Asking for a Miracle: Implementation of Effective Literacy Instruction

This will be my last blog entry. Overall, the theme of my blog was a questioning of the ways in which effective literacy instruction can genuinely be implemented in the American classroom. While the theories of education specialists like Victoria Purcell-Gates, Gloria Ladson-Billings, and Lisa Delpit are arresting and thought provoking in their own right, how can their ideas on education properly take hold in a system that is as battered and broken as that of the United States?

Ultimately, a complete and utter overhaul of the American educational system needs to take place, one in which each individual who chooses to enter the teaching profession receives a standard level of superior training. This training should provide all prospective instructors an arsenal of knowledge specifically designed to help them navigate what is a very tough, albeit very underappreciated, profession.

I think one has to read the variety of educational theory currently in circulation with a discerning eye; many ideas have been put forth on what should be done in education and who should be doing it, but there is often little talk about how to effectively put theory into practice. What can then end up happening is that any one school or district can have different teachers employing a variety of different teaching approaches from one classroom to the next. Some of these methods may be good and others no so good. The end result is that widespread benefit of successful teaching methodology is not seen, since not every child in the country is made privy to it.    

In light of this, I did feel that (in their own unique way) Moses, Freire, and Hirsch all offered solid, concrete steps that must be taken in education in order to generate concrete, positive change. Though Hirsch raised the ire of many in his day by suggesting that American students be taught a standard, national curriculum, one that could be construed as exclusionary and only Western European in content, he did make a valid point in observing that the shared, cultural knowledge of U.S. inhabitants is slipping drastically. He wrote this in 1988. However, during the week of this past 4^th of July (2011) holiday, the Marist Poll revealed that only 58% of Americans could name the date that America declared its independence, and younger Americans were cited as being least likely to know the correct answer” [italics mine] (Marist Poll online, 2011). Furthermore, the poll also showed that 1 in 4 Americans were unable to name the country from which the U.S. declared independence.

When I heard this news on the eve of the 4^th of July, I wondered exactly how many Americans around the country had no clue as to what they were actually supposed to be celebrating. I then couldn’t help but think of the sentiments of Hirsch, that there are certain baseline facts that every American needs to know. In my international experiences, I have found that citizens of many other countries can speak with great confidence and knowledge about their country’s history, government, and overall cultural heritage. Why should standards here be any less? Though the problem with Hirsch’s theory primarily lies in the type of content he proposes for American cultural literacy, the content can be greatly changed and expanded upon. Nevertheless, the point Hirsch makes about the rampant lack of cultural knowledge extant in the American public is a valid one.

I would like to have had an exploration of teacher training programs and practices be a part of our course curriculum. After all, teachers who are not well trained (and this is a serious problem I think is overlooked far too much in discussions about education reform) cannot teach any methodology well. What would it take to ensure that each teacher who enters education has an excellent command of the rules of grammar and Standard English, did not go into teaching because s/he “couldn’t think of anything better to do” or just “wanted the summers off”? From politics, to money, to teaching training, a vast number of factors must come together to ensure that all children in every classroom are consistently on the receiving end of teaching that is interesting, informed, inspired and inspiring.

Through the Lenses of Many: Appreciating Multiple Literacy Practices

Part I

Critical literacy (CL) is a response to injustice and the production of illiteracy in which students and teachers work together to give meaning to what students are learning. This is achieved through providing students with the choice to either accept or decline any academic information given them based on how significant they find a subject to be. Further, critical literacy challenges students to think for themselves and not blindly accept and regurgitate all academic information that is thrown at them.

Of all the writers we’ve covered this term, renowned critical literacy theorist Paulo Freire best breaks down the characteristics of (CL) in his seminal work Pedagogy of the Oppressed. In it, he writes that critical theory works to end the cycle of the “banking approach” to education, one in which students are considered nothing more than blank and empty receptacles who contribute nothing to the classroom and need only to be filled with the expert knowledge of the instructor. In this pedagogical model, “knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider to know nothing. Projecting an absolute ignorance onto others, a characteristic of the ideology of oppression, negates education and knowledge as processes of inquiry” (Freire, 1997, pg. 53).   

PART II

Throughout the duration of this class, many of the readings spoke to me, some far more positively than others. Since one of the foci of our learning has centered on the idea that literacy involves far more than just mastery of reading and writing, I wanted to take the opportunity in this next to last blog to present in a format that is not heavily writing based. In the words of James Gee, “literacy is more than reading and writing…Once we see this multiplicity of literacy (that we read and write different sorts of texts in different ways), we realize that when we think about reading and writing, we have to think beyond print” (Gee, 2003, pg. 28). As so, this week, I present a media centered blog, one that explores languages, their value, the way in which they are learned, and honoring the diversity of learners.

In the book No Kinda Sense, Michael Stubbs begins the early part of his chapter by stating “It is difficult to overestimate the importance of people’s attitudes and beliefs about language.” He further drives home his point by stating that linguists, as part of their professions, “accept that no language or dialect is inherently superior or inferior to any other, and that all languages and dialects are suited to the needs of the community they serve” (Stubbs, 2002, Kindle Edition). After reading these words, and particularly after viewing the A.M. Baggs video in the first week of class, I began seriously thinking about the true meaning of language and some of the forms of it we see everyday. Generally speaking, on a daily basis, each of us sees various forms of language in any number of different arenas, including film, print, and television. How much is the depth and diversity of language truly appreciated on a societal level? Aside from the beauty of different “official” languages that are spoken around the world, such as French, Italian, Spanish, German, Chinese, Japanese and Russian (to name just a few), prior to taking this course, I had given little thought to the sheer variety of language that I am exposed to each and everyday. How much are various forms of communication truly valued among educators, rather than dismissed? I now present examples of individuals who are literally learning language right before our very eyes. You will most likely be quite familiar with the language learner in the first clip!

