Fieldwork+1-+TAP+Lesson+Plan

This artifact is my lesson plan for the The Afterschool Program at Newburgh, my first fieldwork position. I planned my lesson around a crucial idea from my literacy for diverse learners class: home language versus professional language. The school I observed was South Middle School in Newburgh. The school is about 75% black and Hispanic. Many of the students have a unique speech pattern that is either some derivation of Spanglish or African American Vernacular English. After noticing many of the students being reprimanded and told not to write the “way they speak” I felt it necessary to attempt a lesson on different forms of speech and appreciating them.

I centered my lesson on //Their Eyes Were Watching God// by Zora Neale Hurston. Using the multiple dialects of the dialogue contrasted with the fluid, grammatically correct narration I established the divide between speech, in terms of professionalism and colloquialism. The crux of my lesson was to have the students understand that writing in dialect is more than OK, but can be a powerful tool. The execution could have been better, but for a first lesson I think I got a serious point across to a group of students who have not really thought about their language critically.

**Lesson title**: Multiple Literacy's using Hurston's //Their Eyes Were Watching God// **Subject**: Language **General Expectations**: To raise student awareness to the power of language and familiarize students with their own language **Specific Expectations**: Understand the role of language, Identify and understand dialects, Learn importance of HOME language and PROFESSIONAL language **Introduction**: Ask students about their own language and strange dialects they have experienced in the past. Can anyone identify what a dialect is? Has anyone tried to write in a dialect or seen writing in dialect? What about in music? 1) Have students watch 21 Accents, Amy Walker-Youtube.com a) Can you identify a dialect here? b) What does the dialect tell you about Amy or the region? Does it identify homeland, religion, or upbringing? 2) Have students identify dialects in their own lives or experiences a) Have you ever heard a Brooklyn accent or Brooklynese? b) What about the Bronx or Statan Island or Long Island c) What about Wisconsin or Montana or Wyoming? d) How do you all speak? i) Does anyone else you know or are related to speak this way? a) Where do you think your families learned this pattern of speech? 3) Now how do you write? Can anyone write me a sentence the way they were taught to and the way it would be said if they were talking to a friend? a) What do you notice here? What changed? b) Can everyone understand this? c) WHY can't we speak this way? i) How does this make you feel? The way you've been raised to speak is not a "STANDARD" or "ACCEPTABLE" style of writing in most situations d) What does your pattern of speech, dialect, or language mean to you? 4) Break into groups and read a passage from Zora Neale Hurston's //Their Eyes Were Watching God// a) Each group will share what they have noticed or learned about their individual passage b) Why has Hurston chosen to write like this? i) Does it make you feel a certain way or think about her characters differently? ii) Is it easier or more difficult to read than if it were written in "STANDARD" and "ACCEPTABLE" English iii) How do the characters seem when they speak like that? c) Richard Write comments on this book saying: ... "...She exploits that phase of Negro life which is "quaint," the phase which evokes a piteous smile on the lips of the "superior" race." Why would he say that? d) What do you think of Hurston writing like this? Do you agree or disagree? To understand Hurston's grasp of the English language look how she responds to the ideas of the preferred treatment of African Americans: "If I say a whole system must be upset for me to win, I am saying that I cannot sit in the game, and that safer rules must be made to give me a chance. I repudiate that. If others are in there, deal me a hand and let me see what I can make of it, even though I know some in there are dealing from the bottom and cheating like hell in other ways." ASSESSMENT: Write me 2-3 sentences in a dialect of your choice. Then write me 1-3 sentences defending the choices you made when writing in dialect. Dialect can include the way you speak or the way you think someone else speaks, it is your choice! **Sources and External/Additional Materials** Youtube.com - 21 Accents Amy Walker Selection(s) of //Their Eyes Were Watching God// by Zora Neale Hurston

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