Student Handbooks that Teachers May Need

by Rita Deyoe-Chiullán

Are you teaching content as much as you are teaching English, and perhaps that

content area is not your strong suit? Here are some handbooks for students that I

have found we often need as teachers. Those who teach Spanish-speakers can benefit

from a few handbooks that are also available in Spanish.

GreatSource Handbooks order form  1-800-289-4490   www.greatsource.com

http://www.greatsource.com/GreatSource/pdf/WebHandbookSOF108_low.pdf

Four math titles are available in Spanish and English:

Matemáticas para aprender (Gr.1-2)/Math to Learn

Matemáticas para saber (Gr. 3-4)/Math to Know

Matemáticas en mano (Gr. 5-6)/Math at Hand

Matemáticas inmediatamente (Gr. 6-8)/Math on Call

Only in English:

Algebra to Go (8 & up)   Geometry to Go (8 & up)

ScienceSaurus: Gr. 4-5 (blue cover), Gr. 6-8 (green cover)

Write Source K,,,12, Writers Inc. 9-12, Write for College 11-12

Reader’s Handbook 3, 4-5, 6-8, 9-12

Some of these titles originated with Write Source http://www.thewritesource.com/index.html,

which still publishes some of the original versions. I like old editions of Writer’s Express and

Writers Inc. To access their website, use the word “the”; a different company’s URL omits

“the”.

Several of the writing handbooks originally created by Write Source were translated into Spanish

and are available from Hampton Brown, which is now owned by National Geographic. To locate

titles, go to the National Geographic School site  http://new.ngsp.com/Home/tabid/36/

Default.aspx

and use the search tools on the left or use the menus for PRODUCTS at the top of the page, then

select SPANISH LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, SPANISH WRITING HANDBOOKS.

A Navegar (Gr. 5-6) is a useful resource for bilingual teachers, including many native speakers.

Reprinted with permission TexTESOL-V Summer Newsletter 2008, p 6.

Developing Dual Language Academic Literacy: Resources and Realities (Content from selected PowerPoint slides) by Dr. Rita Deyoe-Chiullán, 2009 Annual TexTESOL V Conference: Opening Doors with ESL.

What we have tried that seems to be working…

•Full error correction is done on single-spaced one-page (or double-spaced two-page) reflections that describe what was done/learned in an education class and that student’s personal point of view regarding the topics/experiences.

•No re-writing is required or expected. Students are discouraged from attempting to “master” every error and are told to choose one or two issues they find interesting or surprising, which they will share with classmates.

•On receipt of edited writing, the student selects one of his/her errors to explain to the small class of peers, thus becoming the authority on that error. In larger classes, the explanations are given to a small group of peers.

•No time is spent trying to learn general rules or apply them in practice exercises. Specific errors are discussed within the context in which they occurred. When the correction is a matter of preferred academic style rather than an idiomatic usage or grammatical issue, that is explained, along with the contexts in which one or the other usage would be more appropriate. When a specific general rule or application can be easily drawn from the example discussed, it is mentioned but not assigned as something to be “learned”.

Teaching Suggestions

1.     Learn to recognize and respect the writer’s voice, even when it differs from your own personal style preferences. In particular, with second language and second dialect writers, confine yourself to correcting what are clearly errors of grammar, idiomatic usage, punctuation, spelling and accurate use of standard English/Spanish syntax. Most American writers have been taught to prefer a very direct, simple syntactic style and may be tempted to “correct” writing which contains no actual errors but merely has a more complex, extended or “poetic” tone than is common in expository writing in this country.

2.     If it is feasible, given the time available for such activities as a worthwhile aspect of courses you teach, provide full error correction in writing and set aside a brief amount of time in class for students to pair with a buddy of their own choosing to read their corrections and discuss any they don’t understand. Be available to explain any corrections that neither the writer nor his/her peer understands. Avoid requiring rewrites of assignments if you were able to understand the content and determine whether or not the content objectives for the assignment were met.

3.     Provide reading response templates or lists of criteria that will guide your students to write complete sentences that will lead them to mirror more complex and developed language usage than they might choose to use otherwise. Several of my colleagues have their own preferred reading response generators that solicit the same sort of writing I receive in response to my NewKnewSRU template.

