Spring Conference Program

Friday, April 27th

Concurrent Sessions I--2:30-3:30

FILM AS LITERATURE: DEVELOPING VISUAL LITERACY (6-12)

John Remington (rm 313)

This workshop will encompass a discussion and demonstration as well as present a rationale for introducing and developing a Film as Literature class into the curriculum. This workshop will be moderated by an instructor currently teaching his first Film As Literature class. This workshop will also demonstrate how to use internet based learning as a means of developing and facilitating student learning.

John, a graduate of Western Oregon University, is a native of Pendleton where he has taught Theatre and Language Arts at Pendleton High School for 17 years.

READING ALOUD ALLOWED! (K-8)

Carol Brown (rm 315)

Help your students experience the magic of books and the power of story with daily read alouds. Presented will be the rationale for spending class time reading aloud to children as well as   suggestions of titles that work well as read alouds.

Carol is a retired elementary teacher, presently adjunct literacy instructor at OSU, Oregon Reading Association state coordinator, and winner of the 2005 Walt Morey Award and the ORA lifetime literacy award.

25 READING STRATEGIES THAT WORK WITH FOR ALL STUDENTS (6-12)

Kelly McMichael (rm 319)

Participants of this workshop will receive a comprehensive packet filled with reading strategies for all types of literature (including non-fiction, poetry and plays). They will have the opportunity to view samples of students work for many of the strategies.

POETRY LOVE: GETTING RELUCTANT STUDENTS TO WRITE POETRY (6-12)

Mary Thouvenel (rm 330)
Handout: Poem Presentation.doc

Participants will receive a number of ready-to-go lessons for those spring afternoons when you just want something a little different. These lessons take students through a poem, its key ideas and a couple of poetic concepts, and into writing their own poems.

Mary has been teaching high school for eleven years, nine of them in Pendleton. She has been a participant and co-director in the Oregon Writing Project at Eastern since 2000 where she picked up most of what she uses for her Poetry Days.

Concurrent Session II- 3:45-4:45

THE NUTS AND BOLTS OF WRITER'S WORKSHOP: ONE ELEMENTARY CLASSROOM TEACHER'S PHILOSOPHY AND APPROACH (K-8)

Andra Hollenbeck (rm 313)

We learn to write by writing. Through this presentation you will learn the foundations and tools to successfully implement a classroom writer's workshop.   Discover the essential components of a writer's workshop; glean examples of management techniques, forms and procedures that can help you implement a writer's workshop in your classroom. You will understand how to adapt a workshop approach to your particular teaching situation and get your students to read and write at a more sophisticated level.

IF YOU BUILD IT, THEY WILL WRITE: SECONDARY WRITERS WORKSHOPS (6-16)

Robyn Hernandez (rm 330)
Handout: If You Build It.doc

Writing Workshops are a powerful way to teach kids the value of revision and responding to feedback. In this presentation, participants will learn to set up a workshop that will virtually run itself.

ADOLESCENT LITERACY: STRATEGIES FOR MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENTS

Karen K. Johnson (rm 319)

Want to make reading a valuable activity in your classroom?   Want to know how to hook reluctant readers?   Want to take home a bag full of strategies that work?   Attend this session for ideas and handouts, and a list of sure-fire sucessful books.   Come share your ideas as well.

Karen   teaches 7th grade language arts at Fowler Middle School in Tigard, Oregon. She serves on the Executive Board of the Oregon Council of Teachers of English and is a frequent presenter at state, regional, and national conferences on topics of technology and reading.   She is the 2005 recipient of the NCTE Leadership Development Award and is a regular columnist in the OCTE newsletter, Chalkboard.

GRANTWRITING TIPS THAT WORK

John Scanlan (rm 315)

Do you want to make changes to your classroom but are experiencing the typical budget woes that bedevil us all? Want to add a great book to your curriculum but lack the supplies you need? Write a grant! This workshop will take participants through the grant-writing process and give them an opportunity to complete an proposal for a OCTE mini-grant to fund a classroom project.

John has taught English for 16 years in Eastern Oregon. He has written and won a number of grants over the years bringing in over $70,000 to the Pendleton School District. John is the President Elect of OCTE and will assume the president's duties next year.

Saturday, April 28th

Continental Breakfast 8:00-8:30

Concurrent Session III 8:30-9:30

UPDATE ON CHILDREN'S AND YOUNG ADULT LITERATURE (K-12)

Paul Gregorio (rm 313)

Recent notable literature for students K-12. Includes award winning titles in fiction and nonfiction for class assignments and recreational reading. Includes picture books and graphic novels; historical fiction, nonfiction and biography, popular genre fiction, global literature; and movies, sports and pirates.

Paul is on the faculty in the Education Department at Portland Community College and teaches courses in Children's and Young Adult literature.

EXPERIENCING POVERTY THROUGH LITERATURE CIRCLES AND SIMULATIONS (6-12)

Kathleen Gregg (rm 315)

This presentation includes the essential questions: What is poverty? What issues are associated with poverty? What action will we take? Through the literature circle and simulation process, this unit addresses the above essential questions. Thinking, writing and reading strategies included. Lots of handouts!

