Now that You Are
in the Groove,
It's Time
to Express Yourself
with a Bio Poem.
 

Greetings future language teachers! 

By now, you have become solidly familiar with your first school rotation. Imagine my pleasure to hear the positive comments regarding your experience in the public schools!

I surprised Rebekah and Monica in their classrooms on informal visits to meet their mentors last week. An obvious rapport between mentors, students, and interns was evident in both settings.

And “Felicidades” to Pam for volunteering to be the first to have a formal observation on one of her days as a sub. It was well-worth the visit. Pam’s students were engaged, responsive, and focused on learning and using Spanish in a Level Two class. ¡Qué maestra!

Your first assignment, the Bio Poem, models one activity that is easily adapted to many settings and contexts for learning about your students. It also gives students a chance to show their creativity artistically and linguistically. You can alter the form to suit a linguistic assignment that may incorporate meter and rhyme, or modify the theme to align with chapter topics such as clothing or descriptive adjectives.

Bio poems can provide insight into a variety of topics that are important to your students, including interests, goals, and experiences. The assignment also provides a good way for a teacher to determine the ability of students to express themselves in a prescribed format.

For our Special Methods class, you have very simple directions to follow. The poem’s title is your name. The poem’s theme revolves around your interest in the foreign language you teach and should include connections to why you chose it for your teaching emphasis. The poem consists of fourteen lines divided into an octave and a sestet. The first eight lines begin with the relative pronoun, whose. The last six lines begin with the relative pronoun, who. (Notice my grammar terminology! Very important “lingo” for language teachers. Bonus point opportunity: The first person to send me the definition of “relative pronoun” receives a bonus point!)

Here’s my effort to craft a Bio Poem about why I wanted to become a teacher, especially a language teacher. Good luck with your own creations!

Freddie Elizabeth Alexander Bowles

Whose first language has roots in the Germanic family
Whose first encounter with an unknown tongue came
      from Spanish-speaking migrant workers
Whose first classroom was in the basement of her family
      home
Whose first students were in a Head Start literacy program
Whose first paid lesson came from her great aunt Alice
      for a piano lesson
Whose first trip abroad led to her pursuing a master’s
      degree in German
Whose first teaching job included three languages
Whose most exotic trip included six weeks in Afghanistan

Who began her teaching career in Helena, Arkansas
Who owned her own dance studio for four years
Who taught German and Dance at the first magnet
      school in Arkansas
Who guest lectured at two colleges in Hungary
Who spent ten years teaching ESL and German at UCA
Who now uses her first language to teach others at UA

Dr. Bowles, aka Dr. FAB

Freddie A. Bowles
Assistant Professor of Foreign Language Education
Department of Curriculum and Instruction
Peabody Hall 304A
University of Arkansas
Fayetteville, AR 72701
Office: 479-575-3035
fbowles@uark.edu

Posted on Thursday, September 18, 2008

Different languages — I mean the actual vocabularies, the idioms — have worked out certain mechanisms of communication and registration. No one language is complete. A master may be continually expanding his own tongue, rendering it fit to bear some charge hitherto borne only by some other alien tongue, but the process does not stop with any one man. While Proust is learning Henry James, preparatory to breaking through certain French paste-board partitions, the whole American speech is churning and chugging, and every other tongue doing likewise.
     — Ezra Pound, "How to Read," 1929