 http://youtu.be/T_NQp4VghX4

This second clip is not famous, with the exception of a viral following on the internet. That being said, pay close attention to the way in which genuine communication is taking place between these two boys. In the case of both clips, language ability is writ large, as it is in the cases of most students who enter the American school system and an American classroom setting. The question, then, is how can language ability in schools be honored, honed, and built upon, rather than crushed, misused, and dismissed? In her chapter “Learning From Diverse Learners,” Catherine Luna presents the U.S. as a culture “in the grips of deficit thinking,” a circumstance that limits the diversity of learning abilities and backgrounds that can be found in any number of student bodies” (Luna, 2002, pg. 597).  

http://youtu.be/T_NQp4VghX4

Meanwhile, we also explored ways in which being taught in an unwelcoming, non-progressive, and culturally limited academic environment can have an adverse effect on a student’s learning. In chapter 3 of No Kinda Sense, Lisa Delpit concludes that if schools are going to be successful at teaching children, their curriculums must in some way reflect the children, their lives, and the worlds that interest them. Though Delpit was referring to the academic needs of many African American students for the purposes of her article, in truth, her sentiment is applicable to all students of all races. If publicly schooled children are generally taught through “workbooks and textbooks that make no reference to their lived experiences” and they see little connection to their “cultural lives and personal interests,” why should learning be considered compelling (Delpit, 2002, Kindle Edition)?

In one installment of Calvin & Hobbes, one of my most treasured and adored cartoon strips, Calvin, the main character, shows his prowess in figuring out exactly what is expected of him when writing in an academic setting. Under normal circumstances, Calvin, who is extremely bright, fails to do well in school because he finds it extremely uninteresting. Though he generates any number of innovative ideas and activities in the hours he spends outside of the classroom, in the classroom he is another person entirely. As Delpit would say, Calvin finds no reference to his personal interests or cultural life when he sets foot in a classroom.  Calvin’s schoolteacher is a prime example of a transmissionist, banking approach educator who has little interest in the true identities and interests of her pupils.

However, in the strip below, Calvin has astutely (and hilariously) cracked the code of what type of writing goes far in a scholarly arena.

 

Figure 1. Calvin & Hobbes by Bill Watterson, 1993

Finally, in April of this year, The New York Times reported on a worse case scenario incident in which the cultural background, communication methods, and literacy practices of a professor were not appreciated or recognized, and this came at an extraordinarily high and tragic price. Since April, the story of Antonio Calvo has garnered widespread and national attention.

For the duration of this summer term we have been studying the repercussions of teachers not teaching to the needs of students, teachers not understanding or appreciating the cultural identity, language, and mores of students, and teachers all but dismissing the talents and knowledge that children bring to the classroom. What happens when these very trespasses are done to a teacher of another culture? The story of Princeton professor provides a significant amount of food for thought. A link to the story can be found here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/22/nyregion/after-suicide-firing-of-princeton-lecturer-is-questioned.html

I'm Not Buying It! No Sale, Not Ever!

“So you’d like me to go from being an outstanding teacher to a mediocre one?”

(Gatto, 2007, pg. 73). 

When teacher Lynn Gatto begins her chapter on success guaranteed literacy programs with the above line, it is almost as if she performs several feats in uttering one sentence. Not only did Gatto describe herself challenging the views of a specially hired, “transmissionist trained” Reading First specialist, she also threw down an educational gauntlet of sorts, demanding that students always be taught literacy in a stimulating and effective way. By refusing to adopt the educational methods of the Reading First literacy approach, a program she describes as something “each teacher [in her district] is mandated to use,” Gatto made it clear that she would continue to teach in the manner in which she thought best, no matter who it upset (2007, pg. 74).  

That Gatto was able to take this stand with impunity is refreshing, as is her discussion on the way in which she teaches her own students. After sharing that her personal teaching theory is “grounded in the work of Vygotsky” as well as Nystrand’s “substantive engagement,” (2007, pg. 75) Gatto describes a classroom rife with “dialogic discussion” and inquiry-based/immersion learning.

It was wonderful to read about the enthusiasm and passion that Gatto brings to her classroom, along with a teaching approach that does not intellectually “oppress” children. If Paulo Freire were alive today and were able to look in on Gatto’s classroom, he might proclaim her teaching to be libertarian in application, one that gives students a voice, recognizes their strengths, and promotes a constant sense of conscientizacao. In Gatto’s words, important aspects that underline her teaching include planning carefully, selecting appropriate materials and activities across the curriculum, and always considering students’ needs.  Above all else---at least for the purposes of the chapter we read---the school mandated Reading First curriculum is essentially verboten in Gatto’s classroom.

That being said, within the first few paragraphs of Gatto’s piece, I realized that she was coming from a rather privileged position, one in which she could professionally afford not to implement the literacy program her school district had mandated. Gatto could also afford to publicly make her displeasure with Reading First known, both within the school and in national, scholarly publications. As a veteran of the teaching profession with tenure, a thirty-year plus track record, numerous teaching awards and a professionally produced documentary in circulation, Gatto can let her voice be heard with little risk of personal repercussions, such as losing her job. However, newer teachers entering the teaching profession, particularly in the educational and economic climate of today, do not have such luxury, nor can they afford to blatantly go against school mandate in the same manner Gatto did.

To a large degree, Gatto is a rogue teacher, and, in reading between the lines of her text, there is the sense that she is not sharing all that happened to her in the aftermath of her refusal to teach the Reading First curriculum:

So far, my “Don’t” attitude and “I do not use it” conduct have not been challenged by my school administration…I must admit, in the last sixteen years I have transferred out of four schools because of the frequent changes in administration, which left me to work with principals who lacked peda-gogical vision and leadership skills. Since my district comprises thirty-nine elementary schools, I have had little difficulty transferring to the schools of my choice (2007, pg. 77).

