This weekend you have read Hair et al., Noguera, and Steele. These are three different articles that all touch on the same topic of race and class. How do we, though, fit these articles into our understanding of how to work with your students?
As per usual, before 7 PM tomorrow (Monday, June 26) please respond to the following questions, and respond to at least one classmate's post. I am looking for thorough, thoughtful answers in order for you to receive credit for being "present" during this online class.
1. Taking the thrust of all three arguments (you may want to give an overview as to what they are), ultimately what is your argument about how race and class affect the students in your classroom? Remember, I'm not looking for specific names of students, but I am looking for an in-depth connection between the articles' arguments and your own teaching experience this past school year. Reflect on your own practice in a real, retrospective fashion.
2. Regarding Steele's stereotype threat, is this something you now suspect you have seen? Specifically working with ELL's, what are ways that educators, be it you or others, seek to reinforce certain stereotypes that may lead your students' academic achievement to suffer?
3. Based on your work this year, would this information have helped you better understand your students? If so, in what way, and if not, please explain. Knowing what you know now, how can this information help you work with your students, or possibly even better understand them regardless of what their background is, moving forward into your second year of teaching?
4. Finally, watch this speech by Lisa Delpit. Many of you were interested in culturally relevant teaching, and she's a rock star. Her work is very much worth exploring. After watching the video (it's about 20 minutes), how is she not just reinforcing what we are talking about, but also giving us active ways to apply this work to the classroom? How do you see yourself fitting in to her discussion of reaching students in the classroom?
1) Noguera comes to mind when thinking about the nature of the bilingual classes that are labeled “-21” classes and how my school is changing the name to “-04” classes to avoid the label that has persisted over the school’s history. The “-21’s” are constantly being labeled as such and often in a negative manner as they are considered the problem children, the ones who never stop talking, are always disruptive, and never want to learn or lack the motivation to do so. I have even heard other students call them “hicks” to which I initially thought as some kind of metaphorical label. Yet even one of my colleagues addressed how they have the equivalent of a thick southern dialect in English in their home language that may label them as “coming from the mountains” or how Americans might say “from the country”. I had noticed slight differences in how particular students speak Spanish, but I had no idea it was overtly so. Sadly, the children take the label to heart, (which the numeral change is supposed to address), often giving the impression they would rather have side conversations and avoid speaking English altogether in regard to academics. A few students even told me that they purposely act “ignorant” to avoid being placed in the other classes where it may prove too challenging and demanding. As the year progressed, some students voiced their desire to learn English due to career goals and wanting push themselves further, while for others it seemed I could not reach them. Some were able understand English as a means of furthering their goals and acquiring opportunities, while others seemed to view English as merely another class with no other relevance outside the classroom in a predominately Dominican neighborhood.
ReplyDeleteSteele is also relevant to a degree in my classroom and in the Spanish classroom perhaps in the aforementioned “country” stereotype, but also in the biases shown in the various tests they were subjected to. Rather than being a test on language alone, the NYSESLAT does seem to have the attached threat of being about culturally irrelevant topics such as Andy Warhol or plug-in telephone operators that focus on American culture rather than the use of language. It’s as though the test is also assessing current assimilation into this culture rather than language proficiency alone. To make matters worse, even Entering level students who just recently arrived had to take the ELA common core exam where seeing the English alone was enough to encourage copying sections of readings verbatim as their responses. Even just recently, I was told that the Spanish test that may have been an avenue of success for bilingual students to show their proficiency in their home language was delivered entirely in English save for their responses. These students, while not necessarily completely fluent in academic Spanish, aren’t even able to respond in their home language even though they may indeed know the answer as they can’t comprehend the question in the first place as it’s written in English. How can this be a proper assessment of Spanish if the students whose home language is Spanish aren’t given the proper opportunity to use it? This is not even to mention the newly arrived Arabic students who also had to take the exam about an additional language that they had no knowledge of (Spanish) aside from being Entering level proficient in English.
