Akeelah and the Bee

Don't create robots (rote memorization vs. informed learning)

One of the things that was covered in this movie was Lawrence Fishborne's character, Dr. Larabee, emphasized that Dylan was just a robot who memorized words, meanwhile, he was teaching Akeelah via reading books from Civil Rights leaders.

This has an interesting part to it, it seems to be saying to me that rote memorization is not needed, because what stereotypically requires rote memorization the most?  In my mind, it is tests and spelling bees.  But Dr. Larabee doesn't teach it through rote memorization, which can show us future and current teachers that we don't have to teach out students how to take a test via rote memorization.  We can teach them about Frederick Douglass and in the process, show them how to spell words or summarize a reading.

Believing in yourself

All it took for Akeelah to believe in herself was Mr. Larabee guiding her to it.  He used that quote on the wall to begin her on her journey to begin to believe in herself.  He helped her believe in herself by just telling her that she could do it.  It took one person to begin her journey to believing in herself, one person who could be you as a teacher, a doctor, a politician, we all can be that one person.  If we all become that one person to help children believe in themselves, our world would be drastically different (I will not say that it would be perfect, but it would be different).  When I become a Special Education teacher, I will try to be that one person to as many students as I can.  Even now, only as a Future Special Education Teacher, this semester, I will be in the classrooms, and I will try to be that one person.

Teaching modification

This movie had a wonderful example of a teaching modification, he was teaching her books from the civil rights activists.  But, when they were outside, he began to notice her hand tapping and realized that her mnemonic device for remembering words was keeping time.  So, he stopped teaching her civil rights books and began to teach her while she jump roped.  She would jump rope to everything he taught her, and if you ask me, it became her visual and kinesthetic memory (In the scene where she almost forgets how to spell the word, she begins to jump rope with an invisible jump rope and she sees the letters).

She needed the jump rope to help her kick off her learning the words and the prefixes and suffixes of words.  And he gave her the jump rope, he used it in the beginning to help her get over her distraction of the dog barking, but later it just became a way of keeping time.  This is an excellent example of a teaching modification.