Blog Post #10 - Education is Politics (Quotes)

          Several quotes stuck out to me as I read "Education is Politics: An Agenda for Empowerment" by Ira Shor. The first was "The teacher brings lesson plans, learning methods, personal experience, and academic knowledge to class but negotiates the curriculum with the students and begins with their language, themes and understandings." I believe this to be true because similar to "Literacy With An Attitude", education takes both the teacher and students to work together in order to learn. I though this quote summarized that idea pretty well. The teacher brings knowledge to the classroom but first starts on the same level as the students.

          "Only by active learning could students develop scientific methods and democratic habits rather than becoming passive pupils waiting to be told what things means and what to do." This quote summarized the article pretty well. This article has a political ideals in it, and this quote summarizes those ideas. In order for the student to grow into a successful citizen, they must first take charge in the classroom and become active there first. These will build life goals that will help them later in life.

          "To [Bowles and Gintis], schooling supports existing power and divisions in society by sorting students into a small elite destined for the top and a large mass destined for the middle and bottom - an educational policy also studied carefully by Spring (1989) and by Oakes (1985)." This too reminded me of "Literacy With An Attitude." One of the main ideas from that reading was the study that was taken to see how schools of different economic backgrounds treated their students differently. This statement coincides with their findings. The rich schools allow students to think for themselves and give them a great schooling experience while the poorer schools care less for their students and only accept the correct answer. This quote reinforces that ideal, that students' futures largely depend on where they go to school.

This article shows several strategies a teacher can use to become a more successful teacher.

Blog Post #9 - Literacy With An Attitude (Reflection)

          I found "Literacy With An Attitude" by Patrick Finn very interesting primarily because of the study found within it. This study looked at several different schools and studied student's lesson plan as well as the teacher's and student's reactions to the curriculum day-to-day. The schools that were studied had differing economic incomes, based on the parents of the children attending the school. What I found interesting that was found from the study was that schooling changed dramatically based on how much income a student's family sees.

          In the Professional-Affluent school for example, teachers come from everywhere in the state, students are encouraged to be creative in their responses, and discovery and experience is more important than "getting the right answer." This school's parents earned the top 10% of income based on the study. This is shocking when compared to the middle class student experience. Teachers yell more often, they are more encouraged to get the "right" answer, and most teachers live somewhere in the area. When one takes a step back and looks at how differently we teach children, I believe more can be explained as to how people fall into certain categories and find it difficult to remove themselves from these categories, negative or otherwise.

This article explains how where you live can determine your educational experience.

Blog Post #10 - Citizenship in School (Reflection)

          In "Citizenship in School: Reconceptualizing Down Syndrome", author Christopher Kliewer gives insight into several different student's lives that are afflicted with down syndrome. One class that was focused on was Shayne Robbins' classroom. Shayne struck me as an excellent teacher. Robbin's school sounds like it truly cares about educating its students. It is a parent-run school that helps children in small classrooms. One of Shayne's students, Isaac, is afflicted with down syndrome. This label did not stop Shayne however, she still taught the class and treated everyone as equals. I enjoyed that the class as a whole acted out Isaac's favorite book, "Where the Wild Things Are." This is a very special book to Isaac and it must have made him very happy to not only read it in class, but later act it out as well by starring as the main character, Max. Shayne's ability to treat all of her students as equals was remarkable. This clearly had a large impact on Isaac's ability to learn and participate in class.

          The main idea that I took away from this article was as a teacher, you should treat all of your students equally, regardless of any background they may have or how high they scored on a standardized test. You should treat them like you would treat anybody else, because they are their own person, not just a test score. I aspire to be more like Shayne in my classroom one day.

This article was an interesting read on teaching children with down syndrome and their teacher's ability to help them.

Blog Post #9.5 Oakes (Quotes)

In "Tracking: Why Schools Need to Take Another Route" by Jeannie Oakes, several quotes stuck out to me. The first had to do with ineffective teaching and learning strategies. "Learning tasks consisted most often of memorizing and repeating answers back to the teacher." This stuck out to me because I have always felt that the majority of high school for me was exactly this: blindly repeating definitions we have memorized the night before in order to pass a quiz or test. I remember a teacher saying once that this strategy was ineffective because if you were to ask that student a few weeks later those same words they could not do it.

"Unless teachers and administrators believe and expect all students to learn well, they will be in likely to create school and classroom conditions where students believe in their own ability and exert the effort it takes to succeed." Many people forget that school is not only the effort of the student as well as the effort of the teacher. Most people assume that if a student is failing a class that it is the student's fault, while it could just as likely be the teacher's inability to reach or teach the student. Teachers need to come in with a positive mindset as well as the students in order for everyone to achieve.

"... there is considerable evidence that even the very best students make stronger intellectual gains while working with students of varying skill levels than when they work alone." While the majority of the article spoke of group projects and students working together, this quote wrapped up the entire notion pretty well. If the mind of a student is engaged on several levels: interacting with one another, problem solving, and abstract thinking just as a few examples, their mind grows much more in these group projects than learning by themselves.

This article from Starting Point shows some pointers on assigning group work and different roles students can use to complete a certain project.

