Waverly+Middle+School

Discussion shall ensue!


 * Sandi Stupica's CIP #3 - 8th Grade English Curriculum

Sandi Stupica's Research** My research topic is "choosing texts." I am beginning to explore this at the school level. Thus far, I have interviewed two teachers from Waverly Middle School about my topic of "choosing texts." The following links are these interviews. I was curious what other questions I could ask these teachers about how they chose their texts. Do you have specific questions regarding Waverly Middle School and how they choose texts?

The following is an interview with Heather Lewis, my 8th grade English placement teacher

The follwoing interview is with the head of the special education department at Waverly Middle School, Ms. Mazner. This interview is supposed to be for the TE408 lab but I think it could apply to how texts are chosen. These students are taken into consideration when choosing texts. I centered the questions on hearing impaired students. In the interview, Ms. Mazner continue to refer to hearing impaired students as the HI (hearing impaired). What other questions should I Ms.Mazner that apply to both my topic of "choosing texts" and special education?



One of the first things I noticed in field placement was that the kids seemed to be having a lot more fun and being a lot more participatory than in different field placements for previous classe, and I wondered if the district as a whole that the school was in had any bearing on that--they must have come from elementary schools that were fun too or something. So my question was whether there was a degree to which diferent entire districts had a general "vibe" to them. So far I've mostly looked at websites of a handful of school systems to see how they present themselves there. I'm putting a link to the Waverly School one here in case that's helpful to anybody in some way. I'll use the Discussion tab to go into actual details on the rest.
 * Eric's Stuff:**

[|Waverly schools website]

For my research I began to think about how the community's values impact the students overall education experience. I wanted to specifically look at what the community; the parents, students, and other members thought were important and how that directly translated to the success or unsuccessfulness of the students at Waverly Middle School. The community values also translates into if they value education and what their role in it is; are they active or inactive and what are their education backgrounds and ideologies about education. To start my research I went and played in a charity basketball game, staff vs. the 8th grade girls basketball team. //The charity staff vs. the 8////th// //grade basketball game was on a Thursday night around 6:30 and was being held to help raise money for a lunch lady that had cancer. I thought that this was very incredible of the school and community to go out of their way to the women who was in need of help in paying her medical bills. After asking questions while at the game, I soon realized that other charity basketball games and fundraisers had been put into motion to help the cafeteria worker.// //While at the basketball I was surprised to see that entire stands were packed with many parents, teachers and students; all of which were excited about the game. The overall environment was very pleasant and understanding of what the night was to be about. At half time there was a raffle, and the principle talked about the purpose behind the charity basketball game, and I noticed that everyone was very attentive and acknowledged the situation.// //From this experience I was able to see how the teachers, parents, and students worked together for the common good showing that there was a very strong sense of community in regards to helping each other. This also showed me that there was a lot of support within this community.// __What other types of questions or comments about community values could I have gathered from this experience?__
 * Stacy Coleman's Research:**


 * Katie's Research:****Focus Question: What does the community value and how does this inform the way I think about curriculum and unit planning, alternative assessments, and classroom management?**
 * How do I learn about these values?
 * How are students impacted by these values, if at all?
 * Does the school system perpetuate these values?
 * What do I do if these values are different from my own?
 * How do I challenge students to think beyond these values while remaining respectful of their prior beliefs and experiences?

These are some of the questions I have been thinking about as I begin my research for my CIP. It only made sense to start at the community level, so Stacy and I attended a middle school basketball game to try and get a feel for what the parents and other members of the community were like. The first thing we noticed was that we seemed a little out of place. People were probably wondering what two college girls were doing at an 8th grade basketball game! Most of the people in the stands were parents and it didn't seem there was much draw beyond that. However, the parents that were there seemed very involved and were very active members in the game. It was obvious that the parents were very proud of their kids, while at the same time expecting a lot of them. It was interesting to watch the family dynamics in the stands. We sat next to a family of one of the kids that isn't in our class, but comes in to see the teacher a lot, and while he seems a pretty outgoing, and possibly rambunctious student, he was very respectful of his parents, as were his younger brother and sister. While this is only one example, it is already making me reconsider my own assumptions. Although the school could be considered a true mix of urban and suburban, the families I saw were not "broken" in any way, and it seemed the kids had a lot of support from their homes. From this, I learned that family seems to be an important part of this community, maybe more so than I originally had thought.

