Digital Blog Post #G

Chapter 10 starts out with a topic that might be the most important characteristic to teaching there is right now: Multicultural Education. Multicultural education is the term used to describe how teachers go about "affirming" the expansive diversity of student's interests, needs, and talents present in every school classroom (pg 246). In, more recent years than you would think, the United States education has decided that every student regardless of gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, race or background deserve an equal education. To me, someone born after this idea was decided, it seems obvious that this would be the case. However, in the past few years minority groups have become more apparent in society and have also become a lot more outspoken. I believe that minority groups in the past have kept a low profile when it comes to education. For example, if Christmas was celebrated their child would just simply not participate and that would be the end of it. Recently, it has become more of an issue. The question changing "What are you going to do to celebrate each student and each religious holiday and background?". Although you could argue that the world is becoming very sensitive (and I'd be lying if I said I didn't agree), this issue is one that can be made positive. I definitely support the idea that children should know that every one is different and that it's okay; and they should have a basic knowledge of those differences and how they work. The textbook gives a few ways of how you can create a multicultural education but my favorite one is "Creating Culturally Relevant Curriculum and Instruction". This is basically the idea that you would connect cultural ideas into their lesson plans and assignments. I firmly believe that the best way for anyone to learn is when they can make a connection to their every day life with it and this is the perfect example of that. Technology is so important for this because it offers students access to websites, videos, articles...anything they want regarding all sorts of cultural.

The chapter also brought up an interesting subtopic on writing in schools. It states that writing has taken the backseat to reading and math, which I had no idea about. It also has a list of reasons why students don't enjoy writing.

• Pressure
• Lack of confidence
• Lack of joy
• Misdirected self-evaluation
• Lack of patience
• Ideas about being smart

When I was in school (K-12) I really enjoyed writing. I was that student (and still am) that turned a 2 page assignment into a 4 page assignment. I always wrote "to much" because I would get lost in it. I never felt any of the above when I was writing. Flash forward to college and I have to admit...I feel a few of these ideas. This makes me think that maybe its a 'nature' kind of thing vs nurture, since I am feeling it now in college as students in K-12 are feeling it. It's interesting to think about, what could be causing these feelings in students now. 

The last point is on the section titled "Using Technology with Linguistically Diverse Learners". Now, especially in Florida, we see a huge population of immigrants and children of those immigrants. So because of that, E.S.O.L. (English as a second language) is a big chunk of our schools. I can't even imagine how much technology has helped with this! Between online translation services, multilingual web resources, access to international newspapers and websites and interactive maps (pg 247-248) teaching E.S.O.L. students must be so much easier. My husband has a friend who met his fiance in Spain, where he served in the U.S. Navy, and she told us she self-taught herself English by watching Saturday Night Live episodes online. I mean...come on! Technology has made learning a new language so much more accessible and (while still not easy) much easier. I have even seen videos about wireless ear plugs that live-translate words as they are said. It's absolutely crazy but I can only think that schools have made positive advances in their E.S.O.L classrooms using technology. this website is a great tool for E.S.O.L. teachers to get students involved. 

Zygomatic. "Free Online Word Cloud Generator and Tag Cloud Creator." Wordclouds.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Oct. 2016.

Monaco, By Emily. "7 Superb Speaking Activities That’ll Get Your ESL Students Chatting." FluentU English Educator Blog. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Oct. 2016.

Maloy, Robert, Verock-O’Loughlin,Ruth-Ellen, Edwards, Sharon A., and Woolf, Beverly Park (2013). Transforming Learning with New Technologies. 2nd Edition. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

CNMonline. "Why Is Writing Important?" YouTube. YouTube, 01 Nov. 2013. Web. 14 Oct. 2016.