 Though it is good that Gatto has been able to change from school to school as she sees fit, what type of message does this send to perspective, new, and young teachers?  And what about all the children Gatto regularly leaves behind? With her gone from their lives, they ineluctably go back to being taught using mediocre teaching methods. Somehow, choosing to go rogue and then changing schools whenever administrators begin to turn against you somehow doesn’t seem to be the most efficient approach to changing the educational system. Suppose one is in a position where s/he doesn’t have such a choice? Administrators and fellow colleagues alike can make life quite terrible for talented but less established teachers who refuse to follow rules and protocol.  

For the duration of the article, I was excitedly waiting to hear about the moment when Gatto and her fellow teachers banded together, unanimously agreed to teach their students in a more progressive and inquiry-based manner, and subsequently turned around the test scores and literacy skills of students. In other words, I was waiting to see how Gatto lead her colleagues to Beat the System, but from within. But the moment never came. With a teacher as gifted as Gatto, I never felt that she was particularly interested in sharing her teaching methods with colleagues and working with them to truly make a difference in education as a united group.

For the duration of the article, I got the strong sense that Gatto views herself as a one woman show and a star teacher, but she never takes on a leadership role to “rally the troops” and get everyone, rather than just her, teaching in the best way possible. As educators, it does little good to only be off on our own doing good things for students. In this educational climate, now more than ever, teachers need to collectively support and help one another.

On a personal note, for the duration of my own teaching experience, I have had the luxury of teaching in a setting where I was able to employ an inquiry-based, progressive instructional approach without the use of state mandated textbooks or programs. The inspired and inquiry-based teaching approach I have always employed is somewhat similar to the one that Gatto created.  The curriculum at my school was entirely teacher generated and its quality heavily depended on the skills and talents of teachers. Suffice it to say, effective teachers at the school did an incredible amount of work on a daily basis, constantly coming up with new curricular ideas and devising innovative implementation methods. The teacher autonomy was wonderful, but there is a catch---the school I speak of is private, and I know that the rules of instruction that work well there would not work at all well in most public schools.  

Because Gatto commences her teaching units by immersing students in a theme, begins instruction with the children’s questions (rather than her own or those given in a textbook), has students engage in hands-on, project based learning and extensive, reflection driven writing, she appears to not run a “banking based” classroom. In Freirian theory, the banking approach to education is one in which the road to learning is paved with rote memorization and children are viewed as empty depositories which teachers must fill with knowledge. In Freire’s words:

In the banking concept of education, knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider to know nothing. Projecting an absolute ignorance onto others, a characteristic of the ideology of oppression, negates education and knowledge as processes of inquiry. The teacher presents himself to his students as their necessary opposite; by considering their ignorance absolute, he justifies his own existence. The students, alienated like the slave of the Hegelian dialectic, accept their ignorance as justifying the teacher’s existence---but, unlike the slave, they never discover that they educate the teacher (Freire, 1997, pg. 53).

In all my various academic experiences, both in the United States and abroad, I’ve discovered that having a true Freirian educational experience, one that essentially approaches education from a libertarian perspective and thus promotes authentic thinking and consciousness in students, along with genuine and meaningful time to work and reflect, is an exquisite find indeed. On the rare occasions this has actually happened to me, I’ve felt like I’ve unexpectedly stumbled over the Hope Diamond.

And now for a Freirian homage, put together by Suzanne McDougall, formerly of Antioch (please excuse the small spelling error in one of the frames of the video):

http://youtu.be/KEaH64uhaN0

Literacy in the 21st Century: Arithmetic, Writing, and Civil Rights

Developed in response to the established and accepted status quo in American society, critical literacy theory proposes that students employ comprehensive reading, writing, thinking, listening, speaking and evaluating skills in an effort to effectively communicate and succeed in everyday, real-life situations. In other words, there is no one path to literacy, and, in order to be a full, functionally literate, and contributing member of society, a number of communication forms must be fluently mastered by individual students.

In his landmark work Radical Equations: Civil Rights from Mississippi to the Algebra Project, former Civil Rights activist Robert Moses presents literacy as a Civil Rights issue. After discussing the deeply visceral experiences he had fighting for Black Voting Rights in the racially stratified south of the 1960s, Moses likens that fight to the current struggle for Black Educational Rights in 21^st century America. In discussing the American political climate of the 60s, Moses writes, “In those days, of course, the issue was the right to vote, and the question was political access” (Moses, 2001, pg. 4). Currently, the fight for equal opportunity in education is very much a Civil Rights issue, and, in many ways, is directly linked to the American Civil Rights movement. Once African Americans were legally recognized as legitimate and ‘equal’ American citizens and the right to vote won, levels of racial hatred and discrimination that were already rampant in this country were by no means lessened. Though it was no longer legal to officially discriminate against a person based on skin color, racial segregation could still be achieved through factors such as the ‘White Flight’ phenomenon, implementation of restricted covenants in affluent neighborhoods, and particularly high tax brackets instilled in top-level school districts.

In what can be construed as an echo of the sentiments of E.D. Hirsch, Moses states “the most urgent social issue affecting poor people and people of color is economic access” (2001, pg. 5). He goes on to say that “the absence of math literacy in urban and rural communities throughout this country is an issue as urgent as the lack of registered Black voters in Mississippi was in 1961” (2001, pg. 5). His solution? The Algebra Project, a national, non-profit organization Moses founded with the specific goal of providing quality education to public school children with a specific focus on mathematical mastery.

Founded in 1982, the Algebra Project makes perfect sense in that it attempts to achieve equality and promote personal success through education and the public school system. Moreover, in his effort to instill educational change, Moses carefully constructed a specific and content driven mathematical curriculum rather than just stopping at a proposal of only “what should be done” to promote positive change. In the almost twenty years since The Project was founded, it has been adopted in over 200 schools and, at least in Chicago, has been aligned to correlate with common core state standards (The Algebra Project, 2011). In this sense, Moses has navigated one of the most difficult aspects of educational reform----adapting a different, more effective curriculum to already instilled district standards. Therein lies the promise of the program. A pitfall comes in not having the program adopted in each and every school district that needs it. In order for an educational initiative to truly work, all those in need must have access to it.

