Story of School Episode 3

The main thing that took me by surprise in the documentary is the exclusion of certain events that led to segregation.  The film only paid attention to Brown v. Board of Education, even though I’ve done research in EDU 362 that suggests there were five or six different Supreme Court cases that led to desegregation in schools.  This is a very good example of heroification in our education.  Similar to the treatment of Christopher Columbus and Helen Keller, the Brown v. Board of Education court case has become a legend that people think is greater than it actually was.

            I wasn’t quite as surprised by the defiance of the South to desegregate.  As most education students know, Arkansas National Guard and federal troops faced off against each other.  I am actually more surprised that this situation didn’t become worse.  Looking at something like this, I can’t help but think of the assault on Fort Sumter that started the Civil War. 

            I found it interesting how early television advertisements promoting education started.  I remember seeing a lot of these when I was younger, but I thought the public service announcements were started in the 90s.  I find it terrible that these were required in the 50s and 60s because it set the tone for the future education for minorities.  Since their parents had never graduated college or high school, the younger generations didn’t think twice about leaving school to start working.  This is also the case with low SES families.  

Engagement

            I connect a lot with entry 46 because of the ideas regarding planning periods.  I know in my experience, planning periods have mainly been used as a means to discuss things have happened in class.  During Practicum, none of my planning periods were actually used for planning.  However, I think it is very important for teachers to have this time to take a deep breath and recompose themselves.  The writer makes a joke of the fact that they are called planning periods, but this might be just a name to justify the free periods to the legislators who view teachers as being lazy.

            I also connected with the fact that Ana probably wouldn’t have become as upset if she had been yelled at.  When I was in high school, there were clearly students who acted out more when teachers tried to remain calm.  They’re anger was derived from the fact that they connected the yelling with caring.  Since they loved people who yelled at them all the time, the yelling became synonymous with love.  I’m definitely someone who will only resort to yelling in the most extreme situations, and I can admire the teacher’s efforts to remain calm despite frustrations. 

Story of School: Episode 2

                One of the pieces of this documentary that I found very interesting was the inclusion of details about the Gary School; for example, the simple fact that the school had its own zoo on campus.  This sounds insane to me because I’ve been raised in a time when most schools don’t even have the money for up to date textbooks, but they found ways to provide animal husbandry courses.  It causes me to ask “when did our country decide to stop funding education?”

                I was also caught off guard by how early students were being tracked.  For some reason, I had it in my mind that this system started in the 60s or 70s.  To think that our school system has been using this same flaw means of segregating the students all this years is disturbing.  It is clear that the system poses problems for students, so I don’t see how it could be that old without anyone thinking of a better way of doing it. 

                Most of all, this film upset me because of the educational focus on “the American way of life.”  There were many students in this time frame who were the children of immigrants, and I find it revolting that the American school system wanted to make them conform, rather than celebrate their diversity.  I found it particularly bad that students were being reprimanded for using their native language in school.  If a student speaks in a different language, it could become a great educational opportunity for the class to learn about different cultures.

Generations

Generations Article Reflection

            I know that the piece of this article that affects me the most is the fact that there is a clear communication gap between the different generations.  Earlier today, I was watching the movie Clueless and this idea became incredibly evident to me.  The lingo use in the film must have seemed really cool to say in the early 90s, but some of the things the character say seems absolutely ridiculously to our generation.  Even if we aren’t fully capable of understanding what the new generation is talking about, we should still respect what their views are.

            One of the communication pieces that really struck me was the inclusion of how a Generation Xer might talk to an employee who is a boomer.  It’s very interesting to me because I’ve never considered the fact that anyone would rather work to get ahead, instead of taking a vacation with their family.  This is a clear representation of how the thinking between our generations varies greatly.  It seems to me that getting time away would be the greater reward, but one of my co-workers could view this scenario in a very different way.

            As interesting and informative as this article is, I still have to complain about the introduction.  The Kennedy example is insulting to members of Generation Y.  To suggest that none of us knows anything about the Kennedy family is essentially saying we don’t study history.  Beyond that, I would say that the vast majority of people, regardless of generation, would say the shooting in Dallas.

Challenges

                In this section of Teaching Hope, I felt the strongest connection to passage 43.  The overarching theme of this section has to do with how little information schools and teachers have about their students.  This resonates with me because of my experience working at a summer camp.  The issues weren’t related to legal matters, but a fair amount of information about campers wasn’t told to certain staff members.  For example, I had a camper who had Asperger’s Syndrome, and most of us weren’t made aware of it until late into the summer.  Vital information like this should definitely be made available for teachers and anyone else responsible for the safety of children.

                The other part of this section that really sticks with me is the beginning, when Sequain makes a poorly-timed joke about Sam White’s death.  I completely connected to the actions of Sequain because I will usually make light of situations that are gravely serious.  This is a coping mechanism that has gotten me into trouble in the past.  I thoroughly enjoyed the fact that the teacher did not take time to lecture Sequain on the inappropriateness, since it may have been exactly what Sequain needed in order to feel okay with the situation.

Anticipation

While I was reading this section of Teaching Hope, I found myself feeling rather connected with the author of the seventh entry.  The main focus of his piece is the idea that the students who are having trouble in school aren’t the only ones with issues to deal with.  I connected with this because my high school had an issue with identifying problems.  The students who needed the most help in their home lives were also the students who performed the best in the classroom.  The teachers spent much more of their time dealing with students who were misbehaving and falling behind, while ignoring the obvious problems in front of them.

            I did have one English teacher in high school that helped all of his students.  For one assignment every year, he would submit our essays into a statewide writing contest.  In doing this, he gave shy students a chance to highlight there writing talents.  It also helped as a motivational tool for the students who weren’t interested in writing. 

            I also felt connected to this writer because of his reasoning for going into teaching.  Just like him, I had an intuition that I would follow education.  However, where he cites Martin Luther King Jr. as his inspiration, I would say mine is Kenneth Bryant (my eighth grade social studies teacher).

Diversity, Learning Style and Culture

Diversity Article Reflection

            Overall, I’d say this article effectively captures what the teacher’s mindset should be.  There are, however, a few things I would disagree with.  For example, the article discusses the difficult decision teacher’s make about what the need to keep the same and what they should change.  I have the teaching philosophy that everything should be flexible, in order to meet the students’ needs.  I can’t think of a single thing that can’t be changed in order to make instruction easier to understand. 

            On the discussion topic of special education, I can’t help but think about what one of my high school teachers told me on the subject (I interviewed him for SED 361).  He has his Masters in Special Education and follows the mentality that the “tried-and-true” methods work the best.  He meant that the new special education methods that are created essentially every year are not as accessible for most teachers as the strategies that have been around for a longer time.  I follow this line of thinking, since I tend to feel that there is no right or wrong answer, but it is usually better to go with my gut.

            The other section of this article that truly caused me to think had to do with the processing of information.  Every student processes information differently, so in my classroom, I will vary the way in which I give student notes.  I can definitely make handouts, lecture, or have students working in groups.  I’ve already decided that I wouldn’t use a pneumonics in my classroom since those can be frustrating if students know the letter but not the word.