Discussion 3

I came into this experience at Bethune middle school
thinking that the majority of the kids would be like me.  Born from hard working, poorly educated,
Spanish speaking parents from south of the border, who came to this country for
economic survival. One of the reasons I wanted to teach and be a part of LAUTR
is that I wanted to be a positive influence to these kids and show them that it
is possible to go to college and live the American dream. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

After being in class with these children I came to realize
that some of them they see me as different from themselves and their
families.  Some of children come from
other cultures that don’t always see Mexicans, particularly Mexican-Americans  as being like them.  Some of these kids’ parents speak languages
indigenous to their country and might see Spanish as the language of the “oppressor”.  Several times I have been told by kids that
they don’t believe me when I tell them I am Mexican. They reply that I am
lying, I am white.

Now I am wondering what these children were raised to
believe, either by their parents or by their life history.  I know that when I look at their faces of various
hues I want them all to know that I believe that each and every one of them can
not only be successful in algebra but in life in general.  I try to show them that by words and deeds.  I think that is the best antidote to any
mistrust that they may have towards people in authority.

My job as a teacher is to get to know them as individuals
and be open minded to learning new things, such as developing an appreciation
for “football soccer”.        

 
Children need to have direct and active involvement with the
single group that is being studied in order to have the fully intended
effect.  Single group studies could
be addressed by having students watch videos or read real-life stories that
stimulate the emotions of the students. 
This is a difficult task to incorporate into a Mathematics
curriculum.  Active involvement can
include incorporating students reading graphs and estimating future incidents
based on the trends/slope of the graphs investigated.  An example of this is investigating the increase of the
Latin-American population in Los Angeles. 
After analyzing the numbers students can create a graph that students
can use to predict the population of Latin-Americans in Los Angeles in 5 years,
10 years, and 50 years from now.  Questions
can be incorporated into this activity such as when will Latin-Americans
populate 80% of Los Angeles; if this is possible, include other factors that
contribute to their answers such as the population of other races and their
increase/decrease in numbers.
 
Confronting issues that arise in classrooms around our
community is important because students realize what goes on in other
classrooms, and how those issues could closely affect them. As I was
interviewing for a school this last week, I did research on the school and came
across an article that was not just in the newspaper but also televised.  The article was about a Latino student
that pulled out a knife on a black student, the black student then reached into
his friend’s backpack and pulled out a gun.  All the students in the classroom, including the teacher ran
out of the classroom and got security to come in and diffuse the
situation.  Luckily no one was
injured, not bullets were fired, but three students were arrested and expelled;
the student with the knife, the student that pulled out the gun, and the owner
of the backpack with the gun in it. 
These students are middle school students, and if it happened at this
school in south LA, it could potentially happen at any of the LAUSD schools we work
at.  Confronting these issues and
discussing with the students about how they feel about it, about the
consequences for the actions those students took, and how it affects everyone
else.
 

Quote 1: “Lessons are learned each time a child discovers
that one of the surest ways to deliver an insult is to accuse another of being
a lezzy, a faggot, a sissy. Children
may not always know the pejorative power of this language; they know it is
meant to belittle others.”  “Growing Up
Gay” by Katherine Whitlock
 
I recently had a conversation with a woman at the local dog
park about her two Coton de Tulears. She said one of them had a good sense of
humor. I asked her to elaborate. She said if the dog did something, and she
laughed, he would do it again. Kids are the same way. They don’t always
understand what they are doing, but if they get a reaction they’ll do it again.
I actually got a detention for doing this very thing in the fourth grade. We
were in the computer lab playing with a program that spoke the sentences we
typed. I wrote, “Robbie is horny.” I had no idea what horny meant, but I knew
my classmates were finding it funny. Even though I served the detention for
this I don’t think I learned the meaning of the word for a few years. All I
know was the teacher who got me in trouble said something about sexuality. I
was dumbfounded.
 
A few years later my classmates started calling me “Lizbian”.
I actually thought it was funny. They would say “Liz”, wait a few seconds, then
say, “bian”. I would turn around after I heard my name. Then the kids would
laugh and say, “Ha ha, she responds to lesbian!” We all laughed. It’s worth
mentioning it was Robbie who led this. It’s also a little ironic this happened
in our religion class. Gay slurs were tolerated at my Catholic school because
being gay was a sin. One of my favorite math teachers would bang the desk with
a meter stick and scream, “Homosexuality is a sin! If a person acts on his or
her homosexuality he or she is going to hell!” When teachers say things like
that it’s hard to see the serious negative effects of calling a classmate
“gay”.
 
I think it’s very important to teach acceptance of gays, but
I do get nervous. I worry I might be confronting a cultural clash. If I were to
say the things I tell my students to a young me,  I would need a lot of young me’s trust. If my
students were exposed to the ideas I was exposed to, major resistance would be
expected. This is why I think it’s important not to say the things my beloved
math teacher said, and to start teaching about acceptance at a very young age.
 
Quote 2: “The emotion generated by textbook descriptions of
slavery is sadness, not anger. For there’s no one to be angry at. Somehow we
end up with four million slaves in America but no owners! This is part of a
pattern in our textbooks: anything bad in American history happened
anonymously.” “Lies My Textbook Told Me: Racism and Anti-Racism in U.S.
History” by James Loewen
 
This quote also takes me back to my Catholic school days. We
spent a lot of time in the seventh and eighth grade talking about slavery. We
read the book, “To Be a Slave,” which was a collection of letters from slaves
and slave owners. We studied Martin Luther King Jr. I actually memorized and recited
an excerpt from his Letter from Birmingham Jail in front of the whole school.
All of this aligns with the teaching styles discussed in “Heros and Holidays”.  I think it’s fair to say most of my classmates graduated very
sensitive to racism, but I am not sure they were asked to question whether
their own views were racist. On the other hand, I’m not sure you can expect
that sort of thing from eighth graders—at that age I still didn’t know the what
the word “horny” meant.  

It is important to take in to account student backgrounds and the community when lesson planning. Integrating respect in the classroom is important and at the school that i am a student teacher in, that is emphasized often. Students are assessed on collaboration, professionalism and content knowledge. Everyone works in groups and is expected to collaborate and show respect to each other. Having lessons that model respect and having the teacher constantly model respect is the best way to have students work together effectively. Being open minded and learning and respecting everyone no matter what culture or community they come from is key to a successful classroom. When respect is modeled in the class, students could learn and show respect to other students and apply that in their other classrooms as well. Having lessons in an environment where students collaborate and treat each other fairly is often helpful in student comprehension and provides them with skills they will use in college and their career.