USING DEDUCTIVE REASONING TO ENHANCE WRITING INSTRUCTION (9-12)

Bob Bumstead (rm 319)

The session will briefly review the use of inductive reasoning to enhance writing instruction. It will then focus on methods of helping students to understand deductive reasoning to use it to develop and organize logical essays.

Bob taught junior high and high school English for thirty-three years in Eugene.   For the past ten years he has been an assistant professor at Pacific University's College of Education where he is the current recipient of the President's Award for Excellence in Professional Education.

HOW TO ACTUALLY ENJOY REVISION AND EDITING! (K-8)

Mary Palmer Nowland (rm 330)

Do your students write one single draft and think they are done? This workshop offers tricks to show your writers how easy and manageable it is to polish their writing into something they can be proud of.  

Mary has loved teaching for a quarter of a century. Most of her years were spent in small schools in the high country of Colorado, the back country of Alaska, and at the end of the road in Southern Oregon. Don't let her small town lifestyle fool you. She is up on the latest research, the best teaching practices, and the easiest methods for turning mediocre ideas into magic, no poof needed!

She has published a book for kids as well as written the narration for a documentary movie. Writing is a soulful business and a grand adventure. When you come to her workshops, its a symbiotic relationship--everyone learns, everyone teaches. She is passionate about kids, authentic living, and doing her best everyday. Rejuvenate and energize your own classroom when you attend her workshop.  

Concurrent Session IV- 9:45-10:45

THE POSTER PROJECT: CREATING AN ALTERNATIVE, MULTIDISCIPLINARY APPROACH TO THE TRADITIONAL BOOK REPORT (9-12)

Manuel Mateo (rm 315)

Using Arthur Miller's "The Crucible," the Poster Project is designed to allow for an opportunity to literally see beyond a particular literary work by placing it in a visual, social and historical context. Requiring research, the project allows for a simplified method of communicating effective understanding on a metacognitive level.

Manuel, a lifelong learner, has taught English for 21 years in both Portland, OR and New York City high schools. He currently serves on the OCTE board.

HOLOCAUST LESSONS FOR A BROKEN WORLD (6-16)

Elaine Coughlin (rm 319)

The Oregon Holocaust Resource Center has led the effort to increase awareness about the causes and consequences of racism, anti-semitism, and indifference during the Holocaust and today.   During this session, participants will receive background information and materials for teaching the Holocaust, plus a curriculum packet to help teachers prepare students and organize a visit to the newly dedicated Holocaust Memorial in Washington Park, Portland.

Elaine is Past President of the OHRC and assistant professor at Pacific University College of Education.

MANAGING THE WRITING PROCESS: ONLINE COLLABORATIVE STRATEGIES (4-12)

Nick Viani (Hannon Library, Electronic Classroom 114)
Web Resource: cate.blogs.com/writesite

WriteSite, an online writing management program, provides the perfect opportunity for outside readers to assist in the writing process. Tapping into outside readers (e.g. peers, students in other classes, schools, and/or countries, administrators, content-specific experts, parents, or eager volunteers residing in "wired" retirement centers), WriteSite provides an easy-to-use tool that increases the amount of feedback to student authors and powerfully expands the educational opportunities of any curriculum. And students love it.

Nick is a former instructional technology specialist with Southern Oregon ESD. He has taught in the Philippines, Indonesia, and Japan where, in 1982, Nick entered the digital world as a Language Arts teacher with daily access to a lab of Apple computers. After returning to southern Oregon, he taught in local schools for several years that led to his involvement with the ESD. That position found him helping students and teachers make technology an integral component of their learning. Although officially retired, Nick remains affiliated with Oregon Council of Teachers of English (OCTE) and continues to visit classrooms as a training teacher, conducts staff and professional development workshops, and presents at regional and national conferences.

Inspired by his training at the Bay Area Writing Project in the early 80's, Nick became an active trainer with the East Asia Writing Project. During his middle school writing program's development, it became apparent that certain components of the writing process were, in fact, better managed using technology. This has segued into the highly professional WriteSite that, while emphatically NOT a writing program, embraces and supports Oregon's instructional standards in a secure, password-protected online environment.

THE FLESH COLORED CRAYON: TEACHING ABOUT WHITENESS

Mike Heriza (rm 330)

The rationale for the following lessons and exercises are designed to show that racism is not just an issue for people of color to address and overcome, but that white people by not actively fighting to end racism perpetuate its existence.   Although these lessons could be done independently of the literature unit to follow, my hope is that by raising awareness of white privilege and how racism in this country is not so much about skin color as it is about power, control and the maintenance of white dominance, that students will read the texts in a different light. I also have designed this unit with a predominantly white youth from a rural setting in mind, where racism is often not considered. I hope to show students that this inconsiderateness is very much a part of the problem.

Mike is a recent graduate of the University of Montana English graduate program where his emphasis was secondary teaching. He began his thirteenth year at Pendleton High School this fall where he is teaching some of the same courses he took there over twenty years ago.