On Saturday, April 14, 2007, I attended the Bright Ideas Conference on MSU’s campus. Although I am no longer going into teaching, the conference was interesting and informative. The conference started off with a speech by keynote speaker Jacqueline Woodson, a celebrated author and multi-award winner. After that, participants attended smaller sessions on a wide range of topics.
Woodson talked about the importance of writing, believing that everyone has the right to tell a story. She gave writing hints, not only for audience members, but also for teachers to take back to their students. She said that if one is to write, he must not allow fear to play a factor. He should read everything aloud as a tool for better revision. He should allow himself time to sit down and delve into writing. Woodson said that if a person doesn’t read, he can never aspire to great writing. She said that it is essential to foster a community of people who support your writing and will help you with it.
Overall, I enjoyed Woodson’s speech. She read a lot from her work, which helped connect her points with actual examples. However, I felt that a lot of time was spent praising herself. She talked more about herself and her own writing habits than about how to teach writing to students. In addition, her numerous comments about homosexuality had absolutely nothing to do with education and were flat out unnecessary.
The first session I attended was “Introducing a Twenty-First Century Curriculum: Incorporating Mass Communication into the English Classroom.” The presenters discussed news as a rising form of media, and how it can be used alongside the literary canon in the classroom. They talked in detail about Wikis, explaining the basic idea behind them and giving hints on how to start one. They suggested developing a Wiki for the classroom to teach students about editing and social writing. Not only that, but the Wiki can also teach students not to trust everything they read on the Internet.
The second session I attended was “macBeth: Using Technology to Enhance the Teaching of Shakespeare.” The presenters talked about the idea of embodiment, in which students put themselves into the place of the characters in “Macbeth.” Presenter Lindsay Steenbergen showed examples of videos her students had made as part of an interactive assignment. Students were required to apply the story of “Macbeth” to pop culture of today, and used such programs as iMove and Garageband to create these videos. Presenter Jeff Patterson showed the mock Myspace pages that students in his class had created. Each student was a different character from “Macbeth” and had to create his own Myspace page and choose his Top Friends. Because his school wouldn’t allow students to actually use Myspace, Patterson made a template in PowerPoint to model that of Myspace.
Overall, I enjoyed the two sessions I attended and learned more about technology in the classroom. The second session especially presented ideas that would be extremely useful in high school classrooms. Both sessions worked to link contemporary forms of technology with age-old areas of English study. If I were still planning on becoming a teacher, I would no doubt use these suggestions in my classroom.
