Frustration with Literacy in Classrooms

            After reading the three passages by Thomas, Karon Cadeiro-Kaplan, and the NCTE, I couldn’t help but reflect on what I agree and disagree with about literacy in schools today. The idea of progressive literacy seems like an ideology that is forgotten in schools today. Caderio-Kaplan and Thomas both discuss the importance of recognizing students as individuals. Progressive literacy seems to focus on and remember that students learn in different ways and that no two students are the same. Thomas notes that we seem to forget this and value students by their skills or failures.

            After looking at the NCTE website, I noticed that many key notes recognize that students need to learn to read and write, but teaching writing may vary depending on your group of students. They noted that students will be writing for many different settings, have access to different writing medias, and will be at different literacy levels. To teach all students the same way and as if they all need the same material seems careless. Progressive literacy seems to address this and notes the fact that students have many reasons to read and write, essays aren’t the only reason.

            If a class is based off of one level of learning and one style of learning, a class will come along where the students class with the lessons and the students become disinterested in learning. If students are not interested in the learning or feel it will have no impact on them later in life, little effort will be put into they work they are assigned. As teachers we need to make sure the classroom is productive and that the lessons target all students rather than a select few. Students today are growing up in a society where technology is becoming dominant, they need to learn not only how to do work through it, but how to write for the different platforms offered to them. Though it is not the “formal” essay writing that we value in schools, it is more something that will be important to students later in life. By using these different mediums of writing a teacher could catch the student’s attention enough to teach multiple lessons at once.

            I had so many thoughts about our readings that it became overwhelming. With so many forms of literacy in the world and so many different learning levels, it becomes terrifying to think that soon we will need to create our own lesson plans that can apply to so many students. Finding a place to start seems difficult now. I can’t help but wonder if there is “one way” of teaching a lesson that needs minimal changes hat will fit all or most students. 

(I'm sorry if I talked in circles, I found myself having more questions then answers after this reading.)