Figure 1. “Inch By Inch” (Smithsonian Institution, 2011)

In “Writing Commonsense Matters,” Linda Rief discusses writing as a pathway to critical literacy, and she argues that “good writing is not defined by one set of criteria but differs depending on the kind of writing” (Rief, 2007, pg. 193). She also calls on educators to provide students with “choice, time, and models of good writing” (2007, pg. 2). Her solution is that students be directly engaged in The Process of Writing in an effort to learn and appreciate the different roles that writing plays in everyday life. Like Moses, Rief has her eye on the prize of having students become more well rounded and comprehensive in their academic abilities, a skill which will ultimately serve them well in society as a whole.   

In “Making It Matter Through the Power of Inquiry” and “Effective Teachers, Effective Instruction,” Wilhelm, Smith, and Allington collectively call for teachers to be trained and allowed to work in a manner that actually fosters, rather than crushes, student intellect and literacy ability. Wilhelm and Smith talk about the necessity of intellectual “flow” in a class and primarily focus on the education of boys in the classroom, while Allington talks about the dynamic of an effective teacher’s classroom. All three authors present an argument that primarily showcases ways in which teachers can ideally be trained to be consummate and accomplished educators. In a nod to Deborah Dean’s genre theory (the theory that children must be taught according to the values of many different types of writing), Wilhelm, Smith, and Allington ask that teachers “expand notions of text and curriculum and what counts as meaningful reading and learning” (Wilhelm and Smith, 2007, pg. 236). If all American public school teachers can adhere to this teaching approach and foster the varied writing and literacy skills of children, the academic skills of countless students across the nation would skyrocket. However, the pitfalls of such a literacy proposal lies in having each and every public school teacher properly trained according to a more Genre Theory related academic approach.

While all the readings of this week talked about teaching methods that would ultimately improve the academic and intellectual skills of U.S. citizens, the pitfalls lie in the ways such teaching approaches could be nationally implemented.

  

ROMANCING THE TWEEN

When I first looked at the title of Jane Stanley’s article, “Practicing for Romance: Adolescent Girls Read the Romance Novel,” I initially thought her focus would be on the traditional Georgette Heyer, Johanna Lindsey, LaVryle Spencer “bodice-ripping” type of book.

On a personal note, during exam study weeks in high school and middle school, my girlfriends and I would skim through the pages of classic, historical romances in search of any passage that contained the words, “Oh, God.” We would then read the over-the-top and deeply unrealistic sex scenes---which were invariably replete with a longhaired, broad chested and incredibly muscular hero—laugh like hyenas, and then go back to studying. It was a great stress reliever and provided something of a change to the books we normally read with great voracity, including historical and contemporary memoirs, the Gothic novel, Victorian and Edwardian literature, bio and autobiography, drama, mysteries, and thrillers.

Upon closer inspection of Stanley’s chapter, however, I saw that she referred to books such as Conklin’s P.S. I Love You and Francine Pascal’s Sweet Valley High Series, works that could easily be crossed categorized as tween fiction or tween “chick-lit,” but not necessarily romance in the truest sense of the genre. In her chapter, Stanley laments the fact that many adolescent girls---a number of whom are already reluctant readers---have such an affinity for teen romance novels. In her words, “these novels teach girls to put boys’ interests above their own, and that, by and large, they show only the lives of white suburban middle-class families. In fact, in all this middle-class abundance the only thing impoverished is the range of options available to the female protagonists in these stories” (Stanley, 2008, pgs. 169-70).

The main issue Stanley has with teen romance fiction is that it is potentially damaging to girls’ sense of self and self worth in the absence of a man, appeals to the “lowest common denominator of reader,” and “instructs girls that the quest for romance is in and of itself a career” (2008, pgs. 170-71). 

Though Stanley’s chapter was certainly engaging, there were a number of factors absent from her argument. Though she does discuss the findings of two separate studies and states that the reading of romance fiction for one group of girls is “an important component in the…construction of gendered identity” (2008, pg. 172), she does not mention the plethora of other contemporary cultural factors that influence identity well before girls are choosing their own reading material. Such factors include film, television, pop music, and music videos, all of which illustrate and promote overt gender roles. Furthermore, though Stanley does refer to this in passing, parents play an extremely important role in the type of reader their children grow up to become. Any child who is read to and read to regularly and exposed to a variety of literary genres will very likely become an avid and wide-ranging reader. Stanley mentions the fact that a significant number of girls who were studied by Christian-Smith were particularly devoted to romance literature because “their mothers were avid romance readers” (2008, pg. 174). With this in mind, whenever one looks at literacy patterns in students, the role of parents (in addition to schools) must be acknowledged and, perhaps, more included in academic argument.      

Stanley did not really explore the cognitive, and behavioral development levels of her study subject, that is the female adolescent. As a teacher of middle school age children, I have had a tremendous amount of experience with this age group and know that, at 11 and 12 years of age, girls are just beginning to become interested in the opposite sex after years of finding them “gross.” The same can be said of adolescent boys regarding girls. At this age, girls are naturally becoming interested in romance fiction, but in my experience, they are highly, highly open and interested in other literary genres----particularly if they have access to teachers who are voracious readers, knowledgeable about young adult literature, and know how to “sell” a book to kids, be it fiction or non-fiction.

I felt that Stanley inadvertently did not give adolescent girls their due credit. Just because a child reads something does not mean that s/he takes it at face value and lacks an ability to be discerning about the believability of a text. Children know when to “take the best and leave the rest” when a situation calls for it, and reading romance novels is no exception.

