The Mind At Work

In understanding this piece about the working waitress, just reiterates my thought about jobs in this country. Many of the same skill set are used in a number of different jobs. The correlation drawn between many employment that individuals have is really not all that different. In the Mike Rose piece, the first characteristic that caught my eye in regards to the skill set needed as a waitress "is the ability to think on your feet." A waitress has to be able to do a number of different things all at the same time. In regards to teaching the same can be said. A classroom teacher will have a number of different characteristics to negotiate through. A teacher maybe teaching a class and questions might start coming the teachers way from students. The teacher must be able to negotiate the question and try to come up with answers or answer the questions to the best of his/her ability. That is answer and think on the fly.
The next correlation I came to between the waitress and teachers in the Rose piece was about the waitress getting different orders at different times. They had the example of all requests for coffee don't come at the same time. I see the same things happen in classrooms. Students questions can come at different times of a lesson. I thought about how students learn and there understanding the information. One student may understand the lesson at one time and another student may learn the information in minutes later. The question that they come up with when they begin to understand will come at two different times. The teacher has to remember all the question and learn to deal with demands at different times. Not everything in a class room will happen at the same time. The waitress and the teacher will have to juggle many different request at any one time.
I thought the most telling commonality between the correlation I made between the teacher and the waitress was not from the job itself. However, it came from the people that surrounded a teacher and waitress. The waitress described the types if people and types of personalities that surrounded the waitress. The waitress had to deal with people and personalities that she did not like in the eyes of earning a living. The same can be said of teachers. There may be times when a students personality or opinions may not mess with that of the teacher. However, it is the job of the teacher to teach and not be effected by the problems around them.

Tangerine Part 3

What an ending to the book and maybe a beginning to a new story.

Where should I start.... Well I begin with the beginning of the end for Paul Fisher. Paul and his partner in crime murdered Luis Cruz seemed to only to be a small part to who Paul Fisher was. We learn that he was the one of the people stealing from the houses. He was the one responsible for Eric Fisher's sight problem's. Then he gets beat up at his football banquet. It seems that Paul Fisher is the all-american football star that many people thought he was (I told you in my first blog that there had to a problem with the star of the football team being the kicker). I guess I was right that there had to something wrong with Paul Fisher.

However, this epic story needs a second part. I almost has a soap opera quality to it. I am so wrapped up in life's of Paul, Eric, the rest of the Fishers, and the people around Tangerine that I need to see what happens next. Will Paul go to jail, what will happen with Eric at the new school, what else is going to happen in crazy Tangerine. Where is the second part to this book?

Since I don't know if there is a second part of the book I decided to blog about the overall book no that I have completed it. As I read the book, I always felt there was a a great deal of information to keep track of. A number of different stories go on all at the same time. Then, half way through the book I lost those feeling and another feeling took over. That being of almost a need to know what was going to happen next. There was so many elements to the story, that by the third part I couldn't stop reading until I found out what happened in the end.

I must say I was disappointed in the second part of the book. The author did a great job setting up a plot with the soccer players from the school getting suspended because Paul Fisher "ratted" on them. With Paul Fisher changing schools and becoming friends with those soccer players he told on I thought was going to have an interesting event in the second part of the book. However, the author seemed to dismiss the point when Paul told the players that he was the reason that they had been suspended. Then it seemed to be forgotten. The author of the book seemed to put a great deal of emphasis on showing how tough these soccer players were. Then when the time came for a reason for them to get really angry at events they seemed to take a very weird stance on the situation. It almost seemed that they let Paul Fisher get away with "ratting" on them. With the way the author spent so much time writing about the toughness of the soccer players at Tangerine Middle School, the reaction and the retribution to Paul Fisher would have been different.

Tangerine

Is this the craziest place on earth. Lets start to my first reaction to the book. I always had the thought of a football star in school as a quarterback, linebacker, or some other position,I never thought of the football star being the kicker. I my mind I thought of the kicker on a football team as an important part. However, the star no. If the star of this football team is the kick, then I has to seriously wonder about how this football team will perform in the rest of the book.

The next bit of new is the the lightening strike the kills a football player and student at the school. Then the next day everything goes on as nothing ever happened. I wonder what would happen at a school around Rochester if a student was struck by lightening while playing a sport. I know that there would be no sports or gym class for a while. They would not think of having practice again the next day.

Then the hole middle school is almost sucked into the middle of the earth by a sink hole and everyone is going on like it is not a big deal. The people in charge just decide to move some students and let others return to classrooms that almost were destroyed. I don't know about you but I only read the first part of this book and if this is where I lived, I would be trying to figure out how to find another place to live.

Use of textbooks

I believe that textbooks are not all bad. They are a good jumping off point and they provide quick information for example a time or a place. In addition, textbooks can give valuable information to those how learn well through the use of textbooks. I was able to do well and be successful throughout my high school experience because of textbooks. When I was younger I simply used textbooks and worksheets provided by teachers to learn. The problem is I simply memorize facts and figures but did not learn the information till college. It was then a big set back for me in college because I had to learn how to learn on my own.

However, I do believe that textbooks are not enough in the classroom. Textbooks only offer a glimpse into each subject area, in particular history. There needs to be outside sources, more information and interaction in the classroom than is simply available in a textbook. In terms of history, my content speciality primary sources such as newspapers, letters, journals, writings or documents would assist in students understand of the content. It has been my experience that students I am currently working with gain a great deal of knowledge from outside sources which supplement the textbook well.

Textbooks are a building block for starting students learning process about a topic. On that foundation other aspects of the content need to be addressed so that students are able to learn.