So, I love Bruce Lee. When I was younger, I would watch his movies on VHS with my father on Saturday nights. My favorite was Enter the Dragon. Lee was an amazing martial artist and outside of movie making, a very pensive, philosophical man. There are many wise quotes from Bruce Lee that I could have pulled from for this post, but this one is one of my favorites–“To hell with circumstances; I create opportunities.” 
In my summer externship, I saw a unique opportunity to help teachers of language. My project centers around studying the North Carolina Essential Standards for English Language Development and creating a set of documents that will allow the Essential Standards to be used in a viable way within the Homebase system. Basically, I hope to be adding some expanded levels to our five broad standards in order to create a system of dot notation that will not only help ESL and content teachers access high quality resources that support the standards, but also help them to better define and articulate what it means to teach language within each of the content areas. This is something that ESL teachers across the state have been asking for since we switched to our current standards. Though I probably won’t be creating a lesson plan as part of my project, I hope that the results of my collaborative work with teachers across the state will help everyone better plan instruction for English language learners and better utilize Homebase to do so. Opportunities….. 🙂
AMIlls – that sounds so official! To help our students expand their vocabulary, the teachers at Wallace Rose Hill started a comprehensive school-wide vocabulary program last year. Of course, the organization fell on the English teachers, but it was great.
Each week the students were responsible for learning 10 new words. On Mondays during 1st period, the students wrote the words, along with definitions and contextual sentences, in their notebooks. All teachers, regardless of curriculum (even PE), were required to integrate the words into their lessons. On Fridays, the students expected a quiz in each of the four classes they had. The quizzes required high-level thinking skills, and cheating was eliminated because the same quiz was given in all classes 1st period, a different one in 2nd period, and so on. Maybe this could be bridged with technology.
It’s funny we watched “Fists of Fury” last night. His movies always feel timeless. I enjoyed reading how you tied your love of kung fu movies to your current work as a Kenan Fellow. Well done.