4.     Make it clear that your corrections are a gift of knowledge, not a punishment for taking risks and trying to learn. I ask my bilingual students to write for me in their weaker language, so they will have an opportunity to learn more. If I find they are turning in virtually perfect papers in what is clearly their dominant academic language, I tell them they are depriving themselves of an opportunity to learn, because I don’t count off for their linguistic errors in writing, only if they fail to learn the content or do the work I require. Also, I point out that we all continue to make errors in every language we use, including our dominant language, and most of us who are bilingual have greater strengths in one language than in the other.

5.     Encourage students to purchase and use a writer’s handbook for each of the languages in which they write for professional purposes. I have had good results and positive responses from adult students I have encouraged to try using a handbook intended for fourth and fifth graders writing in English Writer’s Express: A Handbook for Young Writers (Kemper, D., Nathan, R. & Sebranek, P., 2008), currently available through Houghton Mifflin/The Write Source, and a handbook for fifth and sixth grade students who are writing in Spanish A Navegar!, which is currently available through National Geographic School Publishing/Hampton Brown.  This level includes most of the rules, explanations and information needed to correct the treatable errors made by adult writers who are native speakers of the language; after all, newspapers are supposedly written at the fifth grade reading level, and they are read primarily by adults.

6.     All bilingual/ESL teachers should be encouraged to find a colleague whose language strengths and weaknesses complement their own. The teacher who needs a bilingual colleague’s help to send a note home to a parent who only knows Spanish can be sympathetic to her peer’s need for an editor to proofread professional writing in English. We all need an educated native-speaker expert to help us with the untreatable errors that Spell-check will not understand.

7.     For second language writers, it is useful to point out that effective use of bilingual dictionaries usually requires seeking a translation, then checking the meaning of that word in a monolingual dictionary of the language you are translating into to ensure it is the particular meaning of the original word you intended to convey. For idioms that are not easily found in dictionaries, there are several online services or groups that explain the meanings of these. One is an online chat group called English Forum (http://apps.world-english.org/Forum/TopicGroup) where English learners all over the world share requests for explanations and respond to one another. I have also just discovered that http://www.spanishdict.com/ not only provides an immediate online translation from English to Spanish or Spanish to English, but also links to a Spanish Learning Community chat room and Spanish Forum where language issues can be discussed with others. Larry Ferlazzo’s website and daily newsletter (http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/larry-ferlazzos-english-website/) share an overwhelming variety of online resources for English learners at several proficiency levels.

8.     Provide structured opportunities in a low threat environment for bilingual teachers in training to read aloud in their weaker language to a peer. Be available and prepared to explain vocabulary that neither peer knows (or bring along a bilingual dictionary or let them use an online dictionary if the classroom has a computer with Internet service. Find and provide reading material in Spanish in both narrative and expository genres that is just above the level of everyday speech in your community. I have used books intended for bilingual students in grades four through six from the Vistas del Mundo series published by ETA-Cuisenaire (expository and narrative), narrative myths and legends from a book intended for Spanish speaking students in the upper elementary grades, National Geographic en español (expository/photojournalism), and Al Dia (Dallas newspaper).

9.     Finally, talk with your students about their feelings and previous experiences with regard to error correction. If they believe you are open to their perceptions and opinions and truly want to support their academic growth and success, they will provide you with clear and useful guidance.

More detailed information about this research can be found in this article:

“Improving the Writing Skills of Preservice Bilingual Teacher Education Candidates” by Rita M. Deyoe-Chiullan, pps. 182-205, Current Issues and Best Practice in Bilingual and ESL Education, Fall 2008, Texas Woman’s University/Federation of North Texas Area Universities.

•For limited remaining copies of the monograph, contact mcowart@twu.edu Melinda Cowart, Managing Editor of the Monograph Series or for a reprint of the article, contact the author of the article rdeyoechiullan@twu.edu

•Resources from other conference presentations by Dr. Deyoe-Chiullan are located or referenced on her blog at http://maestrostexas.edublogs.org

•There is a new monograph, with a new article by Rita Deyoe-Chiullan, due out any day now, which updates some of the material in the 2008 monograph, particularly as it applies to bilingual teacher candidates writing in Spanish. Limited copies will be available on request from the monograph editors, or a photocopy of just the one article may be requested from the author once the monographs are received.

