Make It Interesting!

For my last lesson I decided to incorporate a lesson about urban legends with my larger lesson about To Kill A Mockingbird. I made a PowerPoint, that I'm going to attempt to link to this, that described what an urban legend is and relating it to the novel. The very last slide of the PowerPoint is the activity that the students did at their tables.


I teach in a morning class so the main struggle with the students is keeping them awake. When I started teaching my urban legend lesson every student perked up and listened and responded to what I was saying and what the lesson was about. They also seemed to enjoy the writing assignment that went along with the PowerPoint, an urban legend explaining the origin of Boo Radley. The lesson was so impacting that in today's class I had a student come to me before class started wanting to share an urban legend with the class. This didn't have to do with the novel but it showed an interest in the class that I thought was important to perpetuate.


That is what I took from this experience in my student teaching class. That it is most important to engage the students with a lesson that meets their interest and also conveys a valid and measurable point. With this lesson the students had to realize the effect of an urban legend and what it means to the community of Maycomb, AL (the setting of the book). They also participated in a creative writing assignment that allowed me to assess their group skills along with their writing skills.

Whole Class vs. Individual Activities

My classroom is in the midst of working out beginning of school jitters and my role is determining how students work together, separately and as a class. One of my classrooms first assignments was a class reading of “Rules of the Game”, by Amy Tan, and “Almos’ a Man” by Richard Wright. From this assignment I got a good look of what students are self-motivated and what students are more likely to talk than work. Randy Bomer, in his book; Building Adolescent Literacy in Today’s English Classrooms,  talks about the characteristics and provides an insight to the importance of whole class teaching strategies and their relationship with other styles;

“So it’s important, but it must always be at the service of the other structures, particularly 

independent work, in order to make a difference in people’s literate life.”

I couldn’t agree with him more. There were several instances when the class reading of the stories took a turn from engrossing to boring and the students were not being held accountable for their work (which can be a problem with whole class teaching methods). At that point it was obvious that individual work time was required so that the students felt some sort of accountability. 

Bomer, R. Building Adolescent Literacy in Today’s English Classrooms. 2011. Portsmouth, NH. ISBN: 9780325013947

Welcome to my Pre-Student/Student Teaching Blog!

All of the names used in the blog are pseudonyms, used to protect the identity and maintain privacy with students and teachers that are mentioned.

Thanks for reading. Hopefully, I will have accrued a nice selection of teaching materials and ideas that will inspire and provide you with ideas you can steal and use to teach your students or children. 

- Mr. Gruning