2) From what I’ve learned in both of my courses from this summer semester, I can see how students seem to view academic English as a form of oppression that threatens their culture, especially in a transition-based language model of schooling. The loss of language is in the name, and emphasized by how English is taught 10 periods a week while Spanish is taught 2 periods a week. Granted their other classes often use Spanish interchangeably, but as one of my colleagues noted it could actually be harmful. Switching languages throughout a class may cause problems in a subject such as science where students can’t reconcile which is the Spanish or English terminology being used and they likewise use them interchangeably on the exam. Students with specific career goals (perhaps domain-identified) seem to understand more the need for both languages and the marketability of such for future professions including medical and communication fields. Meanwhile, students who seek a future as an athlete (perhaps domain-unidentified) seem less worried about the acquisition of English as being an athlete is largely based on physical prowess and engagement (though communication is indeed a vital part of sports in general, including verbal).
DeleteI believe all of the aformentioned segregation of class groups via -21 bilinguals, -02 former ELLs, and -03 IEP students all contribute to stereotype threats to varying degrees as simply by being put in these classes sets these children up with particular expectations and assumptions about their roles as students and their current abilities. The size of the classes also seems to play a role in this labeling as I find colleagues tending to label the class by their number than necessarily discussing individual students unless they are deemed noteworthy are particularly troublesome. While there is some mobility between -02 and -21 classes dependent upon NYSESLAT results and parental intervention, the label is quite a formidable obstacle that even the most “academically-intelligent” students begin to internalize.
Another instance of this occurred when one student who has grown tremendously in both proficiency and academics throughout the year was rejected from all of the high schools she had applied for. From what I was able to gather, she had applied to high schools with medical programs (as she wants to be a doctor) and are based on several criteria including an entrance exam. Perhaps stereotyping was influencing my own thoughts at this point as I couldn’t help thinking about that her status as an ELL may have had a role in her not being accepted to these schools. She was devastated and I was heartbroken that despite all her efforts she was still facing opposition, much like the oppositional tiers mentioned by Steele where each new field requires the individual to prove his/herself all over again, with prior achievement being an unknown. Needless to say she was able to overcome this and with an artillery of recommendation letters she was soon accepted into another high school. What may have been irreversibly disheartening and destructive to her confidence was overcome and she was soon her dedicated self.
The above student was one whose parent vouched for her to be moved out of the -21 class and into the -02 class, which further shows the influence of the label. Students who are placed into the categorical classrooms are thought to be receiving the ideal support as they are grouped with students with arguably similar needs (arguably especially in regard to IEPs that can range from countless variations on services and needs). Yet despite these good intentions, and perhaps influenced by the sheer number of “labeled” students that need to be accounted for, they are ultimately governed by this label and a number change won’t change the visible and audible recognition of the students amongst themselves.
3) Though some of these topics I had learned over the course of the year, though without the specific terminology associated with them, I think being acquainted with Steele and Noguera’s findings would have helped me to focus on diminishing the stereotypes present in the classroom especially with the class names. Perhaps something as simple as renaming the class may have helped to pull out the roots of the -21 implications and instead focus on them as a class of individual students. Though I very rarely called the class by its -21 label (I can only recall 3 times where this occurred) I feel as though I didn’t do my best in diverting attention to their teacher/student labeling. I knew what the number meant for me as a teacher and the responsibility it entailed, yet I never took the time to really understand how it made the students feel until the final months of the school year. I was so conflicted with curriculum sequencing and my identity crisis as content and language teacher that I left no time to reflect on my students’ experiences beyond the surface.