These are texts I have recently used or am currently using in courses I teach. My rating system involves the following considerations:

• Readable by undergraduates without background in the content.
• Current with regard to theory and practice in the profession.
• Thorough with regard to topics I view as important for teachers.
• I enjoyed reading it.
• Students enjoyed reading it.

Brown, S. & Attardo, S. (2005). Understanding Language Structure, Interaction, and Variation: An Introduction to Applied Linguistics and Sociolinguistics for Nonspecialists, 2^nd Edition. Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press. ISBN 0472030388 or 978-0472030385

(Five Stars—with support from the workbook exercises for in class group practice (as “bell ringer/sponge” activities spread over several classes while one continues to other chapters, this makes the linguistics “intro” course survivable and functional for the instructor and the students.)

Carr, J., Sexton, U. & Lagunoff, R. (2007). Making Science Accessible to English Learners: A Guidebook for Teachers, Updated Ed. San Francisco, CA: WestEd. ISBN 978-0914409403

(Five Stars—this inexpensive book and the companion text “Making Mathematics Accessible…” are much needed resources and make unique contributions not found in general ESL/bilingual methods texts. There is overlap in several chapters of the two books, but each provides valuable and unique material that is directly usable by teachers.)

Gonzalez, V., Yawkey, T. & Minaya-Rowe, L. (2006). English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) Teaching and Learning: Pre-K-12 Classroom Applications for Students’ Academic Achievement and Development.New York: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon. ISBN 978-0205392513

(Good depth in some areas, but editing is uneven; harder to read than it needs to be.)

Horwitz, E. (2008). Becoming a Language Teacher: A Practical Guide to Second Language Learning and Teaching. New York: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon. ISBN 978-0205430826

(Good synthesis in some areas; better suited for Alternative Short Training.)

Lessow-Hurley, J. (2009). The Foundations of Dual Language Instruction, 5^th Ed. New York: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon. ISBN 978-0205593279

(Five Stars, excellent for reviewing for bilingual/ESL certification tests)

Lightbown, P. & Spada, N. (2006). How Languages are Learned, 3^rd Ed. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0194422246

(Five Stars, outstanding synthesis and balanced consideration of various theories and approaches.)

Peregoy, S. & Boyle, O. (2008). Reading, Writing, and Learning in ESL: A Resource Book for Teaching K-12 English Learners, 5^th Ed. New York: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon. ISBN 978- 0205611362

(I have not taught using this book, but it is widely regarded as “the” methods text.)

Zainuddin, H., Yahya, N., Morales-Jones, C. & Ariza, E. (2007). Fundamentals of Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages in K-12 Mainstream Classrooms, 2^nd Ed. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt. ISBN 978-0757542077

(Four stars—Online graduate students liked it very much because it had both an overview of theory and practical applications in one book and they could compare text recommendations to their own experiences; I enjoyed it a bit less than they did because I have enjoyed other books a bit more.  However, all students who have used this book and the previous edition in courses I have taught have been very pleased with the cross-cultural information contained in the content and appendices, which I also have appreciated.)

]]> http://maestrostexas.edublogs.org/2009/09/25/updating-resources/feed/ 0 http://maestrostexas.edublogs.org/2008/10/21/learning-in-two-languages/ http://maestrostexas.edublogs.org/2008/10/21/learning-in-two-languages/#comments Tue, 21 Oct 2008 19:24:24 +0000 maestrostexas http://maestrostexas.edublogs.org/?p=16 Following this introduction is the two page handout I created to give out at my session “Learning Content in Two Languages” at the Texas Association for Bilingual Education (TABE) Conference on October 24th, 2008 (http://www.tabe.org/main/index.php)and my presentation “Scaffolding Content Learning in Two Languages” at the Texas Woman’s University’s Billie J. Askew Early Literacy Institute on November 11th, 2008 (http://www.twu.edu/ce/2008Institute.asp). The content of the presentations is not the same because the first one focuses more on language and the second more on specific areas of content learning, although the topics are similar. The recent resources I found helpful for both topics overlapped due to limited recent professional writing that actually addresses the mother tongue aspects of bilingual learning in the U.S.

