Hello Friends,

In what follows, we have a glimpse of (a) Top Ten Libraries (b) a professional growth model; (c) a peak into the historic citations for the famed (and infamous for some) Learning Pyramid, shared during the Faculty Forum at CSUS; (d) thoughts on Alfie Kohn by Crystal Hammer (e) Free Voluntary Reading, and (f) Prairie Pedagogy/ Notes from the Real World.

USA Today: Top Ten Libraries
Please note our Rapid City Library made the list!
http://www.usatoday.com/travel/destinations/10great/2008-03-06-10great-libraries_N.htm

Professional Growth Model for Teacher Preparation
My friend/colleague, Annela Teemant, of Indiana University Purdue University Indiana (IUPUI, yes, sound it out) and her colleagues there are working on a new professional development model. Thank you for so generously sharing with us.
http://www.joanwink.com/newsletter/2008/IUPUI-ModelofELL-TED.pdf

Faculty Forum, March 12, 2008, Faculty Development Center, CSUS
For an overview of all that I shared, see
http://www.joanwink.com/sched.php
For the history of the Learning Pyramid, see
http://www.joanwink.com/scheditems/CSU-0312-part1.pdf

You will need to scroll down about ½ way through the pdf file to get to the various models and citations of the learning pyramid.

Kohn, Motivation, and Me by Crystal Hammer
An A-ha Moment: One of the joys of teaching is watching as a student experiences an a-ha moment. Enjoy reading, as Crystal, a beginning teacher credential candidate discovers the relevance of intrinsic and extrinsic learning. By reading Alfie Kohn, she discovers that she was a "praise addict" who spent her childhood learning for the stickers/the pizza parties/the praise. She even connects this desire to please others to her notions of love. Alfie Kohn is truly transformational in the life of Crystal, who now learns for herself and comes to acknowledge her inherent worth.
http://www.joanwink.com/newsletter/2008/Crystal-Hammers.pdf

FVR Free Voluntary Reading
As you may know, last month I featured the new Crawford/Krashen text, the new Frank Smith text, and the new edition of Samway/McKeon text,
http://www.joanwink.com/fvr.php
Graduate students in my class are reading these books, and this month I want to add comments from a student (Leilani Comber-Casper), which reflect what many in the class expressed after reading these three books. Leilani is also a classroom teacher.

Growing up in California and always being at schools with large populations of students who speak other languages, I thought I had a pretty good understating of multilingual/multicultural education. I have experienced a lot of professional development about multilingualism, and I really thought I was in good shape to teach kids with other languages, and that I was fairly knowledgeable in this area. BOY WAS I WRONG! I cannot tell you how many times I temporarily stopped reading the books for this class so that I could digest what I just read. The books blew me away! It seems as though every day, I'm sharing information at my school, which I've learned from these readings. So, with that being said, here is my reflection on all the reading

Before and after reading Crawford/Krashen:

• I thought sink or swim was not really such a bad thing. Now, I could smack myself for believing such a thing.
• I thought teachers who share information in Spanish with Spanish-speaking students were being unfair to English-only students. Now, I am embarrassed that I thought that way. Kids can't learn in a language they don't understand. Me either.
• In addition, I learned that some speakers of other languages go through a stage in which their desire to integrate into dominate culture is so strong that they become apathetic or hostile towards the cultural heritage of their parents. Those who experience such identity conflict not only have little interest in speaking the heritage language, they may even hide their proficiency (p. 39). WHAT?!? I was shocked by this.

Before and after reading the Smith text:

• I learned that there is no standard pronunciation for the entire United States (p. 20). No wonder it's so hard to learn English and to teach it!
• I learned that stories are our way of making sense of the world (p.32). I never really thought of stories in those terms. I love the way the author said that reading has a special relationship with people. I think I'll share the author's thoughts on this with my students and have them reflect on reading.

Before and after the Samway/McKeon text:

• Children are allowed a free and equal public education regardless of their legal status. The Supreme Court's quote that "the illegal alien of today may well be the legal alien of tomorrow" spoke volumes to me.
• I learned that hindering the use of a student's primary language can be thwarting their growth in English language development and that students transfer information from one language to another. It was so eye-opening for me to read that when students are talking in their native language at school, they are often helping each other learn. This is something I will definitely not stop from happening in my classroom anymore!

FmF (Featuring My Friends)

Friends and Family Sharon, a friend/colleague, prepared some Brain Gym activities for the CSUS Faculty Forum,
http://www.joanwink.com/scheditems/CSU-0312-part2.pdf Again, you will need to scroll down about ½ through this pdf file to find the activity centers. I have always found 5 to 10 minutes of brain gym activities to be so refreshing for all ages. I hope you will try them in your classes.

Smart Moves: Why Learning Is Not All in Your Head by Carla Hannaford
ISBN-10: 0915556375
Brain Gym (Teachers Edition: Revised) by Paul E. Dennison and Gail E. Dennison
ISBN-10: 0942143027

Lisa, mother of two of our precious grandkids, is reading: Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers
ISBN-10: 1601420617

Everyday Sacred: A Woman's Journey Home by Sue Bender
ISBN-10: 0062512900

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt
ISBN-10: 0679643419

My friends in the book club at CSU are all reading.
A Conspiracy of Paper: A Novel By David Liss
ISBN-10: 0804119120

Garrett, 2, loves:
There's a Wocket in My Pocket by Dr. Seuss
ISBN-10: 0007169957

Austin, 5, loves:
Dinosaurs Galore! by Giles Andreae
ISBN-10: 158925399X

Books: Just Lying Around My Desk Pink, D. ( 2005, 2006) A whole new mind: Why right-brainers will rule the future. New York: The Berkley Publishing Group of Penguin Group.
ISBN-10: 1594481717