In both of the studies that Stanley mentions, teachers are described as “giving in” to student desires to read romance, despite the fact that this subverted their delivery of “pedagogized literacy” (2008, pg. 170) In reading this, I couldn’t help but think of Gloria Ladson-Billings in The Skin We Speak, and her anger over the fact that so many teachers unknowingly give kids “permission to fail” by not acting more pro-actively in challenging teaching situations (Ladson-Billings, 2008, Kindle Edition).  

 

How is it that none of the teachers mentioned in Stanley’s article saw reluctant readers’ interest in romance novels as a wonderful thing and a rare opportunity for a tremendous teachable moment?

In her chapter ‘No Kinda Sense,’ Lisa Delpit talks about the great deal of time she spent in a middle school that is 98% black. After observing students and noticing how interested they were in hair care, Delpit saw a need for an effective, cross-curricular unit on African American hair. She saw an opening for a teachable moment and then designed a full-unit based on student interest. In her words, “the object is not to lower standards or just teach what is interesting to the students, but to find the students’ interests and build an academic program around them” (Delpit, 2008, Kindle Edition).

In the case of the studies Stanley presents, all teachers involved could have viewed student interest in romance as an opportunity to teach an entire unit on the romance novel, one designed to appeal to both boys and girls. The unit could begin with a history of the romance novel, discuss the importance of setting using film excerpts and photographs, cover different examples of romance novels through the ages, including books by Jane Austen and the Brontes, have students write and act out their own romance scripts and perhaps do a class parody of the genre, and end with a reading of a modern, paranormal romance, such as the Twilight series. Throughout this unit, teachers could guide students in analyzing and critiquing the romance genre, talk about the stereotypes that exist, and explore ways in which characters could be improved upon. The teaching possibilities really are endless. 

In contrast and in closing, in his article ‘From Video Games, Learning About Learning,’ James Gee discusses his foray into a world he had previously known nothing about, that of the video game. Gee was officially introduced to the video game after witnessing his four-year-old son playing on numerous occasions. Though, like teen romance fiction, the video game has also been criticized for its negative factors, including gratuitous violence and lack of intellectual value, Gee presents the video game in a positive light and presents his readers with its educational merits. In his words, he had a “revelation,” and concluded that video games “require the player to learn and think in ways in which [he] is not adept” (Gee, 2003). Gee goes on to say that he found the experience of playing his son’s game “life-enhancing” and an eye (and mind) opening experience.

Can the same not be said for the teen romance novel in the classroom? If taught and presented correctly, the reading of the romance novel can also be a mind and eye-opening experience, one that exposes students to the history and make-up behind one of the biggest literary genres on the market today. The opportunity is there. The moment just has to be seized. 

Is What's Fair to Some Fair to All?

In each of the readings this week, we explored the ineffectiveness of the  “sameness as fairness” educational approach and read about specific instances in which it simply did not work. Examples include holding all students to the same academic standards, presenting them with a “one-size-fits-all” curricular approach, and having the same learning expectations for all children, regardless of their culture, skills, and language abilities.

·      Gutierrez illustrated her point by taking us into California schools and examining ways in which literacy teaching methods for ELLs “ignore the repertoires of practice students bring to learning environments” (Gutierrez, 2007, pg. 111).

·      Purcell-Gates brought attention to the ways that the under-privileged and illiterate can be virtually dismissed from an educational environment and deemed “too ignorant” to be worthy of an education. 

·      Ladson-Billings discussed the ways in which under-performing children are often given “permission to fail” when teachers are unsure, unwilling, or unable to teach in a culturally responsive manner (Ladson-Billings, 2002, Kindle Edition)

·      Jackson and Cooper presented actual, concrete curricular approaches that have historically helped certain schools close the achievement gap. Their overall point was that, in order for any educational approach to work, it must be based on a Pedagogy of Confidence, or the idea that any and all students can learn (Jackson and Cooper, 2007, pg. 247).

From a political perspective, I believe that fairness in schooling is tremendously difficult to achieve, primarily because there are so many wildly differing viewpoints on what equates fairness. To the politician, “fairness” might mean whatever needs to be done to win re-election. This might include privatizing schools and implementing substandard curriculum that ultimately compromises a child’s education. However, if this means another few years in office and seeing that political allies are stroked, well, to the politician, what could be more fair than that? To the culturally responsive theorist, fairness might involve teaching children in ways that might be offensive to the gender responsive education theorist. Meanwhile, the ELL learning specialist might disagree with the “fairness” approach favored by both the gender and culturally responsive instructors.

I think that fairness begins with all individuals being allowed to compete on a level playing field. However, such a circumstance is all but impossible in the United States as long as individuals exist on such vastly different socio-economic levels. In such a climate, the middle and upper classes, or the “haves,” will always have a stronger voice, more power, and more influence than the lower classes, or the “have nots.”  

Fairness in schooling can only come when each and every school in the nation, public, private, parochial, and charter, is prepared to operate on a curriculum that is foundationally designed to formulate and hone the academic and social needs of children. It might be necessary for a highly effective and comprehensive standard curriculum to be developed and implemented at a national level, and the curriculum can then be finessed, adapted, and broadened as needed within each school. Theoretically, in this approach, not only would each child be given the opportunity to receive a standard, high quality education, more specific teaching theory, such as culturally responsive instruction, could be employed as needed. In order for true fairness in schooling to take place, it has to happen in more than a few schools in a few states. In order for the education arena to be truly “fair,” the fairness must be authentic, far-reaching, and, most of all, comprehensive.   

"Rarely is the questioned asked: Is our children learning?"---George Bush, 1/11/00

 From an academic standpoint, i.e. looking solely at the results of tracking and assessment in American schools, I agree with this statement. In my opinion, standardized test results are not always a good indication of what children know and the depth of their knowledge. However, that being said, I think that one real way of knowing if students are learning is to talk to them and actually observe what is happening in schools today.

