlinson, 1995, 1999).

Gradual release has two important benefits in my classroom. First, it allows me to support my students as they gradually make skills and concepts their own. Before I learned about this method, I would often move from a lecture straight to independent practice that would be assessed for a grade. Only the students with natural talent in ELA or who had learned the content before would be successful. Now, I introduce my content giving ample time for students to explore and experiment with the material and get assistance before they are assessed on their own. With models from me and fellow students and many sessions to practice together and alone, far more students are successful. Secondly, gradual release allows me to work with students at varying levels of mastery. Students who understand quickly from my demonstration lead during shared demonstration while others who still need more modeling can watch. Later during practice, students who struggle can receive more attention during guided practice, while those who feel confident can move into independent practice at varying levels of complexity or begin to receive guided practice on a different skill.

Prior knowledge is another principle that guides my instruction, and is supported by David Pearson and Debbie Miller. I first read about activating prior knowledge through Chris Tovani's Do I Really Have to Teach Reading (2004). I later learned that prior knowledge is just the first step in the principles of comprehension, which also include connecting new and old information together and organizing or classifying information to improve recall. In my classroom, I often check or activate prior knowledge before starting a larger lesson or text. For example, when I used to teach Ann Rinaldi's A Break with Charity about the Salem Witch Trials or Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, we would often complete a KWL chart about the Puritans prior to starting the book to help students gather and remember the historical information they would need to understand the text. Sometimes, I would need to build prior knowledge because students would know very little about the Puritans; we would do further reading on the subject such as completing a jig saw using their American History textbook, reading aloud the children's book The Spinner's Daughter by Amy Sugarlittle, or discussing Anne Bradstreet's poem “Upon the Burning of Our House.” Then, as we read the assigned text, we would connect the factual information in these historical fictions back to the earlier readings and KWL. This would help the students to connect the new information they learned about Puritans to the older information they new from history, movies, or our readings, and thus they were able to recall it later more easily. Implementing this principle in my instructional decisions made a huge impact on my students. First of all, I stopped assuming that all my students knew the historical information in a text. By taking inventory of their knowledge before we started, I was able to support their reading instead of always back tracking when they were confused. This principle has helped with all sorts of topics that involve background knowledge, including grammar, writing, and research skills.

Chris Tovani also taught me about metacognition in her book I Read It, But I Don't Get It (2000). Previously, I assumed that high school students would know how to read. However, when two-thirds of my non-honors students were failing my first year of teaching, I realized that they all did not experience reading the way I did. I soon learned to reflect on my own reading to see what good readers do and then pass this on to students, like Nancy Atwell and Richard Allington in their workshops. Thus, I adopted the principle that reading involves complex thinking. My students in my middle level classes who struggled often thought like Tovani did as a teen (2000). They believed being able to say the words would ensure meaning. Or, they would reread multiple times expecting the meaning to magically come to them. These students didn't know how to monitor their reading to determine when they were stuck, and then apply fix-it strategies like questioning, connecting, or using print conventions. Now, I base a lot of my instruction on the concept that reading is complex thinking that makes meaning.

After I started to use these three principles in my instruction, I then started to work on the materials and environment in my classroom. First, I worked on creating a classroom that is rich in literacy experiences. This started with an extensive classroom like Nancy Atwell, Regie Routmen, and Richard Allington encourage. While funding prevents me from getting the optimal number and range to my library, my library still contains about four hundred texts ranging from a few children's picture books, to texts better suited for transitional readers like Gary Paulsen and Judy Blume, to best selling adult fiction, to canonical classics. However, students rarely looked at my classroom library until I made a few more changes. First, I used Routmen's Reading Essentials to help me organize my library in an inviting way. Then, I added to my instruction and organization three key elements: choice, time, and sharing (all backed by Atwell, Allington, and Routmen). Adding choice, time, and sharing to my instruction has been so important because of the increase motivation and engagement it provides for students both in reading and writing.

