Book Club 2 Summary & Review
Today I attended with my book club group to discuss the next part of "The Death and Life of the Great American School System" In her next few chapters, Ravitch discusses a certain event that impacted schools across the nation. One event, for instance was the District 2 school. This school has become recognized as a national symbol for success. The reason for their success is that they have included a reading program to help students push themselves, producing faster results. This concluded in schools following District 2 footstep in helping their school and students improving. The person to thank for this incredible idea was Alvarado.
In the rest of the chapter, there was a discussion of how students are supposed to collaborate with each other to learn, while teachers and principals should be involved in supporting the schools while treating those with respect. This chapter also explained the aftermath of their success and how that the hard work of what to teach students is finally over.
In the next chapter Alvarado gets hired by Bersin to help make a difference in the school system. Bersin was more aggressive in firing administrators who didn't stand up to the job and preventing in fewer people fighting back of Bersin's decision. From there drastic choices such as the removal of fun programs, and the use of a blueprint to help overcome the plan. However Bersin was expecting the improvement of results to happen quickly, but Alvarado says that this process takes time. As time goes by Bersin loses power and the blueprint was discarded. This concluded in more damage than what started in the result of a businessman having the power to control.
Once finished reading the book, my group discussed personal connections toward the reading to help us get a better understand of what the author is saying. One connection I made is how the school copying District 2's strategy to become successful reminded me of a movie I recently watched called the Jungle Book. With this connection I explained how Mowgli, the protagonist, was fighting Khan all by himself until everyone else jumps in cause they saw a better chance of success if they followed Mowgli footstep. The reason I made this connection is the form of collaboration while having a goal in mind of achieving to overcome this big animal blocking their way in bringing back peace in the jungle kingdom.
After our group discussed some memorable passages that stood out to us and some definitions we haven't heard of before. The most notable definitions were Phonics, which is the learning of gestures, speaking and sounds. And Pedagogical, which is an influence of how students learn. From there, our group worked on an activity of one word, one phrase, and one sentence. After coming up with one of each parts our group formed a ranking list and had a discussion with the rest of our class about what we've read so far, and what we learned about the schools.
In the rest of the chapter, there was a discussion of how students are supposed to collaborate with each other to learn, while teachers and principals should be involved in supporting the schools while treating those with respect. This chapter also explained the aftermath of their success and how that the hard work of what to teach students is finally over.
In the next chapter Alvarado gets hired by Bersin to help make a difference in the school system. Bersin was more aggressive in firing administrators who didn't stand up to the job and preventing in fewer people fighting back of Bersin's decision. From there drastic choices such as the removal of fun programs, and the use of a blueprint to help overcome the plan. However Bersin was expecting the improvement of results to happen quickly, but Alvarado says that this process takes time. As time goes by Bersin loses power and the blueprint was discarded. This concluded in more damage than what started in the result of a businessman having the power to control.
Once finished reading the book, my group discussed personal connections toward the reading to help us get a better understand of what the author is saying. One connection I made is how the school copying District 2's strategy to become successful reminded me of a movie I recently watched called the Jungle Book. With this connection I explained how Mowgli, the protagonist, was fighting Khan all by himself until everyone else jumps in cause they saw a better chance of success if they followed Mowgli footstep. The reason I made this connection is the form of collaboration while having a goal in mind of achieving to overcome this big animal blocking their way in bringing back peace in the jungle kingdom.
After our group discussed some memorable passages that stood out to us and some definitions we haven't heard of before. The most notable definitions were Phonics, which is the learning of gestures, speaking and sounds. And Pedagogical, which is an influence of how students learn. From there, our group worked on an activity of one word, one phrase, and one sentence. After coming up with one of each parts our group formed a ranking list and had a discussion with the rest of our class about what we've read so far, and what we learned about the schools.
Comments
Post a Comment