During the spring semester of 2011, I observed in an alternative high school in Tippecanoe County, Indiana. Though my original goal was to generate curriculum for pregnant teens and teen parents based on what I observed (there is a high teen pregnancy rate among students at the school), my objective quickly changed once I actually got into the classroom at A.I.M (the name of the high school).

The classroom at A.I.M. consisted of one very large room filled with three long rows of computers. In fact, one might initially think that s/he is in the computer lab. Students are expected to come in each day for three hours (either from 8 to 11 or 12 to 3), sit in front of a computer, and work on an academic software program called PLATO. Aside from a person who was hired to help children with any math questions they might have, there is virtually no teaching instruction. The principal of the school and teacher’s assistant sit in the back of the room for the duration of the school day. At A.I.M. the computer serves as an instructor, and the PLATO program is not particularly engaging or informative. On any given day, a number of students are asleep at their desks or chatting with one another within minutes of arriving.

When I asked kids at A.I.M. what they felt about the academic format as it is now, the responses I got included “We’re not learning anything,” “This program is boring me to sleep,” “I miss having actual teachers,” and “Could you (Ms. Collins) please teach us so that we can learn from a real, live teacher?”

These kids were more than able to voice that they were not learning in school. Moreover, when I worked with many of them one on one, I found that they were retaining very little, if any knowledge, from one PLATO test answer to the next.

While A.I.M. is an alternative school, and, in theory, shouldn’t be an indication of a “norm,” I am sure there are many more schools like it in America. Furthermore, I know that the standards of learning at the umbrella high school of A.I.M. also does not teach students in the best manner possible. From this experience, I concluded that  getting into schools and observing classrooms is a way to gauge whether or not children are learning. In reference to some of the articles we’ve read during the course of the past few weeks, there are numerous indications that education is so often affected and manipulated for political purposes, many students suffer. For example, in “The Silenced Dialogue,” Lisa Delpit talks about the deep alienation that many faculty members of color feel when talking to white colleagues about the needs of minority students. More often than not, white colleagues are unwilling to listen to what their minority counterparts have to say if it goes against what they feel they already know. This form of dismissiveness and superiority---that is, a minority teacher being silenced when talking about the needs of minority students—is not an uncommon occurrence. Ultimately, ignoring the voice of multi-cultural faculty members ultimately affects how students are taught. Thus, the knowledge students receive is compromised.

Meanwhile, Lipman and Apple wrote about neoliberalism and neoconservatism, and in so doing, illustrated how incredibly political the educational arena has become. Both neoliberals and neoconservatives have entirely different views of what education should be, and both groups are on a continual quest to pass various policies, bills, and laws in an effort to realize a certain educational vision. Meanwhile, nothing seems to be really addressing the needs of children, and, in the end, many students in American schools are not learning much. Thus, looking at educational policy and how politics affect daily school life is another way of measuring the knowledge that students receive (or not).

It is hard to say where we should go from here, but in terms of my personal vision for American schools, I believe that the public school system should remain, but, in an ideal world, be completely reorganized and restructured to far better suit the needs of children. The American public school system should feature the following:

·      Equal access to education for all, regardless of race, class, gender, and socio-economic status

·      This quality of education should be free for all

·      A mutually agreed upon, high-quality, academic program for all

·      Equal quality of education and training for teachers

·      Trust in teachers from schools and parents

·      High standards set for all students

·      Special support should be provided for children who have difficulty with academics

·      There should be early recognition and prevention of learning problems when possible, i.e. a pro-active, rather than reactive approach should be employed

Finally, I believe that we can let go of teaching students for the sole purpose of doing well on standardized tests. Standardized tests should not be issued multiple times a year, and, ideally, should only be administered no more than twice in one academic calendar. Finally, I believe that NCLB, at least as it is currently structured, should be let go.

Soooo.....Where Do We Go From Here?!

“Certainly, attempts by a variety of stakeholders to effectively teacher-proof public school curricula have influenced contemporary notions on the work of a teacher, and the role of a teacher in knowledge sharing and production. An overly cynical view is that the work of an educator is so undervalued, so disempowered, that teaching has been reduced to another cog in the reproductive school-machine. Of course, your blog post can take up this view, but more needed, perhaps, are writings that re-vision and reimagine what it means to teach, now” (Tuck, discussion post, 2011)

Before I proceed any further with my blog post, I must admit something: to some degree, I am one of those individuals who regards the current state of American education with utter dismay and no small sense of despair. I have a few theories about why the state of American education is so dismal, and will discuss them here. I will then propose how the system might possibly be changed and reimagined.

To put it bluntly, one of the main reasons that the public school systems are failing is that, on the whole, education, teachers, and teaching is not something that is truly valued in this country. In America, teaching is work that is more or less considered “easy” and something that anyone can do. Moreover, my personal experience has been that so many Americans feel that since they’ve all been to school and all had teachers, they know how to teach. And yet, on its face, this line of reasoning makes no sense, and is the equivalent of someone thinking, “Hey, I’ve had surgery. That means that I know how to do it! Pass me that big scalpel.”

Programs like Teach for America, while excellent in a number of ways, hold college recruitment sessions in which representatives say, “Don’t know what you really want to do with your life? Why not teach for awhile?” Meanwhile, I’ve heard the statement, “Those who can’t, teach” uttered on more than one occasion.

In my own teaching experience, I’ve had parents express the view that teaching is easy and anyone can do it, along with the proclamation that they personally know all there is to know about the profession. I’ve had parents blatantly and unabashedly interrupt the schoolday by insisting on throwing their child a birthday party in my classroom and I’ve had parents barge into the school during the day with a new family pet so that all the children could see. All such invasions are nothing short of disrupting another person’s work, yet I would be given awfully short shrift if I did the same thing to the offending parents, i.e. “Excuse me, but I know all about law, and I don’t feel that you are arguing this case correctly.”

