Dana M. Buckmir
I am a Language Arts teacher at Wilbur Cross High School. Wilbur Cross is one of the largest high schools in New Haven, CT with a student population of approximately fourteen hundred. The school is definitely a reflection of the city, New Haven as a diverse urban community. Students who attend the high school filter in from local neighborhoods including: East Rock, Fair Haven, Foxon, The Cove, and The Hill. The blending of various races, ethnicities, languages, cultures and socioeconomic status is representative of the diversity that is home to the city of New Haven and reflected in our school.
Class periods at Wilbur Cross high school are approximately forty-five minutes in length three days a week and ninety minutes one day a week. Ideally this unit would be most effective if instructed during block scheduling; however, because our school only has one long period a week it will extend over a longer span of time. The particular classes that I instruct have given me an opportunity to observe the different dynamics within the school as well as experience the collective culture or environment the school provides. Although I teach a number of different classes I have chosen to direct my unit towards my English 4 class. Even though the unit is targeted for the senior class, the lessons can be modified for various grade and ability levels. Certain lessons can be omitted or altered, yet the concepts can be applied universally.
My English 4 class consists of lower-level or reluctant readers and writers. These classes are labeled "basic" on the hierarchal tier because these students do not read and write on grade level based on educational records and standardized test scores. Despite the classification of these students as lower level, they are quite capable of reading, writing and communicating when provided with the appropriate outlet to choose the genre of literature they desire to read as well as the way they want to express themselves in writing and verbally; that is, when they have ownership of and responsibility for their education and the route it will take. Too often many teachers may assume that basic means lazy or incompetent. In my opinion, basic level students just need a little more of the teacher's patience, direction and acceptance than students on the higher levels. When teacher expectations for lower achieving students are compromised, an injustice is committed toward the student as well as the educational system in general. By lowering the expectations for students that some teachers deem unable to learn, education is counter productive. In the long term this action establishes a permanent underclass of uneducated adults. In fact, basic students are the ones that need to be challenged by educators with lessons that initiate critical higher order thinking processes.
Just recently I attended an adolescent literacy conference sponsored by the Yale University Child Social Development Department that affirmed my beliefs about alternative, progressive approaches for instructing lower level students and the responsibility of the educator to do so. Many of my students have never finished a book before they enter my classroom either because they read below their grade level or because they were turned off by reading in their earlier academic years. Some of my students can read, but don't read. This type of reader is what Kylene Beers refers to as a "dormant reader". Regardless of the reason students don't read such an obstacle must be addressed in the classroom and implemented across subject areas with interdisciplinary lessons that concentrate on strengthening reading and writing skills in addition to learning the content knowledge. With this said, I consider myself to be an advocate for those lower achieving students. It is imperative that as educators we reach these students before they leave the high school and provide them with the basic skills, that means, life skills in addition to content knowledge; that they need to survive in the real world.
As an observant educator, I regularly notice the dynamic between the girls and boys in my classroom as well as in the school as a whole. I have noticed that many female students experience conflict during their high school years that affects their self-esteem and overall identity formation. Body image, peer acceptance and the standards of beauty are issues that influence adolescent female identity formation. Because these girls are at such a vulnerable stage in their lives they need positive reinforcement, an outlet to express their voice and encouragement to create and maintain a healthy self-esteem and identity. Too many girls succumb to peer pressure and the prescribed identity they are supposed to be instead of who they really want to be. Or, if they are uncertain about whom they want to be, they aren't equipped with the appropriate psychological and cognitive resources to make a smooth transition from adolescence to adulthood. These girls struggle to find their voice in a society that limits and silences them on many levels. The purpose of this unit is to utilize the literature in order to model voice, inspire the reader through perseverance, and encourage the student to make a connection outside herself, in other words to view the larger picture as an attempt to gain perspective.