The last McLaren article that we read for class made a few things clear for me that I didn't understand before. Case in point, Shanice. Or maybe I should say, Shanice's family.
A co-worker at my school is heavily involved in basketball camps. One summer, a girl came to play at one of the camps run by my co-worker, and as the co-worker's family got to know this girl, their hearts broke. She was a black girl living in squalid inner-city conditions with many brothers and sisters--all different fathers--and a drug-addicted mother.
Long story short, my co-worker took some of the kids in--the girl (a high schooler), two boys grades 1 and 3, and Shanice, an 8th grader. Shanice became my student, and it was my job to fill in the gaps that had developed over her academic career. There were many. Shani was hard working and eager to please, and hurt by life. She spent most of the school year in my class with her thumb in her mouth. But she persevered.
It is five years later, and Shani has graduated high school and gone on to college. I keep in touch with her through my co-worker, and I am amazed at the transformation. She makes eye contact, she smiles, and she is conversational. But I hear stories as well. She goes home to visit her family and they make fun of her for turning her life around. They ask her for money. They call her "white n*****." I never understood why they would want to drag her down, but now I do--a little more anyway.
It just makes me appreciate Shanice even more. She has resisted the pull to go back to her family's expectations. She is making a future for herself. She is smart and beautiful and strong.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Freire Revisited
I want to comment on Ryan's group's quote today on page 31 and acknowledge that when Ryan talked about how his kids were applying this text to their own situations, I said, hmmm...
I turned back to that paragraph and read it again. "In order for the oppressed to be able to wage the struggle for their liberation, they must perceive the reality of oppression as not a closed world from which there is no exit, but as a limiting situation which they can transform...it must become the motivating force for liberating action."
Time for a personal tie-in. I was a teenage statistic in high school--pregnant at 17 and giving birth to my first child in September of my senior year. Everybody told me I wouldn't make it, I had messed up my life, that I had two chances of success--slim and none. I mean, everybody said that, even my own parents.
In a matter of a couple of weeks in the winter of my junior year I went from upper-middle class to having almost nothing. Though my husband did an admirable job of supporting us, he was a 21 year old kid, and so we made do or did without. We did not go on welfare out of pride, and when my father offered to pay our car insurance, we politely refused. We would do it ourselves.
The problem was, people in the general public made horrible assumptions about my SES, and I was shocked. Being pregnant and being a teenager automatically equated with being a drain on the system. I was treated with pity sometimes but mostly with contempt. Both were infuriating. I knew who I was and what I stood for and what I was up against. I resented the hell out of people trying to make me feel bad about myself when they knew nothing about me!
I made it my personal goal in life to prove the world wrong. My marriage would not fail, my children would be healthy and happy, and I would be able to support myself. That is why Freire's words really hit home with me...my oppression, the label given to me by people who didn't even know me, became a limiting situation which I could transform. It became my motivating force.
My father offered to pay for my college education, and i took the offer. I went to school at night so I could stay home with my daughters during the day, and 8 years later, I had a degree and a job. I transformed my situation through a lot of persistence, a lot of hard work, and a lot of emotional support from friends and family. O.K., I also don't like to lose. :) From that time on, nobody would make negative assumptions about my social class.
But what about those who can't escape a label by earning more money? What about those who can't change their skin color or their gender or their age? I think we owe people more than a cursory glance and a quick assumption. Nobody can truly know anybody else's values by looking at them, and who said we are here to judge anybody anyway? We must NEVER tell anyone what they can and can't accomplish, because though it may motivate some people, it may crush others. I think our role in this world should be elevating those who are oppressed by aiding them in finding their motivating force and helping them to apply it in a way that will bring them liberation.
I turned back to that paragraph and read it again. "In order for the oppressed to be able to wage the struggle for their liberation, they must perceive the reality of oppression as not a closed world from which there is no exit, but as a limiting situation which they can transform...it must become the motivating force for liberating action."
Time for a personal tie-in. I was a teenage statistic in high school--pregnant at 17 and giving birth to my first child in September of my senior year. Everybody told me I wouldn't make it, I had messed up my life, that I had two chances of success--slim and none. I mean, everybody said that, even my own parents.
In a matter of a couple of weeks in the winter of my junior year I went from upper-middle class to having almost nothing. Though my husband did an admirable job of supporting us, he was a 21 year old kid, and so we made do or did without. We did not go on welfare out of pride, and when my father offered to pay our car insurance, we politely refused. We would do it ourselves.
The problem was, people in the general public made horrible assumptions about my SES, and I was shocked. Being pregnant and being a teenager automatically equated with being a drain on the system. I was treated with pity sometimes but mostly with contempt. Both were infuriating. I knew who I was and what I stood for and what I was up against. I resented the hell out of people trying to make me feel bad about myself when they knew nothing about me!
I made it my personal goal in life to prove the world wrong. My marriage would not fail, my children would be healthy and happy, and I would be able to support myself. That is why Freire's words really hit home with me...my oppression, the label given to me by people who didn't even know me, became a limiting situation which I could transform. It became my motivating force.
My father offered to pay for my college education, and i took the offer. I went to school at night so I could stay home with my daughters during the day, and 8 years later, I had a degree and a job. I transformed my situation through a lot of persistence, a lot of hard work, and a lot of emotional support from friends and family. O.K., I also don't like to lose. :) From that time on, nobody would make negative assumptions about my social class.
But what about those who can't escape a label by earning more money? What about those who can't change their skin color or their gender or their age? I think we owe people more than a cursory glance and a quick assumption. Nobody can truly know anybody else's values by looking at them, and who said we are here to judge anybody anyway? We must NEVER tell anyone what they can and can't accomplish, because though it may motivate some people, it may crush others. I think our role in this world should be elevating those who are oppressed by aiding them in finding their motivating force and helping them to apply it in a way that will bring them liberation.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
What about those who don't play well with others?
What do we do with the teachers in our buildings who only see things the way they want to see it? I know, communicate with them. But here's the thing...most of "those people" don't want to communicate. They want to be right. I find myself getting frustrated with people who are so married to their own personal philosophies that they can't hear anyone else's. I don't want to cram my opinion down anyone's throat, but I would like to at least open the lines of communication so that we could at least begin examining our underlying assumptions and address them in ways that will be beneficial for the students. Thoughts?
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Man or Machine?
The machine metaphor that we discussed today is no longer relevant in the 21st century. Anyone who had the pleasure of reading The World Is Flat last fall will remember that a global society is completely different from the industrial society of the past. We have truly "flattened" out due to technology, leaving organizations much more like Morgan's brain metaphor--interrelated, overlapping, and more likely to apply double-loop learning than ever before. And I think that is a good thing.
The machine metaphor is not ideologically neutral because it has no safety mechanism built in to question whether or not the norms are appropriate or "right." Because our world is becoming so diverse, and because respecting that diversity is crucial, we must question the norms at all times and "check in" with ourselves and with others to see if we are operating under correct moral and ethic principals.
The machine metaphor is not ideologically neutral because it has no safety mechanism built in to question whether or not the norms are appropriate or "right." Because our world is becoming so diverse, and because respecting that diversity is crucial, we must question the norms at all times and "check in" with ourselves and with others to see if we are operating under correct moral and ethic principals.
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
The First Idea
It is all well and good to talk about being aware of what we communicate and how our messages are perceived by others, but applying it will take more effort than just talking. In the workplace, and really, in every aspect of our lives, we need to listen more than we speak and try some reflective responses to make sure we are truly understanding others. I remember reading this line somewhere, and I liked it: "Seek first to understand, then seek to be understood." Good words to live by--
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