Driving to Denton to borrow and return media equipment is less expensive than paying the fees conferences now charge to provide equipment, but only if one discounts the time involved. Therefore, I have decided to use alternative ways of sharing useful information in the three conference presentations I am making in the next three weeks.

For the two presentations listed above, I will share easy access to resources I consulted and found helpful in arriving at the ideas I have synthesized and evaluated for the presentations by posting the handout I prepared here, so that it can be downloaded and session participants and others can use the links in the handout directly to view the resources, rather than typing in URLs from the handout.  

For the other presentation “Perils and Promise of Error Correction for Second Language Writers” at the Texas Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages Annual Conference (TexTESOL) on November 7th, 2008 (http://www.textesolv.org/), I will be sharing the research which served as a basis for a chapter entitled “Improving the Writing Skills of Preservice Bilingual Teacher Education Candidates”, which I wrote for a monograph titled Current Issues and Best Practice in Bilingual and ESL Education, Fall 2008 (eds. Phap Dam and Melinda Cowart). Given the anticipated small size of this session “Perils and Promise of Error Correction for Second Language Writers” in a Board Room which probably accommodates 15-20 persons , I used copies of the article as handouts. If you attended that session and were one of two who arrived after the copies had all been taken, please email me with a street address and I will mail you a copy, as I have not yet secured permission to post a copy of the article online.

Direct Access Resources for those who support students who are Learning in Two Languages

(conference presentations and lectures by Rita Deyoe-Chiullan, Ph.D. Oct-Nov’08)

ritadeyoe@yahoo.com , http://maestrostexas.edublogs.org , http://www.maestrostexas.com

Sample Chapters available online (www.heinemann.com)

*Scaffolding Language, Scaffolding Learning: Teaching Second Language Learners in the Mainstream Classroom by Pauline Gibbons, Foreword by Jim Cummins

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E00366.aspx

*Academic Literacy in the English Classroom: Helping Underprepared and Working Class Students Succeed in College edited by Carolyn R. Boiarsky  (Ch. 5 “Challenging But Safe Environments: Helping Students Succeed in College Writing” by Kelly Belanger and Diane Panozzo

http://books.heinemann.com/shared/onlineresources/0525/chapter5.pdf

A Quick Guide to Boosting English Acquisition in Choice Time, K-2 by  Alison Porcelli, Cheryl Tyler, Lucy Calkins

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E02615.aspx

Diverse Learners in the Mainstream Classroom: Strategies for Supporting ALL Students Across Content Areas–English Language Learners, Students with Disabilities, Gifted/Talented Students Edited by Reynaldo Ramirez, Yvonne S. Freeman, David E. Freeman

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E01313.aspx

Stage by Stage: A Handbook for Using Drama in the Second Language Classroom by  Ann Burke, Julie O’Sullivan Foreword by Kathleen Bardovi-Harlig

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E00380.aspx

7 Steps to Success in Dual Language Immersion: A Brief Guide for Teachers and Administrators by Lore Carrera-Carrillo, Annette Rickert Smith

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E00992.aspx

A How-to Guide for Teaching English Language Learners In the Primary Classroom by Pat Barrett Dragan

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E00700.aspx

Explorations in Language Acquisition and Use by Stephen D. Krashen http://books.heinemann.com/products/E00554.aspx

Research-Based Strategies for English Language Learners: How to Reach Goals and Meet Standards, K-8 by Denise M. Rea, Sandra P. Mercuri, Foreword by Yvonne S. Freeman, David E. Freeman

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E00810.aspx

Second Grade Writers: Units of Study to Help Children Focus on Audience and Purpose by

Stephanie Parsons, Teachers College Reading and Writing Project

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E01031.aspx

Teaching Reading and Writing in Spanish and English in Bilingual and Dual Language Classrooms, Second Edition by David E. Freeman, Yvonne S. Freeman,