From a political standpoint, school budgets are always one of the first things on the chopping block and it is always the school systems that can least afford cuts that suffer the most. In New York City, thousands of teachers are losing their jobs, but programs like the New York City Teaching Fellowship and the New York City Teaching Residency are placing young, thoroughly untrained individuals in the classroom with very little guidance, paying them much less than what many of the laid-off teachers made, and expecting them to perform. Though there are many positive aspects to these programs, having unprepared individuals parachuted into a tough, urban school setting has the potential to be a demoralizing experience and has the potential to shortchange both the students as well as the teaching fellow.

Jonathan Kozol wrote his searing expose Savage Inequalities twenty-years ago and has been discussing the problems of “separate but unequal” education for years. Yet there are far too many school systems in this country that exhibit the same appalling conditions that Kozol presented in 1991. How can this be?

While other countries like Finland (which has been able to turn around what was once a poorly functioning system in a matter of decades and now boasts the world’s top rated education), Japan, Canada, and South Korea have been able to consistently produce highly educated citizens, for a developed country, the U.S. considerably lags behind.

How can positive, effective, and permanent change take place? One thing that needs to happen is that teaching needs to be nationally recognized as a highly important and skilled profession, not something that just “anyone can do.”

Since the Finnish school system was in dire straits as late as a few decades ago, looking at the steps that were taken to institute change in Finland is helpful.

First of all, in Finland, parents respect teachers and value education.

Teachers do not begin teaching until they have undergone a certain level of training and all must obtain master’s degrees. The training that teachers undergo does not drastically vary from one person to another and is based on a solid educational approach and foundation. One issue we have here in America is that teachers are entering the field with dramatically different levels and quality of education. While there are definitely many instructors who are extremely well versed in their field and extraordinary at what they do, there are also teachers that did not learn much in terms of exactly how to teach. There are teachers in American classrooms who cannot write well, perhaps cannot read well, do not employ correct rules of grammar, know nothing about classroom management, and think nothing of traumatizing children. This, in turn, does not provide students with the best of role models.

In Finland, there is a set, standard curriculum that was agreed upon and recorded in the Education Constitution. All students are provided with a bi-lingual education and at a very young age can speak both Swedish and Finnish. Children coming from other cultures are taken into consideration in the Constitution and are able to be educated in their own language before fully entering the Finnish system.

Finnish children attend extremely well-run and intellectually stimulating preschools that are of high caliber and available to virtually all citizens. As a result of this, parents do not have to worry about childcare and children officially enter standard school having already been exposed to a certain level and quality of education.

Finally, the educational approach in Finland is one that is dynamic, interesting, and takes into consideration multiple intelligences.

In order for American education to reach its full potential, a massive overhaul of politics, values, and priorities must take place, one that results in a desire to give all American children the best start they can possibly have in life.

Teaching Language and Respecting Language Diversity

My first experience teaching ELL learners came eleven years ago when I was obtaining TEFL certification. At the time, I was preparing to move to France to teach English, and I wanted to specifically be trained in how to teach non-native speakers a language different from their own. As part of the TEFL training course, the students I taught were 70 and 80 year-old Russian immigrants. All the immigrants had been forced to leave Russia for one reason or another and all were quite eager to learn English. None of the TEFL teacher trainees spoke a word of Russian and our students spoke extremely limited English. In addition to following a specific lesson plan format, TEFL trainees were taught that, no matter what, we shouldn’t speak the native language of our students during instruction. This rule was meant to apply not only to our Russian pupils, but also to any students we would be teaching in the future.

The atmosphere of the TEFL training course was extremely convivial, and we as student trainees really loved both teaching and learning from our Russian students. Though we were not officially told to do so, we all were very interested to know about the lives our students led in Russia and learn about their past experiences. I was quite interested to learn some Russian words, and, overall, a very respectful and happy atmosphere was created by all involved. I fully understand why my TEFL instructors taught trainees not to ever bring the native language of our future students into the classroom----not only might students use this as a crutch, but what happens when the teacher doesn’t speak the language of her/his students in the first place? However, above all, though I think we as teacher trainees already innately had the instinct to show respect for the culture and first language of our students, it was great that our teachers also felt the same way. When writing about ELL, Mari Haneda stresses that there is any number of ways that students can learn another language, but she focuses on the importance of literacy practices at home, school, and the community.

In the course readings we’ve read for class this week, whether learning about trilingualism, bi-lingualism, the primitive language myth or bi-culturalism, a common theme in all articles was to always show respect for the first language/culture of students when teaching in language diverse settings. Not doing so has a high likelihood of having a deleterious effect on learners. During the course of my TEFL training, one of the key factors in teaching approach was to show respect for the language, culture, and overall identity of students, despite not knowing much about how to speak Russian. As a result of this, the TEFL teaching experience was successful and fulfilling. I was then able to take what I learned and apply it to my teaching English to French students in France.

I entered into this role with much eagerness and was quite excited to teach young French pupils. I did find that my TEFL training rule of never speaking to students in their native language didn’t apply so well in this instance----because I was now teaching young children, they constantly asked me questions in French. I speak French fluently, and I found that, when working with young children, always refusing to speak in French meant that we often could not move on from an idea. I wound up finding a happy medium of having to speak French when necessary during the course of a lesson. In contrast to my French pupils, my Russian students at the Boston Language Institute knew that one of the rules of the TEFL program was that speaking in their native tongue during English instruction might impede the learning process.

In Chapter 4 of The Skin That We Speak, Judith Baker discusses trilingualism, an English teaching approach that focuses on the idea of students mastering three different forms of the English language: that which is spoken at home, that which is spoken in a professional setting, and that which is spoken with all formal rules and standards intact. The goal of the trilingual approach to teaching is to help students master the mechanical difference between these three forms of English. Of these three forms of the language, formal English is generally considered superior.

