The Tree of Knowledge

University of Puerto Rico at Humacao English Department Humacao, P.R.

Laura C. Donato Sanes 842-­‐09-­‐2730 Mrs. Iralys Sanabria Practice Teaching Prof. Aníbal Muñoz Claudio

Title

Purpose

Justification

Permanence

Action Plan

Action Plan Table

Results

Reactions

Recommendations

Appendix

Table of Contents

Page

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Purpose:

“The Tree of Knowledge”

In my town there is a saying that people have adopted and it’s that necessity is the biggest muse for inventions and with time I have seen this saying to be true.

Out of necessity man discovered a way to create fire, the wheel; ways of communications, technology and the list goes on. Humanity is in constant need for something new, but what about the need for knowledge? How do we invent things without the knowledge? And so, we come to the root of the one thing human beings are in constant search of and that is an education. Whether it is formal or informal education, the human being is constantly educating himself, seeking to transform himself into something new.

The hunger for education needs to be fed, now more than ever and that is my goal as a teacher, to provide the food of education for those who hunger it. I have titled my special project “The Tree of Knowledge” for three main reasons. One, because I believe that young minds like the ones at the elementary level deserve to have a space that will connect with there needs. Two, because I have seen that although this school has the structure and the space, they are not using it correctly and three, because as I previously mentioned, my students also hunger for knowledge. The purpose of this project is to promote the usage of the library to the elementary level students.

For some time the school had two separate libraries, one for secondary and one for elementary, but because of the lack of usage from the elementary level and

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many weaknesses on the infrastructure of the space they decided to close it and leave only the one that was meant for the secondary level. This school is one of the few that promotes reading and that actually provides the students with elective classes such as library skills. Because the library plays such an important part in this school and the academic process of all the students, I want to create “The Tree of Knowledge” that will be a corner meant for elementary school students.

Justification:

I believe in the importance of this project because when we teach students from a very young age to expand their minds and to hunger for knowledge, we get educated adults, with critical and open minds. In my personal experience, I didn’t have the privilege to access a library until I got to high school. The school where I studied did not have one, but I have always believed that if I had had access to one from a young age I would have taken advantage of everything that a library has to offer. I remember being one of those students that wouldn’t leave the library when I was in high school. It was a place where I felt comfortable and even peaceful. I loved being surrounded by books and computers. To be able to have a place where I could grow made my high school experience a memorable one.

The Palmas Academy has provided the students with a well-­‐equipped library.

It has around 6-­‐7 computers, individual private rooms for study groups; each room has a white board. The library also has a photocopier and also serves as a classroom for extracurricular courses given by the librarian Mrs. Johanna de Leon. However,

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the library has been going through some changes and it is still in transition. Part of this transition is the organization of new books that will challenge the high school level students. The library right now has contradictions in its roles because the students that are mostly using the library are high school students, but most of the library’s books are meant for elementary level students who barely visit the library.

During my time there I will not only create a space for the elementary students to use but I will also be helping the librarian with the organization of the new books and with the up coming Scholastic book fair. I have outlined all of my ideas, which have been approved by the director of Academic Affairs Mrs. María Lomba. I know that these projects will benefit the school and the students greatly. I am glad to be part of something that can make them feel as I did and still do whenever I step into a library.

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Permanence:

I know that in many places, new projects are brought and even if they are great ideas, the moment the person that started the project leaves or can no longer continue with it, the project fails to continue and the people in charge of giving it continuity decide to discontinue it. I know for a fact that this will not be the case of my project. For starters, part of my project is to help the library get organized. This is something that once it is established it’s a matter of learning the system and to continue doing it. Because I will not be doing this on my own, I know I have Mrs. Johanna de Leon’s support on this matter. She is very strict when it come to the library’s organization and I know that this is something that will be implemented and adopted without any problem.

The second part of my project is the book fair. The book fair is done every year at the school but what I will bring to the equation is my idea to make it like a carnival. I want to make the book fair a big celebration and I believe that’s the correct way to have a book fair. To me, reading is a privilege and is a cause for celebration, a celebration of our privileged education. This year will be our first experimental run of giving the book fair a little twist because I see it a big event. If the school likes it and gets good feed back from parents I am certain that they will adopt it as well. The key is to get the support of the parents and of the administration. The third part of my project is the elementary corner for the library. This part of the project I have no doubt that will be made permanent because it is something that the school needs. I know that once we continue growing we are going to be able to expand it.

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In terms of budgets, the school has a budget that it is exclusively for library materials. In many cases Mrs. De Leon goes out and buys the materials herself and the school reimburses her. The reason why she does this is because she says it is easier for her to buy it on her own than having to wait for the school to process the order.

Sometimes materials are needed for a specific date and the school tends to take a little time to process the money. Other than that, when it comes to maintenance, the school’s maintenance staff takes care of the cleaning part of the library. The tree that I will be creating will be removable so the school will have no problems when the time to repaint the library comes. The only thing that will require a little work are the shelves and it will only be because these have to be nailed to the wall, but the school has an engineer that works directly with those type of situations.

The tree can be moved, in the event that the school decided to maybe re-open the elementary level library and what it is important to me is that the concept itself becomes part of the school. My tree will only be the first step of many more to come. I know that this school will embrace it and if at some point the school decides to re-open the elementary school library, Mrs. De Leon will continue with the legacy because we were both on the same page when I shared the concept with her.

