Assignment Template

Hello Readers:

This is a response to the Assignment Template.

            I found this template so incredibly helpful and I know I will use this as a resource in my future as a teacher. For someone who has had very little teaching experience and a lot of reading/learning experiences, I have been afraid of not knowing how to make the transition. Yet this template does a wonderful job of breaking down exactly what needs to happen for teaching literature to students. The Overview was helpful to see how a unit progresses over time and how you build on each skill throughout. Then each section got more in depth and gave specific examples and activities on how to achieve those skills.

            The section I had previously not thought very much about was the Prereading; how to set-up students to purposefully and successfully prepare before beginning the reading. It makes complete sense that you can’t just jump into a text without setting up goals, objectives, and questions to look for. Exploring key concepts, making connections to their lives, surveying the text, understanding vocabulary, making predictions and asking questions are all things that build to those critical thinking based skills from Common Core. That’s before even reading the text!

            Another fear of mine as a Literature, not Education, major is what if the students do not comprehend what they read. This template again gives wonderful examples and activities not only for the teacher to gage their comprehension but for the students to do so as well. The basic idea for students is to revisit they have read and discussing what they got from it. Answering their own questions from the Prereading would be a very useful exercise. I also enjoyed that not only are these activities based on the textual level but also goes to the author level, which is something I never explored until college. The author level brings a new depth to the critical thinking of a work by exploring the structure, language, and style, of the text, why the author chose it, and how it affects the work and in turn the reader. This is an extremely important skill for students to learn. I also particularly found the logos, ethos, and pathos section very useful with all the questions that can be asked.

            The writing sections I also found very well organized and well laid out for teacher and student alike. A writing process can be very difficult to understand until those skills are honed but because this template is fashioned in a way that builds skills. It takes previous sections and continually adds elements one at a time in order that by the time the student arrives at writing they need only look back at the critical skills already learned and apply them in a new way.

            I know that this resource will be extremely useful in helping write lesson plans as well as presenting texts in a way that students can understand why they are doing specific activities and how they build those skills.

Thanks all,

Halee