To restructure our curriculum in a nature that places our student's issues as top priority, we have to critically examine our teaching of the past and discern whether it has had negative implications for communities within our nation. We cannot erase what has happened in the past, nor should we try to forget about it. We must feel the pain and bear it with us as a constant reminder to fight for our students until each one has the education best fit for their cultural needs.
As we frame the new curriculum, one which is pedagogically reflective and responsive to each community within our social schema, we have to center our discussions around the groups we have marginalized for decades, centuries even. More than just teaching our kids to be tolerant, we must teach them to be anti-racist, anti-sexist, and anti-oppression.
Let us not forget through the strife to guide our students to exploring their heritage for all its joyous wonders. We can help our students imagine themselves in roles of success by expanding their access to role models who represent pieces of their own personal identities. The local town where our students reside is rich with living resources, people who grew up within the communities and can recall how much things have changed. We have to share their stories with our class too.
Lessons based in fear lead to deficit-thinking which furthers the educational disparities in minority populations. If we allow the divide between classes to grow any stronger we are perpetuating violence.
However, this does not mean we should omit topics that make people feel uncomfortable because it disregards the comfort we have thus far felt at the expense of the safety of our neighbors. If we ignore their struggles they will not just stay silent. They will likewise come together to put an end to it.
We have so much to learn from our students. Until we show them that our classrooms are a space where they are open to criticize our methods, we will fail to obtain the funds of knowledge that each of them has to offer. We have to reframe our mindsets to be open to this feedback, rather than rejecting it as many of us have been conditioned to do.
The impact of how we adjust our curriculum to fit the needs of the children within our spaces is dependent on our ability to get in tune with the influences that have socialized their attitudes and beliefs. We have the power to break our student's self-esteem and self-concept if we don't make the effort to understand how they view the world and teach from a perspective that's compatible with their understanding.
We can never truly make it up to the people who we have silenced in the past. We cannot erase the generational trauma that has bled over from years of abuse and inhumanity, but we can start repairing it by giving future generations the tools they need to succeed through reconstructing our curriculum to include the nullified curriculum of our past.
Hi Tori, I really appreciated the emphasis you placed on listening to our students and allowing them opportunities to criticize our methods and to create an environment where they can take an active part in their learning. There are so many factors that play into what we are allowed to teach in schools and how we are allowed to teach it but you are absolutely right. If we just omit all the parts of history that make a particular group of people look bad, we are missing the point of teaching history in the first place. ALL of our students have the right to have their perspective represented in their education and, as teachers, we have a major role in facilitating that through our curriculum. How we reconstruct that history can have a major impact on the students who come into our care. It seems like a huge task but I would say it is also a worthwhile one.
ReplyDeleteHello Katy!
DeleteI agree, there really are so many forces that dictate the subjects that we are suppose to teach, as well as what we aren't allowed to teach. I think it's important for us as teachers to push the boundaries on the things they tell us not to teach. It can be risky riding on the lines of the rules, even pushing them to the next extreme, but we owe it to our students to do what is best for their cultural identities, in addition to their educational growth. Unfortunately legality doesn't always equal morality. Until the legislative and justice systems start acting in the best interest of our children we will have to break the law by ignoring it. It sounds extreme, but it's the right thing to do. We cannot uphold laws that oppress even minor portions of the population if our ultimate aim is equity.
Tori, this was such a well-thought-out blog. I love that you pointed out that we cannot change history, so we should not try to forget about it or omit it in our curricula. Even the most difficult things need to be addressed. We will never truly be able to provide full reparation to those who were mistreated, and their descendants who are still suffering from the heavy effects of our country’s dark history. It is our incredibly important job as teachers/ future teachers to evaluate and reevaluate everything we are bringing to the lives of the children we teach. Because it is not just academics these children are leaving school with, it is the social impact they will have, from the emotional and intellectual person they had the ability to become during their years with us.
ReplyDeleteHello Christel!
DeleteI also think that we can never make full reparations for what we did in the past, but a good start would be to actually serve the communities that we terrorized for over centuries. Reallocating some of the funding from higher socioeconomic white schools, and giving it to lower socioeconomic minority schools would do exactly this. Teaching them their histories is important, but it isn't enough as far as reparations are concerned. We have to help them come to voice and find their identities while at the same time taking any measures necessary to increase the resources at their disposal. Granting them all the knowledge in the world does no use if we keep them trapped in the financial shackles that was generationally passed on from the persisting era of desegregation.
Hi Tori! I really liked your post I think you hit some great points when talking about kids/ students. The first thing that caught my attention is how you mentioned we teach out kids how to be accepting of others. I believe this is something very important to make sure we are including in classrooms. We need to be able to make sure all of our kids feel comfortable when coming to school. The next thing that caught my attention is when you mentioned learning from out students. I believe it is important that teachers are still whiling to learn for our students. Things are changing everyday and we can't just ignore what is happening.
ReplyDeleteHello Shalondra!
ReplyDeleteHave you ever had a teacher that you just could not meet eye to eye with and you suffered in their class despite your best efforts? I know I have. I think we all need to take a step back and remember that before we were teachers, we were students. By reflecting on the spots where our education failed us in the past, we can work to find ways to minimize those mistakes in our own practices. What I am suggesting by taking feedback from our current students, is that instead of waiting for them to grow up and gain the knowledge to mend the holes we have put in their education, we should instead just listen and change it now. There is no reason we should keep waiting decades to change our teaching styles when we can listen to what the students have to say about it right now.