It’s been fun.

I’ve learned a lot from this class and we studied quite a few things that I never thought I would be studying as an English Major. One of my favorite ideas was sponsorship. Learning about this made me rethink all of my literacy practices and compare them to people around me. Why are my practices so much different from my brother’s? This was something I explored a bit at the beginning of the semester and I realized the difference was mostly caused by the differences in our sponsors.

While the idea of sponsorship was interesting, the book club was much more fun and was my favorite part of the semester. I read Just Girls and it had a huge impact on how I view literacy. Things that often get dismissed such as note writing, reading magazines, and yearbook rituals are so important to the group of middle school girls. We can’t just dismiss their practices because we don’t like them. This got me thinking about the literacy practices of middle school boys as well. What about the video games they play (which we learned more about later in the semester). It really made me examine how I view certain practices that I used to think were unimportant or bad. As a future teacher exploring these different practices and how important they are has been really helpful. It’s important for me to not dismiss things just because I don’t understand the appeal of them. Instead I should try to understand why they are important, and how are the students using them.

I had a ton of fun working in a classroom. The teacher I worked with, Mr Asnault was awesome! I spent the first half of the semester grading and creating vocab quizzes but eventually I started working with the students more and more. I was nervous about this at first, but it ended being really fun and I think I was able to help the students with their writing. I really liked how much collaboration was going on with the teachers at Chico High. M. Asnault also asked me for my feedback a few times. He asked me what I would do in certain situations. Those discussions were really useful for me.