Ashley's+Portfolio+Assessed

Dear Ashley: Your portfolio confirms that you are a student-centered, process-oriented teacher with a strong image of your own literacy. You reflect candidly about your young adult reading and writing, so you understand the value of YA literature, in particular //Hunger Games.// I like the revisions you make in the reading questions to elicit more thematic notes in student journals. The question is how do we connect these to a thematic essay? Themes are often connected to characters and relationships. You can identify themes by keying on relationships and how they end up. A good example is Create a Venn Diagram comparing Katniss to another Tribute BESIDES Peeta. Include their skills in the arena, information in the district, and personality traits in your comparison. This is an effective formative assessment and will lead toward thematic issues. I suggest using it formatively instead of the many “ala carte” summative assessments. Many of these “a la carte” assessments fit earlier in the unit and probably should be formative. The Venn diagram can lead to questions about power, equity, media-effects, and other themes. I would suggest establishing them before the summative assessment is introduced. This will give the students specific options. Choice is important, but students can only function with defined choices, rather than unlimited choices of themes. In a thematic unit, what the themes are should not be a mystery. Your respect for language diversity and differential ability is evident in the portfolio. You can even see it in the teacher research blogging project, which focuses on conceptual understanding, rather than grammatical expression. A very articulate reflection and comprehensive portfolio. 70/70