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E00801.aspx

When English Language Learners Write: Connecting Research to Practice, K-8

By Katharine Davies Samway

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E00633.aspx

Word Wise and Content Rich, Grades 7-12: Five Essential Steps to Teaching Academic Vocabulary by Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey Foreword by Karen Bromley

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E01382.aspx

Working with English Language Learners: Answers to Teachers’ Top Ten Questions

By Stephen Cary

http://books.heinemann.com/products/E00985.aspx

Academic Language for English Language Learners and Struggling Readers: How to Help Students Succeed Across Content Areas Yvonne S. Freeman, David E. Freeman, Foreword by Robert Marzanohttp://books.heinemann.com/products/E01136.aspx Introduction&Chapter2http://books.heinemann.com/shared/onlineresources/E01136/new_Academ_Lang_sample.pdf

___________________________________________________________________________________

Assessment Accommodations Toolkit from CEEE at George Washington University

http://ceee.gwu.edu/AA/SEAtoolkit.html

LPAC Updates from TAMU-Corpus Christi Institute for Second Language Achievement

http://ell.tamucc.edu/LPACupdate.html

Direct Access Resources for those who support students who are Learning in Two Languages

(conference presentations and lectures by Rita Deyoe-Chiullan, Ph.D. Oct-Nov’08)

ritadeyoe@yahoo.com , http://maestrostexas.edublogs.org , http://www.maestrostexas.com

Webinar Archives from West Ed—Schools Moving Up

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/query/q/19 Recommended for ELL Educators:

October 8, 2008

English Learner Literacy Development through Formative Assessment of Oral Language

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/3046

April 30, 2008

Critical Science Vocabulary

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/2628

April 22, 2008

A County Immersed in Vocabulary

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/2708

April 17, 2008

Using Formative Assessments to Accelerate the Academic Achievement of English Learners http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/2801

April 9, 2008

The Key Three Routine: Comprehension Strategy Instruction

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/2690

March 18, 2008

A School Immersed in Vocabulary http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/2692

January 23, 2008

Building Oral Language into the Basal (Research from CREATE)

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/2447

November 8, 2007

Making Standards-based Lessons Understandable for English Learners: The SIOP Model (Research from CREATE) http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/2058

October 24, 2007

Tools for Literacy: Technology to Support Reading Comprehension and Vocabulary Development http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/2057

October 3, 2007

Reading Science for Understanding in Middle and High School

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/1532

September 6, 2007

Learning All-Purpose Academic Words (Research from CREATE)

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/2056

June 14, 2007

Findings from the National Literacy Panel on Language Minority Children and Youth (Research from CREATE) http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/1574

May 24, 2007

Word Lists: Choices and Uses http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/1786

April 5, 2007

Double the Work: Challenges and Solutions to Acquiring Language and Academic Literacy for Adolescent ELLs (Research from CREATE)

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/1573

January 29, 2007

What’s Happening in Vocabulary Research? http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/1401

November 30, 2006

Teaching Science: How to Really Give Universal Access to English Learners

http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/cs/wested/view/e/1105

New Books to Own and Use

Reading, Writing, and Learning in ESL: A Resource Book for Teaching K-12 Learners, 5^th ed. Suzanne F. Peregoy, Owen F. Boyle (New York: Pearson: Allyn & Bacon, 2008) ISBN 0205611362 http://www.pearsonhighered.com/educator/academic/product/0,3110,0205593240,00.html

Instructional Assessment of English Language Learners in the K-8 Classroom.

Diane K. Brantley (New York: Pearson: Allyn & Bacon, 2007) ISBN 0205455999

http://www.pearsonhighered.com/educator/academic/product/0,3110,0205455999,00.html

Spacing is unreliable when one is trying to cut and paste!!!

Now my concern is to look a little beyond theoretically well-designed mentoring programs (such as TxBESS) which appear to have helped a little, and consider the somewhat larger and less precisely defined context of what factors weigh most heavily in the minds of teachers in causing them to leave or encouraging them to stay and become leaders and mentors of coming generations of teachers.

