"you'll never be black"

When I was in sixth grade, we were assigned to write an essay on someone we wanted to be. It wasn’t supposed to be the typical “hero” essay, or “I look up to ______ because…” We were to write about someone’s lifestyle, career that we wanted. I was pumped. I wanted to be Jackie Joyner Kersee. I knew everything about her athletic career and basically I did want to be her. During the brainstorming part of class, my teacher vetoed my idea, suggesting I pick the principal, my mom, my sister, or the mayor (a woman). Those are more realistic, he told me. Really? The principal? That is not realistic or admirable to most sixth-graders. He laughed (honestly), and said, “Erin, but you’ll never be black.” No shit, sir. I’ll also never be a pro athlete—but isn’t this what the essay’s supposed to be about? Since he was my teacher and this was his assignment, I decided to write about my sister.

I didn’t (and still don’t) know how this reason was ever legitimate to my teacher. Apparently the guys in the class only wanted to be white basketball players, or Brett Favre—or maybe their dads. And the only non-white student—a Hmong girl—must’ve decided to be a family member, because, heaven forbid, she’ll never be a famous white woman.

I hadn’t thought of this for many years, until reading Kathy Jervis’s article “How Come There are No Brothers on That List?” Questions about race (and ethnicity, culture, religion, gender) are asked because students are genuinely curious. Of course these questions are difficult, but that our students ask them means they trust us. As Jervis argues; unless teachers create an environment that is safe to explore these implications, these critical discussions will never occur. To discuss—to combat—racism and discrimination is something that should definitely be part of classroom discourse. (These discussions can create discomfort for the teacher, but professionally and ethically, they should be had.) The world, the United States, the city of Milwaukee—are all very diverse places, racially, ethnically, and culturally. It is part of our profession as teachers to help prepare our students for the discourse of these worlds outside of the classroom…

sexism and photographs

Something discussed in class this past Monday really grabbed my attention, and related to part of the reading in Chapter 27. It was brought up in discussion that many of us don't think twice about when we see teachers wearing wedding rings or have photographs of their ("traditional"/heterosexual) families up in their classrooms. Many of us therefore fail to realize how how this might make LBGTQ students feel. On day one of my fieldwork, I noticed all the family photographs my cooperating teacher has up in her room—including a wedding one of the bride and groom kissing—but before Monday's class, never thought about the repercussions of this for some students and other teachers. This is most definitely part of the hidden curriculum that Peter Mclaren discusses that can lead to sexism and sexually accepted beliefs. The "unwitting and unintended granting of power and privilege" mentioned is one of the most dangerous things happening in today's classroom through the hidden curriculum (414).

What I find to be most frigthening about this is that we rarely see our own hidden curriculum to the extent that it exists or is being unknowingly taught, and that we rarely reflect on it....

Problem-Based Learning

*As I was unable to get my hands on someone's book to borrow this week, I am blogging about the problem-based learning projects introduced in class this week.

Throughout the week, I had some discussions with classmates about how problem-based learning can be made relevant in our classrooms. I didn't want to agree with those who right now see no relevance, but there was some pretty strong support behind their ideas. However, because I want my group to do our project on something with the environment (like recycling), I was brainstorming today for awhile about it.

Aaaand I found one way to make it relevant in both English Language Arts and in Social Studies. (So don't steal my ideas...) Here was my thought. In English, a problem-based learning project could stem from reading T.S. Elliot's poem "The Wasteland," because the wasteland in the poem is created from the people, and we could therefore compare it with the waste generated by people today. Aligned with this in Social Studies could be the Industrial Revolution and all the polution and such that came with it. I also think it's important that we see these relationships over time and how some things have changed drastically (thanks to technology) and some things have not changed at all (thanks again to technology, or lack thereof).

I still wonder about the question of time and how we might be able to do such a project in a 45-minute class period (such as the one I'm in now at MSL). However, I do believe problem-based learning seems incredibly engaging depending on the topic chosen, and it seems like something I would like to try in a classroom.

In the first handout on "What is Problem-Based Learning" introduced by the Association for Suepervision and Curriculum Development, it is stated that "The problems that students meet during PBL demand the same problem-solving strategies we use in the real world: making observations, creating hypotheses, conducting investigations, collecting information, defining issues, evaluating our thinking, developing possible solutions, and selecting solutions that fit our construction of the problem" (41). This statement is why PBL is legitimate in any classroom; because it is relevant. Relevant not only to the student's life by the topic as it affects each individual, but because the project probes them not only to learn lifelong skills, but to use them...

identity

The introduction of Ward's "Racial Identity Formation and Transformation" shares the common message we've heard since we entered the field of education: "For some black students, doing well in school is equated with 'selling out' or becoming non-black; thus for them, 'the burden of acting white was too high a price to pay for academic success" (259). This to me is one of the most frustrating things we, as future educators, will have to deal with in an "urban" or more racially diverse school. Primarily, this issue frustrates me because there are sooooo many successful black Americans in many fields of employment that do have high-school and college diplomas. And these aren't hidden in our society; we can buy magazines like Black Enterprise, listen to black politicians speak in the House, senate, and at state and local levels, and watch college basketball on television where more than half the men are the court are black. And college basketball requires at least a high school diploma.

