4/26/09 Implementation paper DRAFT:
Next year I will be teaching in a new culture. I am retiring from LKSD this year and moving to Washington State to spend more time with my Grands and my daughter.
Since I do not know if I will have a full-time teaching position or be a substitute, I will tell you what I will carry with me in my bag of tricks for either outcome. Because I love writing about ‘place’ using poetry, I will take with me the “I Am From” poem we all tried earlier in the class. I will use this poem as a way to introduce myself and as a way to get to know my students. This can be an emergency sub plan or the opening assignment of the year in a regular classroom.
Another poetry assignment that can be adapted for either situation is the “Language Keepers” poetry assignment I adapted with permission from a poem of that name by Caroline Kermers, an Alaska poet and writer. In this assignment, students are asked to write the names of the month of the year in their native tongue – and the meaning of the word. It is a very powerful assignment for connecting second language speakers with their cultural view of time and the western view of time. If all the students speak English as their first language, the model poem connects them to the notions of time outside Western culture. Of course, as a sub, I would just have each student take one month on the calendar, and then put the whole thing together with them by the end of the period.
Yet another instant writing assignment can be found by just looking out the windows on the fall landscape or taking what I call a Journal Walk. On a Journal Walk, you and your class go for a short walk through the village or close to the school to observe the fall changes. It’s amazing how we can see, but not see. Students know that they will journal about what they see on the walk either at some point on the walk or when you get back to class. You talk to them while you are walking: “What do you see?” –“What do you hear?” – “What do you smell?” – “Color?” – “Sounds?” – “Something that has changed?” - “How do you feel?” Very powerful connecting activity.

I hope to connect with my students through blogging next year, if I have a full-time position. I hope the school will have loads of technology – computers and projectors, scanners and more. I’ve found that schools outside of LKSD do not always have the same level of technology as I have become spoiled by here in LKSD. Computer access will make it possible for me to try a blog with my students to share their poetry and comment on each other’s work. The blog seems to be a quick way for a teacher to check to see who has been doing the assignments and who may need some extra coaching.