6809 - Weekly Reading #8

"Along with his affinity for sports, Ned loved rap music. A self-styled rapper, Ned had formed his own rap group and had created a home page for it on the Internet (which, to preserve Ned’s privacy, is not linked here). Known as the M-L-P Boyz (Major League Player Boys), the group consisted of Man (aka Ned), L’il Thug, Tron, and G-money. Together, they composed raps that they subsequently committed to memory and performed for special occasions. But Ned’s major interest in rap centered on the Atlanta-based group Goodie MOb, an acronym for “The Good Die Mostly Over Bull,” whose members include Big Gipp, Khujo, T-Mo, and Cee-lo " (Alvermann, Hagood, & Williams, 2001).

I chose this quote because it touches home for me.  I am from a small town - Glen Dale, WV - which is ten minutes from Wheeling.  I have a friend who has been into rapping for as long as I have known him.  He was never the greatest in school - but boy did he love his rap and his popular culture.  I feel that if he would have had an opportunity like Ned - reading and writing all about his favorite rap group - he would have loved it.  He is now making it bigger than I thought he would; however, he always had his school work come first.

Retrieved from http://forum.purseblog.com/television-and-cinema/the-best-and-worst-pop-culture-high-schools-282739.html

I chose this image because I thought it was a little funny at first.  However, looking at it now makes me think - what if I had a teacher who came in dressed as someone we all were familiar with just to teach us that lesson that day? I feel that if teachers are involved with the popular culture that students are today - they can really motivate the students.

1. What is your stance on using popular culture texts in school?

I feel that it is a great idea.  This way the educators can be involved with the same popular culture as the students.  This can really motivate our students to read and to write.  Also, they can continue to learn how to gather information that is needed - however, they will not even realize how fun it can actually be.

2. What are your concerns about using popular culture texts in school?

Two concerns - I would never want to be involved with popular culture that is inappropriate, or bad for the students.  Some of the students are interested in inappropriate things and this cannot be the type of popular culture that we should use in schools.  Also, I feel that we need to make sure that we are using popular culture as a crutch for our curriculum as opposed to in place of our curriculum. 

3. How can popular cultural texts support school-based writing?

Well, if we use these popular culture texts while teaching school-based writing, students will enjoy it more.  If we are using something interesting to students as a way of teaching them the school-based writing they will be motivated and they will want to continue writing for school assignments. 

4. Find and link to a web-based popular culture text you might use to support writing in your teaching context.

Survivor Math

This is based on calculus; however, I think that it would be interesting.  It is based on the TV show Survivor. It is used for calculus problems; therefore, I may not use it in my 6th grade - but it would be neat to use someday.

Source:

D.E. Alvermann, M.C. Hagood, & K.B. Williams (2001, June). Image, language, and sound: Making meaning with popular culture texts. Reading Online, 4(11). Available: http://www.readingonline.org/newliteracies/lit_index.asp?HREF=/newliteracies/action/alvermann/index.html