DeleteSomething I am still unsure about is how to address these stereotypes, or whether to avoid them, as a means of empowering the students. I worry that bringing up stereotypes in a deeply personal context, as opposed to grounded in a character from literature for example, might encourage some kind of self-fulfilling prophecy much like the distinguishing of bias in Steele’s exams. Yet avoiding it almost ensures that they will become unknowing victims of the shackles of stereotyping without having the tools to reflect on how it actually is affecting their lives. I will also admit to my own fears of being in a predominately Dominican neighborhood as a Caucasian male and potentially being seen as a threat to my Dominican students’ very identities as though some educator-missionary. Yet I was pleasantly surprised by how well received I was by my students though also unnerved by their desire to have white physical characteristics (hair, eyes, etc.) as their own. It isn’t as though they are ashamed of their culture, so I wonder if they consciously identify or have been subconsciously conditioned to identify white features as “privileged” or if it truly is their own curiosity of me being the type of person not normally seen in the neighborhood.
4) I had no idea how close to home Delpit’s message would reach, so much so that it mirrors something I requested to add in a prepared speech discussing “character” for our school’s honor society. Aside from adding end rhymes to the provided lines, I also inserted my own statement derived from my own personal philosophy and spirituality: “[Character] is the harmony of what we are and hope to be and most importantly who we are eternally”. When inquired further by a colleague about my meaning, I said that I believe that even criminals or people that inflict pain and sorrow on others does not embody who those people are, but what they have become. It is therefore of great importance to allow these unique individuals in our classrooms to discover and rejoice in who they are so that it may inform who they become. I feel ashamed that I have yet found a way to marry my personal beliefs into my role as the teacher, instead focusing on the very things that Delpit warns against. The pressures of such things are real, but so are the repercussions of treating students as their roles and as data rather than the metaphorical snowflakes that they are. I also agree with Delpit’s encouragement towards asking “what do you know?” which I feel contradicts the constant bombardment for evidence found in the Common Core: where is the evidence in this text rather than where are the experiences found in each unique voice. Though I still have my conflicts with teaching “tolerance” as opposed to “acceptance” as the former seems more of a compromise to avoid conflicting beliefs, I think the overall message of giving the opportunity to students to share what they know to build upon mutual understanding is a more informed way to teach as teaching truly is a mutual learning experience.
DeleteWhile I often tried to tap into this in the Do Now’s of my lessons, which often went on longer than intended due to the personal investment, the students were often more demanding of a “right answer” rather than coming up with their own and defending it during the rest of the class. This brings to mind purely behaviorist tendencies of call and response and being “taught at” where there clearly has to be an answer that is more correct than others. I found myself caving into the “do you know what I know” mentality due to this demand, when I should have stood my ground and refused a correct answer (one of the few things that TLAC does right). I feel like there is so much more that my students could have taught me, though I am thankful for the opportunities that arose particularly from the Do Now’s that opened me up to my students’ cultures. I feel like this also relates to the active agent versus open participant argument that Delpit makes in how the students and myself included should be open to new perspectives on seeing the world as being acceptable rather than simply different.
Derek,
DeleteI think you raise a really important point about the stereotype discussion. It's a delicate line to toe, and we don't want to be over stepping our boundaries or the students' boundaries when we are having this discussion. I think what we can do is take advice from Delpit and get to know our students really well and then when we have the familiarity and the trust between teacher and student, we can have a real discussion with them about these stereotypes and how they can break them if they so choose. It's important to remember, however, that if we are going to have this conversation with the students, we should be aware of how that conversation will alter their reality, whether positively or negatively.
Especially with older students, if they have been living in a mindset for their entire life, throwing them a curve ball could create more tension for them and potentially derail them. However, they could also take the information and run with it and it could be really beneficial. We must be sensitive to the needs of the student, but we also have a duty to prepare them to the best of our abilities to the world around them.