Meanwhile, Lomawaima and McCarty introduce the idea of the primitive language myth, a theory that raises the belief that some languages that exist are savage and less advanced in quality when compared to English. Historically speaking, any Native American language, regardless of tribal group, fell into this category. European settlers deemed all Native American languages primitive, and the learning of English and a western way of life was wrought upon Indians by force. In order to learn how to survive in the changed cultural landscape of North America, Native Americans have been caught in a battle of attempting to hold onto their own cultural languages and identity as well as master English. In this blogger’s personal opinion, any indigenous group in any culture theoretically will face the challenges of bil-lingualism and bi-culturalism if they are dominated and colonialized by an outside group.  

Ultimately, and without exception, all articles we read for this week shared a common theme: in order to have the effective teaching and learning of English and literacy instruction take place, not only must the original languages of students not be criticized or labeled as ‘wrong,’ they should be respected, be left intact, and used in an appropriate setting.

Hirsch, Cultural Literacy, Lists----Oh, MY!

In his memoir Cheap Motels and a Hot Plate, former economics professor Michael Yates chronicles the experience he and his wife had when they decided to leave their jobs, sell their belongings, travel the United States, and purposely work at minimum wage jobs, all in an effort to experience the wide economic disparity that exists among various members of American society. A professor emeritus of University of Pittsburgh-Johnstown, Yates begins his book by describing the skill level of students he taught late in his career; though they were admittedly able-minded and intellectually competent, Yates found that his students possessed an extraordinarily limited amount of general knowledge and overall cultural literacy. To make matters worse, these individuals were proud of their limited knowledge. Yates labels these students “willfully ignorant” (Yates, 2007) and teaching classes of students who so blatantly lacked academic and/or cultural curiosity eventually took its toll on him. He admits to becoming disillusioned with teaching after over 25 years at UP-J and, as a result decided to take early retirement.   

As I read the Hirsch text, I recalled Michael Yates’ commentary about the obvious shift that occurred in the “quality” of student that began appearing in his classroom late in his career. After decades of teaching pupils who were quite well read and knowledgeable about a variety of subjects, Yates originally considered the student who was not curious about the world to be something of a novelty. Then, gradually, a shift in student attitude began to take place. Generally speaking, the willfully ignorant individual does not know much beyond his or her own personal experience (including but definitely not limited to important facts about world history, domestic and international geography, literature, language, and, in some cases, life beyond his home town) and does not care to know.

In my experience as both student and teacher, the phenomenon of the willfully ignorant seems to indeed be prevalent in modern America: as an undergraduate English major, I still vividly remember a fellow English major asking an entire seminar group the definition of the word “bigamy” (this was during a class reading of Jane Eyre). In response to this question, another student responded, “that means when you’re racist.”

At the elite Baltimore private school where I taught for several years, I often encountered parents who were quite adamant about the peerless genius of their own children. Meanwhile, it was often the children of these parents who could not find the United States on a map, could not locate Italy on a map, stated that Italy was in France, believed that South Africa was a United State, and did not know the capital of Maryland (the state in which they all lived).

Meanwhile, one academic tutor at this school did not know that Hawaii was part of the United States, while another tutor had never heard of the American Civil Liberties Union. Even as I type these words, though I know the information to be true, I still find it unbelievable.

I can fully identify with Hirsch recognizing that there is something deeply wrong with the font of knowledge that young Americans at the turn of the 21st century possess. To be blunt, the font seems to be rather shallow, and, in some instances, has dried up completely. Hirsch’s call for action and a proposal that all young Americans should grow up being taught a basic foundational cultural literacy is understandable, and on some level, valid. However, the problem in Hirsch’s approach is that he actually attempted to compile a list of what every American should know, and in so doing, really only reflected a white, Eurocentric cultural literacy. Moreover, it is almost impossible to put together a viable and acceptable list of what every American should know, primarily because so much depends on the identity and values of the person making the list. There is also the issue of making a list that reflects a high degree of multiculturalism and acknowledges that there is no one type of American. This is something that needs to be done, yet exactly how long would this list be?

That being said, I am in agreement that many American students today are woefully devoid of cultural literacy and global awareness. When David Letterman and/or Jay Leno send production assistants out in the street for random cultural quizzes, it is not so funny that vast amounts of people walking around New York City cannot name the Speaker of the House, the Secretary of State, or three supreme court justices, but they can easily spout all the lyrics of the latest Lady Gaga album. Why can’t many Americans be able to do all of the above?

If I were to compile a list on what every American should know, I would begin with some facts on the United States. The list would read as follows and is primarily geared towards middle and secondary school students. Please know that this is a very basic list, one that only covers rudimentary information that I have repeatedly seen lacking in students. I feel that kids should not be leaving 12^th grade without the following knowledge firmly intact:

·      Basic rules of standard English and grammar

·      Know the names of all fifty states and have at least a passing knowledge of their capital cities

·      Know the capital of the state in which one lives

·      Be able to locate North America and the United States on a map

·      Be able to locate all world continents on a map and have familiarity with their major cities

·      The purpose and approximate dates of The Revolutionary War, The War of 1812, The Civil War, and WWI and II

·      The history of North America before Christopher Columbus claimed to have discovered it

·      Segregation, desegregation and The Civil Rights movement

·      The Harlem Renaissance (musicians, writers, artists)

·      Major American poets and writers of prose from the 20^th century

Knowledge should include white, black, and Latin American writers

·      Knowledge of the Dewey Decimal system and how to actually find a book in the library

·      How to conduct research

·      How to plan, structure, and write a paper, essay, or article

Again, this is an extremely limited list and does not begin to address much of the cultural literacy I feel that students should possess. For example, I didn’t at all get into the global literacy that is needed. However, in mastering the concepts mentioned above, adolescents would be significantly more prepared and competitive in an academic setting and better able to see beyond their own lives, their own small corner of the world, and life beyond only what they know.