Blog Post #1: My Word of the Semester is "Verbalize"
One hundred seventy thousand, four hundred and seventy six. This is the number that Google returns when asked how many words there are in the English language.
It's a big number, but to be honest it didn't take long at all to arrive at my word for the semester, which is verbalize. I began by thinking about what I observe in my family, what I do with my friends, what I see (and often try to promote) in my classrooms, what I see on athletic fields, and in short what I witness in virtually every other setting where there are humans. Human beings are the most social of animals, which means that there is a lot of communication between us. We talk to each other a lot!
What do we say with one another? Of course the list is limitless, but most importantly we communicate our thoughts, our feelings, our hopes and aspirations, our fears, our shortcomings, and our ideas with each other. These are what make us unique individuals. We listen to what others verbalize to us, and as part of this we learn about things and even develop relationships.
I really enjoy verbalization in the classroom. I don't know exactly how this happens, but when a student has to use their words as part of the learning process it seems as if they really end up learning something. I'm always eager to have them describe to me what they are thinking, or how they might be feeling, or what they have learned because it allows me to understand them and better facilitate their learning.
To be sure, my definition of the word includes non-spoken communication, too, namely writing. I'll include body language, too. But writing in particular, and the ability to read and understand what others have written, are what literacy is all about.
It's a big number, but to be honest it didn't take long at all to arrive at my word for the semester, which is verbalize. I began by thinking about what I observe in my family, what I do with my friends, what I see (and often try to promote) in my classrooms, what I see on athletic fields, and in short what I witness in virtually every other setting where there are humans. Human beings are the most social of animals, which means that there is a lot of communication between us. We talk to each other a lot!
What do we say with one another? Of course the list is limitless, but most importantly we communicate our thoughts, our feelings, our hopes and aspirations, our fears, our shortcomings, and our ideas with each other. These are what make us unique individuals. We listen to what others verbalize to us, and as part of this we learn about things and even develop relationships.
I really enjoy verbalization in the classroom. I don't know exactly how this happens, but when a student has to use their words as part of the learning process it seems as if they really end up learning something. I'm always eager to have them describe to me what they are thinking, or how they might be feeling, or what they have learned because it allows me to understand them and better facilitate their learning.
To be sure, my definition of the word includes non-spoken communication, too, namely writing. I'll include body language, too. But writing in particular, and the ability to read and understand what others have written, are what literacy is all about.
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