A New Age of Writing

compliments of Google images.

“We need to know the destination–if not in a precise way, then at least a generalized way.  Before we actually translate anything into reality we must be able to dream about it.”

-Muhammad Yunus

In my world, in my sphere of influence, the destination is all I have. I am not a writer. I am a teacher. If I wish to have any success, if I wish to have any a power or influence, I have to sell my students on their potential; I have to help them see the end–sort of a transpurposed (yes, I made that word up) photograph–they have to see a snap shot of who they could be in the future. In the end I have to help my students believe the dream I have for them and help them have that same dream.

Boldly Go Where We Have Never Gone Before

all images courtesy of google images

Superintendent Hodge has been the driving factor in integrating technology to our district. He has personally developed the use of twitter and podcasts to draw the community into what is going on and changes being made. Our small town has tried to stay as small town as it can for as long as it can–but our superintendent is intent on changing this.  However, as I interviewed him for my first blog, I thought I could branch out and seek people who, under his instruction, have headed up our efforts in other areas of social media. Now, I am not trying to imply that our district has made leaps and bounds in this department, nor even a hop and skip–more like baby steps–but we are advancing our progress into the realm of Facebook; we are not wanting to rush anything. So, in this blog post, I am going to show parts of two interviews.

Truth in Genre

“The goal of education is the advancement of knowledge and the dissemination of truth.”

– John F. Kennedy

As a high school English teacher, I have more of an opportunity to write e-mails, letters of recommendations, and even a graphic organizer, but a lengthy, in depth paper is few and far between. I have an unusual take on writing because I don’t write–I teach it.  My goal then, when it comes to writing is to facilitate it and help students or most of them, for the next stage in life, which is college. I do not teach students to write just because the Common Core State Standards says so. I do not teach them to write because in the state of Wyoming the ACT requires them to write. I teach them for the very reason Mr. Kennedy says so. I feel it is my responsibility to to advance knowledge and help my students disseminate truth.  “Truth” is an interesting word; because I am an English teacher I love to look for word origins, and because I am a curious person, I like to see how other cultures view truth:

According to Martha

James Paul Gee, a modern rhetor says that, “Language has a magical property: when we speak or write we craft what we have to say to fit the situation or context in which we are communicating.”  If this blogger can take a few lines to show my gratitude for this man to say such a wonderful thing. As an English teacher I advocate for a world where people understand this point exactly. Or even, I will go further to say this: more than a magical property, words are magic. So this blog goes out to all my educating colleagues. This blog is to show how all my fellow educators can use their words in order to bring about magic. I feel we can do this through discourse communities, or perhaps it would be more accurate for me to hope that we teachers will use our discourse communities to bring about magic for the people we educate.

L-Team

First of all–a little about myself. My name is Eric Anderson; I am a high school English teacher and I have taught 9th and 11th grade English now for five years. I received my bachelor’s degree from Brigham Young University; I am married with two children: Liam (William) and Portia. My wife, Anna, is also an English teacher, but she has sacrificed her career to stay home and raise our children.  I LOVE teaching–I consider it to be one of the greatest aspects of my life; only after my two children were born did I ever dread going to school.  I have loved almost every minute of it and I hope to continue with this enthusiasm until they take me out of my classroom on a stretcher; one of the greatest things I love about teaching is working with my superiors in order to make our work environment more conducive to learning, and deciding where change is needed and helping to implement the change.

During my interview with Superintendent Hodge, I began to see many aspects of our reading coming out. Especially communication.