Chapter Two: A Journey
Zull’s second chapter focuses on discovery and action.
More specifically how one mimics and action or skill until he or she can master
the task. As in chapter one Zull weaves
in a narrative about a formative educational experience in his own life. This
narrative serves as connective tissue throughout the text for the reader to
understand the difficult topics Zull tackles in the chapter. In my opinion, the
biggest takeaways from this chapter came from the sections: Action is for the
Learner, Talk to Learn and finally the section, Write.
One of the earliest sections of
chapter two entitled Action is for the Learner, hit home for me as we wrap up
another school year. I thought Zull’s line, “Action is a test of learning, but
only the learner can know the motive or the outcome of the test.” was important
and something I think would require many of my colleagues to stop in their
tracks. A lot of my peers focus so much time and energy into having our
students master the PSSAs and Keystones that the students are unaware of why
they need to know something. The answer is always “it’s on the test” which I am
not advocating we don’t prepare our students for testing I am just saying that
we can go too far and only prepare them for a test. A good reader, writer and
thinker will pass the test, but a good test taker may not be able to read,
writer or think. I feel that Zull advocates throughout this chapter for an
education system that places more emphasis on why a student is learning something and less emphasis on what did they learn, or what can they
mimic back. Did the lesson stick with them or is it simply just a task needed
to master before they can leave the grade, or graduate?
The second biggest takeaway for me
in this chapter came towards the end of the chapter in the sections, “Talk to
Learn” and “Writing”. In these sections Zull discusses the role of talking and
writing and the impact of discussion and writing on a person’s education. In
the section “Talk to Learn” Zull uses a vignette of a carpenter talking himself
through a problem as a way to show the benefits of talking in the
classroom. This struck a chord with me
because I have a classroom has been described to me by a peer as “busy” which I
took as a euphemism for “why are your kids talking so much and moving around.”
This came a day before one of my formal observations from my principal. So
needless to say when the observation came and my class was “busy” I got extremely
nervous. During our post-observation conference my principal had extremely nice
things to say about how great it was to see the students excited about a topic,
and working with energy on an academic assignment. She said that some of her observations are so
boring because the kids just sit there and copy notes. The sense of relief I
felt afterwards was enormous. I know,
from conferencing with my students, talking through their writing has benefited
my students. They have told me that when they talk through the topic they feel
their writing is stronger and better organized than when they have to construct
a piece of writing on their own. They love to “bounce ideas” off of one
another.
The final takeaway for me is closely
connected to talking and that is writing.
I loved the line, “I propose that learners should write for the explicit
purpose of thinking.” I could not agree
with Zull more. I feel that especially
in older grades writing has become a lost art.
Teachers in other disciplines do not teach writing, because that is what
English is for, and even more commonly, it is hard to teach and grade. Writing
is time consuming. But does it have to be? The writing that Zull is proposing
is not a formal writing, it is simply using language as a way to slow students
down and force them to think about what they are doing. Teenagers are impulsive
and what to take shortcuts (some adults to do) but writing is a task that
requires you to sit and think. It requires thought, and time- two things
teenagers hate.
This year I’ve been lucky enough to lead several
trainings on TDA’s at our I.U. and within my district. One of the biggest
complaints I hear is about how long it is to teach the concepts needed to write
a TDA. I always tell the teachers that
if you break it apart and do it repeatedly throughout the year the time it
takes students will decrease, they will become masters of the task. I feel
validated by this section and chapter in my statements. I feel that Zull would
advocate for more reading and discussing in a classroom. Furthermore, I feel
with more volume of discussion and writing the quality will go up. As long as
the teacher is there to guide the students in the right direction.
Overall, I found this chapter to be very interesting.
I very much enjoy how he weaves stories into the topics. For me as a reader it
is much easier to follow along and apply them to my own classroom experience
because of the stories. Without them I think I would feel the writing would be
dry and difficult to grasp. I have enjoyed the first two chapters and look
forward to the rest.
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