"Sometimes I Wonder If ZOOM Is More Ideal for Teaching," He Types While Thinking About the Fact That, "Whoa. There's a March Madness Basketball Bracket"

Yesterday was strange.

I caught up on who was in or not in the NCAA bracket, I corresponded with a writer I haven't talked to in a year (new children's book coming out, awesome), I attended several a.m. and afternoon meetings, and I taught an evening graduate class. 

Let me start by the teaching. For years, I've been pairing a piece by my Syracuse colleagues Maria Murray and Kristin Munger with "She Unnames Them" by Ursula Leguin. Their chapter in Best Practices for Adolescent Literacy Instruction aligns well with points to be made about content-area literacy. Reading Leguin, and guiding graduate students through it, has always been fun for me. Also, to couple it with lexiles helps me to make a point about pairing the right text in front of readers at exactly the right time.

Difficult texts are made easier to read, when guidance is provided. 

I did a reverse breakout room last night. The graduate students read Leguin and were given a series of questions to ask while I went offscreen and on mute. I simply responded to what I was hearing in the chatroom.

Basically, the students talked through Leguin's difficult text while I listened (almost like a voyeur) on how they processed the story and made connections after working through questions. I witnessed live how good questions help kids (well graduate students) come to conclusions where they make bigger connections and epiphanies. In a classroom setting, I miss this development because I'm eavesdropping while wandering a room. Here, however, I watched the epiphanies as they unfolded. It was miraculous to view. I would put in the chat, "You're doing exactly what I hoped you'd do." What is weird and wonky, becomes clever and strategic. The mysteries reveal itself and the clever writing, a puzzle, unfolds through critical thinking.

And they proved my point. And Murray and Munger's point, too. Complex texts are good, but they really need to be taught and nurtured by an educator strategically layering student understanding. They also have to be coupled with easier to digest and more flavorful readings. A class of only Leguin might traumatize readers, but Leguin as a point to be made, intrigues them.

So, in my end-of-the-day teaching bracket, I say I advance. It is beautifully alarming that we have a bracket again this year. It's almost too hard to believe after the March we had in 2020.

Looking to this as hope. 

Onward.