Book Spine Poem:

"the one & only

kids these days

in the deep end

lost at school

sink or swim

this is where I leave you"

-Kali Koppen

Based on my selection of books at home I decided to create this 6 stack book spine poem. In the end it is open to interpretation, but this is what my thought process was. I thought about how school can be so difficult for so many students to make it through to the end. This poem is about the drop out rate in America. Even though our dropout rates are improving overall about 7% of high school students will not graduate according to the National Center for Education Statistics. That is about 1.2 million students each year. This assignment really got me thinking about how much of an impact I hope I can make during my teaching career in middle school. I hope I can inspire students to see the benefits of finishing school and absorbing everything they can throughout school!

This would be a great activity in a middle school or high school class! I would take my students to the library after showing two examples that I had made. This would be a great individual activity to get to know what they care about and to get them into the library to find texts that interest them. Since I won't be using a lot of literature in my class (mainly nonfiction texts instead of fiction) this is a great way to show them what else is out there that we won't necessarily use in my room, but is still available to them.

Resource:

DoSomething.org. (n.d.). 11 Facts about High School Dropout Rates. Retrieved from https://www.dosomething.org/facts/11-facts-about-high-school-dropout-rates

U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. (2015). The Condition of Education 2015 (NCES 2015-144), Status Dropout Rates. Retrieved from https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=16