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Action Plan:

The main objectives of my project are to improve the quality and organization of the library and to promote library usage for the elementary level students. In order to achieve this I will be spending an hour and a half every Tuesday, Thursday and Friday at the library, building the tree during the week of March 10-­‐14. The next phase will start on March 17 and will end March 28. During this time I will be organizing the library as well as planning the scholastic book fair which will be on April 22-­‐25. I will be working along with the librarian Mrs. De León and with my cooperating teacher Mrs. Iralys Sanabria who’s going to help me prepare a library schedule for the elementary level students. This will be done in case the teachers wish to use the library for their classes or for their clubs like Mrs. Iralys’s Reading Club that gets together twice a month. When it comes to budget and materials for the project, the school has provided me with half of the materials such as dark brown cardboard, for the trunk of the tree, a machine that cuts letters and a little paint. The librarian told me that if I buy anything that I could bring the tickets so that the school would reimburse me. So far, this is the agreement we have come up with. However, I have separated around $200 for the special project. For the other two projects I will not need a budget because they do not require materials.

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Action Plan Table:

March 11

March 13

March 14

March 18

March 20

Activity:

Activity:

Activity:

Activity:

Activity:

-­‐ Preparing the -­‐Preparing the -­‐Preparing the -­‐Installment of -­‐Organization letters for the

trunk of the

foliage of the

the book

of the library’s

title.

tree and

tree.

shelves.

books and

-­‐ Materials:

branches.

Materials:

-­‐Organization

codification

Cardboard,

Materials:

Tissue paper

of the library’s system.

glitter, glue,

Cardboard,

and glue.

books and

cardboard

paint and

codification

cutting

scissors.

system.

machine.

Materials: Shelves.

March 25

March 27

March 28

April 1-­‐11

April 22-­‐25

Activity:

Activity:

Activity:

Activity:

Activity:

-­‐Organization

-­‐Organization

-­‐Planning of

-­‐Planning of

-­‐Scholastic

of the library’s of the library’s the book fair.

the book fair.

book fair

books and

books and

-­‐Organization

event.

codification

codification

of the library’s

system.

system.

books and

-­‐Setting up a

-­‐Planning of

codification

schedule for

the book fair.

system.

the elementary school corner.

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Results:

My tree of knowledge was a great success. I received full support from the

librarian Mrs. Johanna de Leon and I was also able to involve some of the secondary students in the project; there were two students from the third grade that also volunteered to help. I was happy to be able to finish the project inside the timeline I had proposed myself to do it. I had no interruptions during the process and although it was tired-­‐some and it required a lot of sacrifice the end result was more than what I had pictured it would be in the initial plan. The money I reserved for the project was more than enough and I even got some donations from Mrs. Johanna, who was so pleased with the way the library was taking shape, she decided to contribute with decorations.

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Reactions:

From the moment I started constructing the tree of knowledge, I started

getting feedback from everybody. The students from the school came into the library to find me on top of a chair gluing tissue paper to the wall. They would all stop to see what I was up to and some were brave enough to ask what I was doing.

Johanna got some of the secondary students to help me and though they were shy at first, they later started to ask all kinds of questions while Mrs. Johanna took pictures.

However I have to say that the biggest reaction I got was from the parents.

Since the school has a PTO (Parent-­‐Teacher Organization), most of their reunions were inside the library and every time they had to get together they just had to stop and look at the progress of the tree. Everyday they say something new that had been put up. If I was there while they were in their reunion, they would ask me why I was doing it and if I was going to get a grade for it. Most of them said things like “you should be a decorator” or “I’m taking you home so you can decorate my daughter’s room.” The best part of doing this was that even teachers that would have probably never even seen me met me and they at least know me as “the girl who did the tree at the library”. I was also able to meet Mrs. Versón, the school’s headmaster, whom I had not met officially. Overall I can say that making the tree opened many doors and it got me recognized around the school. It was a very gratifying experience and even though I got many blisters because of the hot glue I would definitely do it all over again.

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Recommendations:

When it came to selecting what type of project I should do I had a hard time

because one of the blessings of this school actually became a small obstacle for me.

The Palmas Academy is a very well prepared school and it took some time for me to really get to know the school and see what issues needed to be attended. No school is perfect of course but there are schools that are in real need of improvement; that is not the case for The Palmas Academy. I had several options such as create a poetry club or work with the technology infrastructure but neither of those really convinced me when it came to pursuing them as a project. After getting to know the librarian, we started talking about hobbies and things we would like to do in terms of decoration and I told her what my idea of a perfect library decoration would be and she loved it. It turns out she was dying to do something like that with the library because she felt it was too plain and the elementary students had stopped going to the library from the moment they closed the elementary library. At the end of everything we managed to fulfill our goal, which was to promote library usage to the elementary level and reading.

So, what would I do differently? Absolutely nothing. I loved every minute of

the things I did. I felt like yes, this school has everything but wow I am still leaving a legacy behind. I have transformed at least one part of the library where students can feel like they belong and they can be comfortable in it. I was more than happy to serve my students and to provide them a space that could also be used as a teaching tool.

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What would my recommendation be? Don’t select to do a project just because its something that needs to be done for a grade. Select something that will really matter not just to the school but to you as well. Do your best to connect your personality to the things you do because that’s how you really leave your mark in the school, not to mention you’re going to enjoy it as well. It doesn’t have to be something related to English; it could be anything. If you’re into sports, then create a team if the school doesn’t have one. If you like fine arts, like me, create a dance group, or a theater group and have them participate in a school activity; the point is to get involved and impact their lives in a positive way. Being here I noticed one thing and its that it didn’t matter that my students came from wealthy families and that the students of my practice teaching colleagues came from less wealthy families, in the end, they all have common needs and the reality is that they are not being met at home, so they try to look for that in school. Even though it is not our “place” to meet those needs it indirectly becomes our job as well and we are in the perfect position to fulfill that job. So whatever you select, make sure you put your heart and soul into it because it will show and it will be appreciated.

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Appendix:

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