Your advice and insights are welcome in this task! I have been preparing teachers, being one, mentoring a few, mentoring a few teacher educators and continuing to learn about teaching for most of the past forty years and hope to continue doing so for another twenty or so. Thus, I have some relevant knowlege and experience, but I have a lot to learn about doing this well in the twenty-first century. This is our profession; we should think and care deeply about how to make it one that builds a better world without using up the primary resource that creates culture, civility and knowledge–the teachers.

Jim Cummins’ website gives you access to a number of his landmark articles and to research information that can be helpful when you need something in print to help you convince someone of the value of what you are trying to do. On this webpage, on the lower left-hand side in the box of links to other parts of the site, be sure to click on Version 2 under Links-Bilingual Education! It takes you to incredible online resources and discussions from the “crème de la crème” of bilingual and ESL experts!
Although the part of the site entitled Reflective Teaching and the Texas EXCET is out-dated in its references to the EXCET Professional Development test which was revised and became the TExES Pedagogy and Professional Responsibilities (PPR), the observations of the writer of this segment (apparently a Houston ISD teacher) still provide some useful guidance for new teachers and those attempting to understand the philosophy which underlies the Texas teacher certification tests.
http://www.iteachilearn.com

Colorín Colorado! A bilingual site for families and educators of English language learners. Go to this publication of theirs for something you can share with your monolingual colleagues that will make them more aware of the differences between Spanish and English: http://www.colorincolorado.org/educators/background/capitalizing I don’t agree with everything this article says (as a linguist or as a bilingual teacher), but the inaccuracies are minor and it is a useful attempt to explain some contrasts. Be sure to look around their website for items in Spanish that you can share with parents.
http://www.colorincolorado.org

Reading Rockets: “Launching Young Readers”. This site sometimes reflects a point of view that is somewhat more behaviorist and less constructivist than the orientation preferred by many education professionals, but often there are useful practical suggestions for parents and teachers.
http://www.readingrockets.org

LDonline: “The world’s leading website on learning disabilities and ADHD”. They often have brief articles by some of the most cited and sought after authorities, as well as practical advice for teachers and parents.
http://www.ldonline.org

Education Week is such a helpful resource for staying current on important issues in education. When you go to this page, in the upper right-hand corner, be careful to click on Free Newsletters, not trial subscription! I subscribe to all the free newsletters they offer because I have such varied interests in teaching as a profession, but often the same articles are repeated in the different newsletters, so you might be more likely to benefit by choosing one or two options. Keep in mind that this resource provides articles collected from other sources such as newspapers and is probably not what your graduate school professors expect you to cite in research papers. However, the news items you find in EDWEEK publications give you a good idea of where to look for current topics and often provide links to important reports of funded research studies. Often the executive summary or the entire report can be downloaded as a pdf document or you can at least read enough to determine whether you want to spend time and funds to access them.
http://www.edweek.org

What I really need are some reports from all the truly wonderful bilingual teachers who were once my students, mentees, interns, neighbors, friends, colleagues—-and some of their friends who don’t even know me.

The only way I could think of to get the data I need without going to schools and trying to get tired teachers to fill out a form at the end of a long day, was to use this blog and impose on several former students and/or interns who include me on their lists of people who welcome their forwarded PowerPoints about the things that matter to them, religion for some, gentle humor for others. Please copy the link to my blog to your list!

So, here goes! I don’t have any special funding to provide a perfectly composed and formatted questionnaire and, frankly, every time someone asks my opinion and it has to fit one of their pre-conceived responses, my answers become less informative.

Please just highlight the rest of this blog post and paste it into an email addressed to
maestrostexas@gmail.com
then edit in your responses and send it to me. I will not reveal who responded to my questionnaire, nor do you need to reveal your name if it isn’t in your email address.

