This has been a great learning semester for us: working with Charlotte & her 4th graders in an authentic writing project from start to finish; dialogue about relevant issues about race theory; guest speaker Ricky Lee Allen; opportunity to talk among yourselves about course text in literature circles format; engage in book club discussion; develop a web site of your intellectual property related to our course; venture to new places outside our stuffy classroom setting. Although we dealt with uncomfortable issues, it was important to get them out in the open and to begin the dialogue. We are by no means finished with concepts such as white priviege, critical race theory.

There is a film which I hope to purchase for future viewing titled: Mirrors of Privilege: Making Whiteness Visible by Dr. Shakti Butler. 
Michael Dyson's video about Race Matters as well as selections from San Juan College library would be beneficial to view in future classes. We will invite Ricky Lee Allen as well as his colleagues to our future classes.

I hope I have stretched your thinking since the first day of riding on the Little Red Apple Transit Bus. Do you remember how uncomfortable you felt playing the Barnga game? Learning new things is similar to feelings of uncertainty, discomfort, lack of suredness, questioning confidence. Being introduced to the theories of critical pedagogy and history of race and white priviege during our course is just the beginning of this professional discourse. No doubt you will see it more often in our educational literature.  I strongly encourage you to read about it on your own. This is an opportunity for you to weigh in on your own thinking and question the curriculum content within our own teaching practice as well as the information perpetuated within our society.

Asking you to think about RECONCEPTUAL thinking is nudging you to reconsider the 'truths' that we, as educators, will be perpetuating in our classrooms. Let's think twice about what we want to include when we talk about Thanksgiving and the Pilgrims. Let's aim for historical accuracy even when it counters what we read in our beloved textbooks. How will we discern authentic and accurate information from that which the dominant society wishes us to believe, however inaccurate? Whose voices are being left out of the information disseminated and how others being ignored or abused are critical questions of thoughtful, inquisitive critical thinkers, as teachers should be. My hope is for you to develop into such an educator.

Communication was central to our class via weekly email updates in between class; other email correspondence; opportunities to listen and work with fourth graders in the proces of sharing a family story; sharing through articles, textbook chapters; literature circles; processing theoretical perspectives such as introduced by Ricky Lee Allen and the instructor.

Technology was used a tool for maintaining and managing your course portfolio of intellectual property including your own writing as well as weekly reflections of the family story project.

Literature circles was a way of talking with others about the chapter content. In this way, you were the directors of talking about what was important to you. Your peers were your teachers and guides for your learning. It was important for me to step aside and let you own your own learning at this point. I hope you have gained confidence and independence as learners.

In your role as teachers in Mrs. Bradshaw's classroom, you were given the responsibility to act as educators guiding the writing process from beginning to end. Each fourth grader produced a story and a final copy of his/her book. You all succeeded in accomplishing this goal. One last thing we have left to do is evaluate each student' progress based on the Six Traits rubric. Charlotte will appreciate receiving this last important concluding detail of working with her students. The Authors' Chair is the culmination of the project and you seem to be just as proud as the fourth grade students.

It was sometimes difficult to get into a groove and pace the remaining class time due to limited time. Some things we did not benefit from this semester were: visit from Vicki Bruno, communications disorder and sign language specialist in Bloomfield; student case studies; more time to read in our book clubs with multiple copies of books. However, it was fun to go to various places outside of our classroom for class as a reflreshing alternative.

Being part of this experience was a learning curve for me, since I was not always in my comfort zone. I chose to be learning alongside you in this process. At times I was preaching, teaching, questioning, observing, problem-thinking, asking, apologizing, clarifying, modeling, role-playing. I thank you for your trust in me and understanding that teaching is a vulnerable process-an art and science.

I thank you for your willingness to learn and joining me in this journey. I hope my enthusiasm, joy, and passion for teaching you during this time was contagious.

May everything you do come from joy! Niente senza Gioia! (Nothing without joy!)

Please continue to add to your webpages. They will contribute to your professional protfolio. Just list their webpage on your CD-ROM. Remember to add your reflection of this course (and your others) to your CD-ROM.

Thank you for the gift of lessons you taught me this semester.

I look forward to your culminating student teaching (preservice) experience!

Thank you, Frances