Week 3: Assignment A: Literacy with an Attitude – Finn

Week 3: Assignment A: Literacy with an Attitude – Finn

Talking points:

1 – (beginning): A quote that I found to be very powerful from the preface is: “First, there is empowering education, which leads to powerful literacy, the kind of literacy that leads to positions of power and authority. Second, there is domesticating education, which leads to functional literacy, literacy that makes a person productive and dependable, but not troublesome” (p. ix-x) This particular quote intrigued me as it brought up the topic of discussion revolving around literacy and education and how it differs between different classes of individuals. It also highlights the idea that literacy does not directly correlate to equity, which is a powerful statement.  

2 – (middle): First off, page 10 - LITERALLY MY SCHOOL. The quote that I want to highlight however is one where Finn states, “Work was following steps in a procedure. There was little decision making or choice. Teachers rarely explained why work was being assigned or how it was connected to other assignments. Work was often evaluated in terms of whether the steps were followed rather than whether it was right or wrong” (p. 10). This resonated with me and how DelSesto teaches their students. While we utilize the Summit program that emphasizes the idea of personalized learning, there are still steps that each student must complete in order for it to be considered correct. There are specific dates that each student has to follow to complete their assignments and, truly, there is not flow between content areas. This made me think about the first quote I pulled from the preface and how we are teaching our students and whether or not it is truly bringing up equity in education.

3 – (end): On page 173, Finn describes a teacher that starts off the school year by diving into the students backgrounds that forces the students to think about their families and their culture. This connects to the concept of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy and the discussion we had last week about bringing students and their backgrounds to the classroom.

Argument Statement: Finn argues that education does not always help reduce inequities, but actually plays into the cycle of inequity via the type of education provided to the student.

Week 3: Assignment B: This American Life -- The Problem We All Live With

Week 3: Assignment B: This American Life -- The Problem We All Live With

This week's assignment was one that I found to be very intriguing as it discussed a lot of uncomfortable dialogue that occurred during the period of desegregation in the Francis Howell school. 

I honestly could not handle some of the comments that the parents were making in regard to desegregating Francis Howell because of the transfer law that went into effect for Normandy. There was a quote that a mother of a student made that states, “Years ago, when the MetroLink was being very popular, St. Charles County put to a vote whether or not we wanted the MetroLink to come across into our community. And we said no. And the reason we said no is because we don't want the different areas [INAUDIBLE] coming across on our side of the bridge, bringing with it everything that we're fighting today against.” How are we supposed to ignore the racist undertones that come up with this statement? How are we supposed to act as role models to our children if the comments we are making have to do with not wanting people from “across the bridge” to come to our schools? (sorry, I took this personally and began to think about it as if I were one of the parents in the gym)

These comments made me wonder if these parents ever look back and wonder about how their comments could have affected the students that were to be coming to the school. The sad part is, probably not. Looking back on some of the readings we did in this course, I couldn’t stop think about Johnson. He constantly argues that we need to name the issues in order to move from it. The parents here never named it. In fact, the continue to argue that it IS NOT a racial issue but IS a school issue. Really? Then why comment on the MetroLink and not wanting it to come to your community? Why comment on the bridge being a divider between communities? I think this lady could have used a lesson in red lining and how that affected the school districts.

This video on YouTube by “Adam Ruins Everything” explains red lining in a comical way by using a game board to explain the way redlining works. The comment about the bridge separating the areas connects to this idea of racism and the separation of people based on color. This image by Alex Williams allows us to see the ways in which the line was created to separate the two groups of people. The white groups are represented by blue colors and groups of color are represented by red or orange colors. It is absolutely ridiculous that by simply drawing on a map with a red line has allowed for these systemic issues to take place, such as segregation. It is even more embarrassing that individuals (in the year 2015) were still acting in this way and making comments that were so rude. I guess in a way I just thought that people were more into helping others than fighting so fiercely to keep things like segregation in place.

Here is the link to my TAL Integration worksheet with notes from the video.

Week 2: Assignment A: The Silenced Dialogue: Power and Pedagogy in Educating Other People's Children - Delpit

Talking Points:

1 – (beginning): One the first page of the article, Delpitt quotes a student of color on her experiences in education. The student states, “No, they listen, but they don’t hear – you know how your mama used to say you listen to the radio, but you hear your mother. Well they don’t hear me” (p.21). I highlighted that second part of the quote because of how important it is for me as an educator to know and understand why this student doesn’t feel heard. Think about it, if they don’t feel seen or heard, are they learning as much as they could be? Probably not because their needs are not being met. I thought about how this related to the concept of being “colorblind” that we discussed on Sunday in our larger post.

2 – (middle): There was one quote that I felt really stood out and summed up the middle of this article. Delpitt states, “To provide schooling for everyone’s children that reflects liberal, middle-class values and aspirations is to ensure the maintenance of the status quo, to ensure that power, the culture of power, remains in the hands of those who already have it” (p 28). This is such a powerful statement. It brings up the conversation of power that Delpitt has in the earlier portion of the article. Power is such a huge component of inequality and a huge part of the racism that we see in our society today. I know our students see it but I often wonder why Providence never addressed power dynamics and the effect of power dynamics in the classroom. I received a lot of information and training on that through TFA but never through PPSD. How does that affect our students?

3 – (end): I found that Delpitt’s argument towards the end of the article on her beliefs of what needs to be done in order to work towards equity in and outside the classroom. He top down approach is one that I think many educators don’t think about as we often think about the change we can make in the classroom and how that change will have a ripple effect in the future (first three paragraphs on page 40 explain her solution). This made me think about Trump and the racially motivated issues that began to occur around the time of the 2016 election. Could this have been directly related to the ways in which Trump's power motivated others to act in ways motivated by racism? If Delpitt's solution were followed and the top-down approach was taken could the opposite effect have occurred in the 2016 election?

Argument Statement: Delpitt argues that the current education system is not meeting the needs of POC for the majority of their education (including K-12 and higher education); students do not feel seen or heard in the classroom.