Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Recognizing White Priviledge

Bronx, NY, USA

We were just talking in class today about what Michelle Martin has been talking about all week on NPR's Tell Me More. To be honest, we've been talking about it all summer, with some in our program having to really restrain themselves not to let talk boil over into rage. Is there still racism in America? Is there racial inequality? Is there still (or again) segregation in our schools? Is it inevitable? What can we do about it?

Of course there is. More black and Latino boys are diagnosed with Emotional Disabilities and ADHD than white boys, certainly more than girls. More black and Latino boys drop out. Why? Is it because of the culture of their communities, or the culture of their schools? We used to think it was the culture of the communities. Kids in urban, ethnic, poor neighborhoods grow up with families that don't care about them, fill that gap with gangs and crime, and end up in prison or dead, right?

We watched "Waiting for Superman" today and we've been reading about the KIPP Academies and Uncommon Schools all summer long, and the reality today is that we cannot blame where they come from for the problems our kids have in schools. Schools across the country, many of them urban charters in low income, high crime neighborhoods, are proving that black and Latino boys, given the right instruction, can pass state exams at the same rate as white children. (Now, only about 20% of charter schools are more successful than your average public school, so I don't want you to think "Waiting for Superman" is right about that ... but he is right about a lot of things!)

Geoffrey Canada, founder of the Harlem Children's Zone, features prominently in "Waiting for Superman," and he's proven that schools and communities have to work together, from birth through college, to achieve wide-spread success. That doesn't discourage me, though. I'm more convinced than ever that there are things I can do in my classroom that will have far-reaching effects. (I'm thinking about Kawthar and her sister...)

It makes me see my own youth and young adulthood with a lot more humility. Yes, I was most definitely discriminated against in grade school because of my lack of religion and because my parents were from out of state. I thought I was such a persecuted teenager. (What teenager doesn't?) I had it so easy. I know this; I knew it before I came to New York City. I learned it in the Peace Corps, in Jordan, but all along I said, 'Being poor in those places is so different from being poor in America!' And it is. But I didn't really realize until this summer just how difficult it was to be a poor black or Latino kid in America. And I've no doubt I'm only seeing the beginning of what will be a very enlightening--and probably heart-breaking--journey.

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Why Art Is Important to Education

An Example You Have To See To Believe!

Brooklyn, NY, USA

I was doing research today about some of the New York City schools I've been told have significant Arab-American and Arab immigrant populations, where I think I have particularly relevant skills to offer. One of them is William McKinley High School. I found this video on their Website, and it is simply amazing! These kids understand history, English language arts, art theory, and the way that they intersect on a level I'm just not seeing in my summer school teaching experience. That's without even mentioning the images of amazing whimsy, like the image of Phaeton in a chariot pulling the sun across the sky in which the sun is the red bell of the fire alarm system.

This is precisely why we need to fight for room in school budgets for arts education.

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Another Theorist on Collaborative Teaching

Don Tapscott was speaking on NPR about re-designing the way universities deliver education, but I think this applies all the way down to pre-K. I noticed that he said again and again that our teaching methodologies are "the very best that the Industrial Revolution can offer," and are completely out-dated. Of course, this is exactly what Sir Ken Robinson has been saying for years, and I agree completely.

It's the same theory behind Karl Fisch's "Shift Happens" meme that went viral four years ago. The Fall 2009 update is equally enlightening in the age of social networking. (Amazing how 4 years just became an "age" in that sentence....) We need to start envisioning 21st Century education. I'm not sure what that means yet, but I'm on a quest to find out!

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Comic Differentiation

NPR reported today on something that's been on my mind for a few days, an often overlooked tool for teaching and encouraging literacy.

One of the challenges in special education is this ubiquitous, vague term we call "differentiation." (It's funny think back to myself in Peace Corps teaching two whole Saturday seminars for the Jerash Directorate of Education on the term, and today feeling like I haven't a clue what it means.) Essentially this means varying your instruction to play to the strengths to as many students in the classroom as possible. This could be playing to the strengths of visual, aural, kinesthetic and interpersonal learners. It could mean providing support to weak readers, children who struggle to concentrate and self-regulate, students with processing disorders, as well as high-achieving students.

In our public schools, especially in high need schools like the ones where we as Teaching Fellows will be teaching, one of the biggest problems is with reading. Students in NYC schools tend to be at least 3 grade levels behind in reading. A surprisingly high number of high school students are still reading at a 2nd or 3rd grade level. Add to that the significant population of English Language Learners, and you have a serious problem across the curriculum.

But more daunting than students' inability to read is their disinterest and resentment of reading. This is where I think the graphic novel could be a high quality tool, and I know that my friend Nicole Bailey and other researchers are really pushing the literary and literacy value of the graphic novel. They're not just superhero stories.

There's Maus by Art Spiegelman about his father's journey to and survival of Auschwitz, which won a Pulitzer Prize in 1992. There's Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi about growing up in Iran during and after the Iranian Revolution. The Book of Genesis Illustrated by legendary comic book artist R. Crumb generated lots of headlines in the past year for its absolutely faithful but surprisingly unique adaptation of the first book of the Bible. In short, comic books aren't just for kids and nerds anymore, and I'd like to incorporate them into my classroom in the fall as part of that all-powerful, pervasive imperative to differentiate instruction.

Friday, July 8, 2011

Field in the Sky

Manhattan, New York, USA

Today I met up with CASA Fellow Andrew. He told me that since I "live in New York City now," I should decide where we would go. I'd recently seen this video about the founding of the High Line Park in Manhattan, and posted it to Facebook. Immediately, our mutual friend Emily had said it should be one of the first things I did in NYC, so I decided on that as our excursion for the day.

Even though it rained, it was an excellent choice. A little piece of wild 3 stories up in Manhattan. It was an excellent opportunity to walk, talk about the Egyptian Revolution and Andrew's trip to India, see some of the interesting architecture that's 5 or 6 stories up in the city, not to mention the Hudson River and the Empire State Building. There were some vendors set up along the way. We got these excellent rhubarb sno-cones and reminisced about our childhood Snoopy sno-cone makers.

I'll be going back again on a sunny day with my camera. Next year, I've decided to get there early on the morning of the 4th of July to watch the Macy's fireworks on the Hudson from there.

Monday, July 4, 2011

Holy Cleavage, Batman!

New York, NY, USA

As I've written before, reverse culture shock strikes differently every time I come home. I'd been mentally preparing for my return to the United States for months before it happened. This time I thought I was ready for American fashion, tank tops and short skirts. I'd even walked around Cairo with Mohannad in a knee-length skirt on my last night in Egypt. I was even prepped for Daisy Duke's.

What I wasn't ready for at all was cleavage! As much as 6 or 8 inches of it sticking out of necklines. Not just teenagers and young adults in full mating plumage, but professionals in pencil skirts and business-like pumps. Even my colleagues at the Teaching Fellows, where we're all on probation for the summer and "professional dress" is one of our measures of success, sometimes surprise me with the amount of cleavage they see as professional. I realize I'm not in the Middle East anymore, but we're still teaching teenagers, half of them hormonal boys, the other half girls in search of good role models.

Nor was I prepared for the prevalence of tattoos. Not just the discreet little shoulder blade or ankle tattoo, or the ubiquitous tramp stamp. I'm talking professionals on the train with tattoos on their forearms or the inside of the wrist, on the collarbone, behind the ear, curling around the bicep below the hem of a modest short sleeve.

I feel so out of touch!