1. What events or experiences would have caused you to leave the teaching profession and find a different line of work? This may be something that happened to you, or to a friend or something you imagine. Examples that come to mind from teachers I have known who either considered leaving or did leave include
____A. being physically assaulted by a student or someone else in a school,
____B. having an administrator who set out to prove a teacher incompetent,
____C. having members of one’s family “punished” for one’s professional convictions,
____D. having no real mentor or friend to turn to at school when faced with new or serious challenges,
____E. being offered substantially more money for work that has similar rewards in terms of serving humanity
____F. some of the above, and these others…
____G. none of the above, but maybe…
____H. all of the above and…..
____I. couldn’t happen–I was born to teach and I probably won’t stop til I drop—Some call it “VOCATION”.

HINT: to save time, just put the number rank (1=MOST LIKELY TO MAKE ME LEAVE through whatever rank is needed to include the ones that could affect your decision in a major way), after you add the others you think of to F., G. or H., as needed.

2. In rank order from MOST IMPORTANT to ALSO MATTERED, these are the people, events or experiences that kept me from leaving teaching or a particular school or district in my first year or first two years of teaching:
These are some possible considerations, rank those that are/were not important for you as N/A, and for the others and those you add, rank them from 1=MOST IMPORTANT to whatever number you think is a good place to stop:
____A. Having a very supportive family, partner, friends, pets at home for sympathy, encouragement, etc.
____B. Having an official mentor who was paid extra to help me learn how to do the job.
____C. Having an informal mentor who wasn’t paid but took me under her/his wing and anticipated my every need for guidance, information and support.
____D. Having direct support, including visits to my school from my college, university or AC program professor/supervisor/specialist/coordinator.
____E. Having direct support with modeling of instructional strategies from a specialist for new teacher support provided by my school district.
____F. Having a principal who believed in me and who gave me an opportunity to overcome my errors.
____G. Having students who made me feel I was important to them.
____H. Having the support of the parents of my students.
____I. Having religious beliefs that supported me in times of doubt and difficulty.
____J. Having a strong personal and/or philosophical committment to the value of the work I am doing.
____K. Having a good sense of humor.
____L. Having a copy of the poem “Invictus” in my desk drawer. (Let me know if you need a copy.)
____M. Relishing my addiction to caffeine in its many life-saving forms–coffee, Coca-Cola, Mountain Dew, chocolate, etc. (O.K., this is getting a little too personal; use your own imagination from here on.)
____N. (your ideas)
____O. (your ideas)
____P. (your ideas)

HINT: to save time, just rank any that work for you and add the others you think of with their rank.

3. Is it important for teachers to get a master’s degree or other specialization as a way to keep up in the profession? If not, what is a better way to learn new information, skills, strategies…?

4. If you have or are currently taking post-graduate courses or training, what have been additional benefits (if any) beyond the new knowledge you have gained or are gaining?

5. How have you made professional contacts with colleagues who share common interests and concerns, other than working with your grade level or subject matter team at school?

6. Are you active in any professional organizations for educators? If so, which one(s) and how have you benefited from that experience (if you feel you have)?

7. What else should I have asked?

Please tell me the following personal information about yourself:

female/male
age: 20-30, 30-40, 40-50, 50-60, 60-70, 70+
How many years teaching in Texas?
Bilingual teacher? ESL teacher? Mainstream teacher? Middle School or High School–subjects taught?
Certified through–
University degree with teaching certification?
Alternative certification, university degree in another field?
Alternative certification after teaching in another state or country?
Out of State/Out of Country certification based on testing only?
Other program:___________________?

PLEASE PUT YOUR RESPONSE DIRECTLY INTO AN EMAIL (NO ATTACHMENTS PLEASE) AND MAIL IT TO ME AT MY NEW EMAIL: maestrostexas@gmail.com

Unfortunately, I cannot reward you with anything but my intense gratitude, but I will send up a prayer that none of the bad experiences I listed in question one ever threaten your pedagogical bliss!
Also, I will respond to your email with a copy of the poem “Invictus”, and maybe some other bit of inspiration.

Also, in the next blog, I will share links to free newsletters that may be useful to you, and I will pass on information about professional conferences, listservs that provide professional opportunities, as well as what I learn from research about ways to become and remain successful in the teaching profession.
Cheers,
Rita
Incidentally, in case you received this as a forward from someone, my blog address is
http://maestrostexas.edublogs.org