Derek, I think you bring up an interesting point (under question #2) when you discuss this idea of labeling our students. Working in the education system for a year now has opened my eyes to many situations that I would consider "unfortunate". As educators and just smart and capable people we need to always be watching out for our ELLs. Recently I went to test a child. The parent of the child initially told the ENL coordinator that the first language is Spanish. For that reason we tested the child via the NYSESLAT. When I spoke to the child, they did extremely well and I couldn't help but think this child really wasn't dominant in the Spanish language. When I went back to the parent I knew that I needed to be careful because maybe this was a cultural thing and the parent wanted his child labeled as an ENL student for some reason or another. I had to explain that it seemed that the child was much more fluent in English and that it would benefit the child to be in a general education class. I was careful with my words because I didn't want them to think that the ENL label was ever a bad thing. The truth was that the student did not in fact speak or know much Spanish. Every day we unintentionally label our students (whether high, medium, low etc) and we need to be aware and careful that our students don't let that group or label affect their academic performance in a negative way.
DeleteDerek, I find the connection you draw between Noguera and your school (Question 1) interesting. I would love to hear how, if at all, the name change affects the preconceived notions teachers have. On the surface, a name change like this sends a clear message in my opinion. This is especially true if the reason you list is officially the motivation behind the name change. However, in reality, the name change might not change people's opinions. Your response shows that you have taken the time and made the effort to get to know your students. You understand the reasons why some students "do not focus" and why some do not want to achieve certain goals. Unfortunately, those who use the class name as a synonym for "difficult student" do not seem to have this understanding. It has been my experience that educators, especially experienced ones, can hold very persistent prejudice, and at least in some cases, a name change may not be enough to address this.
DeleteSuperb discussion, and powerful response, Derek. I was particularly struck by your comment that "bad behavior" doesn't represent the person, per se, but what they have become, and I would add "under a system of oppression."
DeleteAlso, in regards to your wondering about whether or not to address or ignore stereotypes, I always fall back on my belief that when we don't bring to light information, feelings, or beliefs, we give it a power that it doesn't deserve to hold. Ignoring stereotypes gives them a power that they SHOULDN'T have, and you take away the power when you can facilitate a discussion with your students that questions what they know, how they feel, and what they think they can do about it. This is the intersection of the sociopolitical critical consciousness. What is YOUR experience? Where does it come from? What can you ACTIVELY do to change things? These are powerful questions to ask your students, and in turn, it hands them the power in the situation rather than allowing the stereotypes to have power OVER them.
Philip
ReplyDelete1. All three articles investigate one or more factors that affect student achievement unfairly. Hair (2015) finds that children from lower-income households perform worse on standardized tests, in part due to differences in brain development, Noguera (2003) explores the negative ways in which racial separation in and outside of the school continues to affect students, and Steele (1997) discusses the devastating effects of stereotypes in the academic performance of women and African Americans. All of these findings align directly with my own experiences. I teach at a school in which almost all students are eligible for free lunch, almost all students are racial minorities, and more than half of the students are female. I have seen some of my students act violently and explain that this is a part of their identity. I have also seen some of my students not even attempt to answer a test question, because they believed themselves to be stupid based on their heritage. As a result of such actions, many students end up at a transfer school like the one where I work. While our school has its challenges like any other school, my colleagues and I do show some of the “wise” practices suggested by Steele (1997) and make serious efforts to break down racial segregation, as Noguera (2003) suggests. In fact, I believe that many of my students have experienced some culturally relevant education previously. The toughest part of all the issues discussed is that poverty, racism, and sexism prevail outside of the school, too. What this means for me is that I have to continue doing my best to address these issues while understanding that it often seems like an uphill battle.
2. As I mentioned, I have seen stereotypes lead students to think they are inadequate and give up before trying. At times, the stereotypes about what women or members of a certain race may or may not be able to accomplish are presented to me in the form of an excuse from a student. Many of my ELLs have told me they do not know how to write or that they do not understand any part of a reading. Without exception, they always prove themselves wrong after I encourage them to do their best. My ELLs’ low confidence is often paralleled by low expectations from staff. When teachers say “I just want him/her to get some of the basic facts out of the lesson,” they undoubtedly think that they are helping students by setting lower expectations. However, I often notice that the result is that a student is not sufficiently challenged. As a result, students may themselves settle to learn “just the basics” without aspiring for more. Other teachers think that students who came to the U.S. as immigrants should have an “immigrant work ethic,” comparing students not to their general education peers but to an unrealistic ideal. In either case, students are judged and marginalized because of it and they generally respond with absenteeism and disinterest. What is most problematic is that educators with the best of intentions may hurt their students unknowingly through the reinforcement of stereotypes.
