Saturday, April 07, 2007

Script for High Schoolers

D-Ed Reckoning often praises the Direct Instruction program. I have come to the conclusion that a scripted program could work at the elementary level. Today, I found a link, through Kitchen Table Math, that provides an example of a script for the high school level--assuming a literature class. Hey, I teach literature. Maybe I should give it a try:

1. Some people are smart. Smart is how they are the same.
The sameness is a concept.
Again, the sameness is a concept.
Sameness is a what?...a concept.
So, if some things have a smart sameness, what is the conept?...smart.

2. Some students work hard. Work hard is the sameness.
Work hard is a concept. Work hard is what?...a concept.

3. Some things are easy. Easy is the sameness.
What is the concept?...easy.

4. Look around the room. Find a way that things are the same...
What is one sameness?...the students are sleeping.
So, what is the concept?...sleeping.

4 Comments:

At 1:04 PM , Blogger graycie said...

My high school students would be insulted by material like this, and rightly so.

 
At 5:39 PM , Blogger "Ms. Cornelius" said...

That is absolutely a riot.

Our middle schools are doing a DI approach to teach math, but they ..."forgot"... to homogeneously group the students. Probably because every child belongs in the high group at Lake Wobegon Middle School, else their self-estem would suffer.

What? You wonder how that can be, since our math scores are a bit on the woeful side, under NCLB, especialy for our students with an IEP?

Quite a conundrum, yes.

 
At 7:49 AM , Blogger Rebecca Haden said...

I think that script can best be understood as a poem.
If you read the bits like "can move is a sameness" in your best poetry-reading voice, then it becomes literature, not stupidity. And the chorus of "a concept" from the high school students is a part of the shared poetry reading, not a deeply offensive time waster.

 
At 7:56 PM , Blogger the anonymous teacher said...

I don't even know how to respond to that. My lowest-tracked students...the students who make animal noises in class...would be offended if I tried that approach in class.

 

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