Jeannie Oakes:

Blog Post #8 - Becoming Something Different (Quotes)

          "Becoming Something Different" by Fairbanks, Crooks, and Ariail was a very insightful piece. Researchers follow Esmé from the sixth grade until the eleventh grade and note how she reacts to different components of school. "Corson (1991) has argued that ELLs have been systematically marginalized in school because of language domination, a process by which the dominant culture not only fails to recognize the value of linguistic diversity but also circumscribes the use of students’ first languages." I picked this quote because it shows how difficult school can be for students that speak a different language. They not only have to learn English, they have to be taught in a second language, read books in a second language, and write in a second language. Many teachers are unaware of this difficulty meaning that many children are discouraged from learning and school in general. This is a terrible fact and I enjoy that this reading brings this point forward.

          "At the end of seventh grade, she thought she had become a little bit stronger student. I think it’s because I’m getting a little bit more help ’cause they changed my schedule, right? And so they gave me a reading class, a lower, a reading class [at] my level." This was good to see, the school was working with Esmé in order for her to understand her work. I was glad that the school understood that she was having difficulty and placed her in a remedial class in order for her to gain the skills she needed to continue with school. I'm sure this helped her self-esteem as well.

           "Esmé’s struggle with writing and grammar usage was a reminder of her status as an English language learner and her ongoing acquisition of academic English." This quote stuck out to me personally because I wish to become a high school English teacher one day. I want to treat all my students as equals and will hopefully realize when a certain student is having trouble with certain skills. I don't want any student leaving my class discouraged because English is not their first language.

This video shows an interesting immersion program in which students learn both English and Spanish as one at a young age.

Blog Post # 7 - Between Barack and a Hard Place (Reflection)

          In his video "Between Barack and a Hard Place", Tim Wise talks about topics of white privilege and how schools give advantages to white people and not to African Americans. Several good points were made and made me realize that some statements such as "I don't need to talk about racism, I have many black friends." I used to think this was a completely valid statement, if you have African American friends then you couldn't be racist. But as Wise explains, most people would either lie about this statement or simply state that they had friends but they were really more acquaintances. This with his statistics of white and black people in America made me realize this statement was false.

           Wise also touched on how different professions will practice these racist thoughts and stereotypes. Doctors and brokers will not give the same treatment to black people they give to white people. This was similar to several readings we have read thus far, especially "White Privilege" by Peggy McIntosh. Different racial groups will receive different treatment than white people, for example black people will be more likely to be suspected of shoplifting than white people.

          One of my favorite parts of the speech was that Tim Wise admitted to having racist thoughts. Wise, someone who fights everyday for racial equality in America, still has racist thoughts because he is conditioned to this because of several different factors in society. I was glad that he openly admitted this, and when he talked of the other college in which he did this, several students started sharing different stories of racist experiences. I believe that the first step in order to stopping racism is first admitting that it is prevalent in everyday society. If this first step is accomplished, I believe that these ideas will slowly fade from existence.


This song by Nas talks about the struggles of being brought up in a black community and the struggles such as drugs, gangs, gun violence and several other topics. Warning, contains strong language.

Social Justice Event - Shirley Wilcher

           On March 18th, I attended a Social Justice Event which was hosted by Shirley Wilcher, Executive Director of the American Association for Access. She spoke of affirmative action and the "Age of Inclusion," a time we are living in as people of different ethnicity are attempting to obtain jobs held particularly by people that are white and mostly males. This reminded me of the first reading we had in class, "Privilege, Power and Difference" by Allan Johnson. I was reminded of the term "white privilege" and I felt it was very applicable here. Jobs that have been held by white males for years are now opening up to people of different color which is a great start. Wilcher touched on this subject, saying that  if a white person and a person of color both applied for the same job, chances are it would go to the white person simply based on appearance and not on background skills or talents. People on the street talk of white privilege in this video.

          Wilcher also commented on this Age of Inclusion not only includes people of color, but people with disabilities and the LGBT community as well. This reminds me of "Speaking the Unspeakable in Forbidden Places" by Allan et. all. This reading challenges the fact that many schools don't teach about gayness at a young age, causing unfair stigmas against gays at an older age. I feel this directly relates to Wilcher and The Age of Inclusion. Many of these people not hiring gays were not taught at a young age that they are equal to everyone else. I feel like if this topic was taught at a young age many gays would be more openly accepted into society and more likely to achieve positions of power within the jobs they wish to receive. This short film explores the idea if the world was primarily gay and that straight would be the minority.

           Another group that Wilcher spoke of that are now being accepted into jobs are women. Women have gone years without holding positions of power, and not until only recently have they received these jobs. They still hold positions that make less than men, but it is a good start nonetheless. This reminded me of a quote from "White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack" by Peggy McIntosh. "13. I can speak in public to a powerful male group without putting my race on trial" (2). While this is more applicable to a non-white person, I felt that speaking to a group of powerful males was applicable to women in general. This is an advantage of white privilege and I found it related to what Wilcher was speaking of. I'm sure that many women are very nervous when it comes to these interviews. Wilcher also commented that one woman in particular applying for a powerful position was told that the job was "dirty" and "she wouldn't like it." Wilcher said in response to this that it was unfair for the male interviewer to say this to the female interviewee, claiming that it would be disheartening to hear this and that she was discouraged to pursue the job. This video explores the topic of gender equality.