Not to go on and on, but I really appreciate that God gives insight to those who are willing to ask for it. Allow me to explain.
Today I was having a discussion about the Common Core "Literacy Block". This person let me know that what was seen during my segement of the block wasn't impressive. Ok. Continuing they explained what they were looking for.
As I listened a light went off. We have been talking about doing the same thing, but we were going at it totally differently.
I told them this story. When I was a child I was able to eat as much food as I wanted on my plate. The only requirement is that when my mom said dinner was over, I had to have a clean plate. I didn't matter what I ate first or last. All that mattered was being done when time was called.
I've always thought the Literacy block was like my childhood eating. I can do what I want to do, when I want to. I only have to ensure that I'm done when time is up.
What they had described they were looking for was more this example.
I have to eat as much as I can from each compartment, but I only have so much time to do so. I can't jump all around the plate like I did when I was young. In this situation I have 15 minutes to eat my potato salad. I can finishe in less than 15, but I can't take more than that. Next I have 15 minutes to eat my corn. Same thing, I can eat it in less time, but I can't go over and taking my time and eating it in 14 minutes would be ideal. This goes on until the Literacy block is over. If anything is left over it can be wrapped up and taken care of the next day.
I say that was a divine revelation, because NO ONE has made that clear to me or to many of the other teachers. We've all been figuring it out. Since I wasn't clear WHAT I didn't know I wasn't able to ask for more help. I just knew that some segments were good. Others were horrid and I had to press through for 90 minutes.
The name also adds to the confussion. I think of a block as a large "unit" of time that can be divided and sub-divided as I see if as long as all the parts of literacy get covered. Was I wrong or what? I really see how this is supposed to work and I can certianly hit the ground running faster tomorrow.
In honor of this revelation I made a cafe tray anchor chart with the time slots for each part on it. Now if I could find a huge timer that allows me to set different alarms for different times I'd be GOLDEN!
