Book Talk: Student Oriented Curriculum

I thought that the ideas in this book were helpful, especially since we are currently doing an integrated unit. I really liked how the teachers had such free reign over what they could teach, it seems like their administrator really let them go crazy. However, I don't feel like we got to know enough about the teachers, and that you guys jumped into the effects of their work before we knew a lot about it. I don't know how much freedom we would have in our classrooms, and I also think having more teachers on a team makes it more complicated to be as integrated as they were. Regardless though, their success is a great example to follow.

Your presentation was alright, but I felt like there could have been better use of the MIs and maybe more hands-on activities for us. You would have to have shortened your other activities, but it would have kept us more engaged. It also seemed like some of the members of the group put a lot more effort into the presentation, but that the work they did was really good. Lastly, I feel like your wiki was very jumbled, and that you should have all stuck with the wiki format rather than just linking your individual pieces to it.

I really liked the idea of team building, and having us do an activity was a great idea. It can be very important for a class to come together (as we saw with the Freedom Writers). I also like how students guided the curriculum and how you guys walked us through the process of designing curriculum. Having teachers and students sharing all of the roles in a classroom is a great way to turn everyone into teachers and help provide a sense of ownership to the work you do.