I started the 2008 school year with free choice reading being the norm instead of an occasional reward. I really took to heart Atwell's belief that “free choice reading of books should be a young person's right – not a privilege granted by the teacher.” Students at all levels were instantly more interested and engaged with their reading. Next, I added twenty minutes a class period for reading time. With out rotating two day block schedule of eighty minute periods, this equalled between forty to sixty minutes of in class reading time a week for students. Where homework used to be a prescribed chapters, it changed to reading thirty minutes a day out side of school adding an additional three and a half hours of reading time a week. Coupled with choice to read anything they like, students were completing their reading homework and flying through books. Even students who claimed to dislike reading or had failed the course the year before because of not reading were reading silently and sustained for the twenty minutes every class period.

To keep up the momentum once the novelty wore of, I added sharing of reading. Sometimes I shared with students my experiences with reading through book talks. At other times in the year, students shared their favorite books or books that influenced them. About once a month, students posted a on a web forum letter essay, designed after those Atwell uses in her students journals, to allow students to read about each other's reading and respond. Recommendations from peers and me inspired many student choices in reading. And, I always allowed a couple of minutes after silent reading time's conclusion during which I hear students excitedly sharing and recommending their books.

At the same time I introduced time, choice, and sharing in reading, I did the same in my writing curriculum. Highly inspired by Atwell's In the Middle and Vicki Spandell's book The Nine Rights of Every Writer (2005), I devoted the last thirty minutes of my class periods to writing time. Students were allowed to choose their own topics and genres for writing. During writing time, I conference with students and encourage them to conference with each other both formally and informally about their topics and ideas as well as more conventional areas like grammar and spelling. (I know a literacy program includes writing, but to save on repetition I'll explain the rest of the design of my writing program in question 5's answer below). Overall, the introduction of choice, time, and sharing into my writing curriculum, which used to be made of teacher chosen essays, greatly increased the number of writing assignments that were completed and students' enthusiasm to complete them.

When I introduced choice and time to read and write in my class every day, my biggest concern was that there would be less rigor in my class. However, when I read Alfie Kohn's article “Challenging Students ... And How to Have More of Them,” I adopted the principle that rigor does not come from a text choice I make or a creative project I plan. Instead, rigor can come from me letting go of all the control and authority of “being the teacher.” Kohn explains that students can be reluctant to think for themselves, especially when a teacher is there to give them “answers.” However, teachers can create rigor by helping students become critical thinkers. He suggests “taking children backstage” to show them how we solve real problems in our content. To take it even further, he states that “every lesson included chances to wonder, to argue, to criticize, the text and what the teacher has said.” This component of fostering students who challenge what they read in texts and question the status quo is rigor that is more important for the real world and fits well with the freedom of reading and writing workshops.

The most important factor I find in all of my teaching is balance. With so much to cover in my curriculum as well as local, state, and national assessments to prepare my students for, balancing my instruction has been crucial to the design of my program. I need to ensure a balance in the work students do for enjoyment versus academic work. Thus, I have a balance in choices I make and the students make. The majority of the year, my students chose their own texts to read and own writing topics and genres, yet I must make sure that they cover the content needed for all freshmen, primarily essay writing, literary analysis, and research. So, over the course of the year I have chosen (or limited choice on) three texts that students read and we based three essays and a research assignment off of these texts, but still allowed students freedom on the pace they read the texts and the topics of their essays. This ensured that students learned the difference between reading for enjoyment versus reading for more academic purposes such as to analyze or gain information.

Another huge piece of balance in the design of my program is assessment. As freshmen, my students only take one criterion referenced test, the NWEA. Then they complete two local assessments. Everything else throughout the rest of the year is designed by me. I made sure to include variety, basing a lot of my choices on Atwell's chapter on assessment in In The Middle. I use informal reading and writing conferences. I observe students reading, writing, and working in groups. Students reflect on their own work. Then there are more traditional assessments such as polished writing pieces, prompt writing, quizzes on vocabulary or grammar, and oral presentations. The variety in my assessment is important. For example, a criterion referenced test allows the teacher to see if a student can preform at a certain level; particularly, the NWEA breaks data down into specific standards and skills students have master, need more work on, and should move on to next. But, a test like this doesn't represent a real world reading or writing experience. Thus, assessments like teacher observations and anecdotal notes allow teachers to gather data on more authentic experiences. Providing variety and balance in assessment also allows students to use their strengths as well as improve on weaknesses and allows teachers to get data from a variety of perspectives (student, teacher, more objective from a standardized test).