Later, on page 262, she writes, "Transmitted daily to black children are messages that black people are undesirable, inadequate, and inferior... In the face of glaring contradictions between the black experience as non-blacks believe it to be, and the black experience that the black adolescent knows it to be, the task becomes one in which the black child must unravel the faulty and dangerous attacks upon her identity, both individual and group." This message is something very crucial for educators to grasp; especially educators in an urban area or those working with a more racially diverse set of students. The first problem is one we can't fix. We all had a different adolescent experience, and therefore truly know our own. (And really, how well did we know ourselves as adolescents?) This problem aside, adolescence is a difficult and somewhat shitty experience for everyone. Considering the black adolescent experience as a white teacher may be as difficult as our own adolescence was! These kids must "unravel the dangerous attacks on their identity" while at the same time taking in what we're teaching in our classes, because really, isn't that what we're there for? To teach these children our content?

Question being, where and how do we create this balance?

English Language Arts Standards: Scope & Sequence

My research revolves around the English Language Arts standards created by the National Council of Teachers of English and the Wisconsin Model Academic Standards for English Language Arts. For the purpose of this project and course, my research focuses on the eighth grade standards, as these are the standards that should be met by a student's completion of middle school. The question I'm researching specifically is to determine the appropriate scope and sequence and state/national standards for Language Arts.

I am quite familiar with these standards and encounter them daily in my UWM classes as well as my fieldwork/student teaching classroom, and I know how I feel about them (the standards). However, I am encountering a few problems in my research. Primarily, the scope of curriculum used in eighth grade classrooms is HUGE—hundreds of lesson plans shared by teachers online prove that there's a lot that can be taught to eighth graders. Many plans meet/include national standards, but it's interesting to notice how Wisconsin Model Academic Standards expect more of teachers and students than many other state standards do. (We have our work cut out for us!)

Finally, determining the sequence of curriculum and in which order to apply the standards is somewhat difficult. I'm currently in the process of researching NCTE and the Wisconsin standards websites to conclude whether the order of the standards is meant to affect the order of organizing curriculum.

Middle School Content

After this week’s readings, a lot of questions have been brought up regarding middle schools, junior highs, and high schools. A few of us have mentioned some uncertainty about certification and whether middle school teachers should have a separate certification because of the fragile time of adolescence. Here is where I take issue: CONTENT. K-8 certifications do not specify one content area, placing teachers in classrooms where they might teach all of English, Social Studies, Science, and math. My cooperating teacher has a K-8 certification, and has recently taught all of the above courses except for math because she feels quite weak in that area. She confided that my certification is a better way to go because it is more content-focused. In elementary school, the basic materials of these core subjects can be taught by one professional, but as students reach adolescence, many could be missing out on the content they should be receiving.

Dr. Cyrus Smith, a wonderful professor here at UW-M, has engrained this phrase into many of our heads: “Content determines process.” So, when a teacher is weak in content, the process used may not be the best for relaying content. It is not the fault of the K-8 certifiers, but some type of change needs to happen if we are to stop blaming the students for not knowing enough, reading well enough, or writing to meet standards. If teachers are not trained in their [content specific] profession, how are our middle school students going to perform in freshmen English with little prior content?

media vs REALITY

I found Mike Males' articles "Bashing Youth" and "Wild in Deceit" to be both a sad and necessary reality we must keep in mind as future educators. The research on media that Males performed was a wake-up call for me. Anytime an association with an acronym or name that sounds legitimate comes up in an article, we (or at least I) assume it to be the truth. However, the skewed statistics (and lies) that the media portray of teens are horrifying; heightened "teenage" pregnancy rates, out-of-control drug use, and an epidemic of STDs. This was a wake-up call to me because I just assume that these published statistics usually hold a bit more truth to them than what Males discovered. Although there were a few articles researched that directed more positive or truthful attitudes about teens, the majority of what we encounter and "hear through the grapevine" are that teens are bad. They are promiscuous. They are law-breakers, drug users, and apparently sex fiends. Males concludes his article with these words: "But these occasional exceptions do suggest how media responsibility could halt today's political assault on youth and heal spreading intergenerational hostilities." Obviously this is much more easily said (written) than done. However, as teachers of adolescents, we have some power and weight in these kids' lives. Keeping an open mind, not making assumptions, and providing a safe classroom environment are the beginnings of what we can do to turn around the bashing of youth in our society, by starting in our schools.

Finally, in "Wild in Deceit," I think Males made the crucial statement that so many are feared to say: "'teen violence' is poverty violence in disguise." A very large number of minorities in this country are living in poverty, and the stresses caused by poverty, according to criminologists often can lead to violence—not only among teens, but people of all ages. Males goes on to say that if the stats are reduced over every age group, teens in poverty are no more likely to commit violent crimes than adults over forty living in poverty. This has many implications for us as educators. First, teen violence will be more noticeable than adult violence because adolescents are the age group with which we are working. However, we alone can obviously not counteract the poverty in which these kids are living. All I can think to say now is that we need some serious education, economic, and social reform...