Delete3. The articles do expand my understanding of my students. At the beginning of the program, I was focused on learning about the atrocities culturally insensitive teachers committed and about the “best practices” for me to use. My goal was and remains to become a better teacher, so I focused on classroom problems and classroom solutions. But as these investigators show, much of what we battle to overcome in the classroom every day are societal problems. The effects of racism, poverty, and sexism manifest in the classroom, among other places, but that does not mean that the problems are caused there. In fact, I believe the classrooms of my colleagues are among the more accepting places in the lives of many of our students. That being said, we still have a long way to go as a school. What I might do with this understanding is to bring more texts about these topics into the classroom. I do not think my students realize, for example, how substantial the stereotype threat can be. After investigating an issue like this, students could propose solutions for themselves and for society.
Delete4. Lisa Delpit discusses some of the same problems the aforementioned authors discuss, but she also discusses how educators can work to address them. Her urge to do something is powerful when she says that without action, we risk many more years of African American students who think that “multiplication is for white people.” Delpit stresses the importance of getting to know your students deeply. She emphasizes that this is essential, even if it appears that pushing through a Common Core aligned curriculum and preparing for high-stake tests takes is already more than what can realistically be accomplished. When teachers complain that there is no time to get to know students and that all instructional time must be used for delivering content, Delpit asks a question like “How has that been working out for you?” As other scholars would argue, instruction and getting to know students are by no means mutually exclusive. Rather, Delpit argues that the learning cannot take place successfully if teachers do not know their students and if students doubt their own abilities. Delpit addresses the audience when she says that their children do well because they believe in themselves as a result of their parents’ and educators’ confidence. Miss Delpit’s speech resonated with me. A colleague of mine recently warned us against using words like “these kids” and suggested thinking about them as “our kids.” The argument my colleague was making was that it is much more difficult to accept “my kids do not know how to write” or “my kids can’t even do simple math,” whereas it is easier to distance yourself from a statement about “these kids.” Delpit also suggests that educators should abandon the widespread focus on deficits, rather than assets. Connecting this to the previous point, it would be better to see how amazing it is, for example, that our ELLs are learning U.S. History in their second or third language rather than focusing on the difficulty they have in some areas.
I agree with your last point Phillip. During the past few days we've been showing students their Regents scores. I've noticed that teachers and students are so quick to point out what they see as failures. But for a student who moved here in December, began learning a new language, adjusted to life in and out of school, scoring a 40 on the Global History Regents can be seen as a serious accomplishment. I loved how Delpit urged educators to ask not what students don't know, but what they do know.
DeletePhilip,
DeleteI really agree with your point (# 3) about potentially bringing in texts to inform our students about these stereotypes and their negative effects. I think that when students have an understanding of how these stereotypes shape their lives and the lives of others they will be more likely to make a conscious decision about ignoring the stereotypes and being who they truly are. I also think that my students (also high school) generally are interested in texts that inform them about human nature, sociology, and psychology and thus would really enjoy this discussion topic after we complete some related readings.
Philip-- I think the example you give about ELLs learning U.S History is a good one. The fact that they are learning so much about the history of a country that is not even their home country, in a second or third language, is very impressive! The fact that they may be missing certain pieces of knowledge in that history that someone has deemed "critical," is maybe a shortcoming of much smaller proportion. That is a good example of the kind of thinking Lisa Delpits encourages educators to use: the kind that places attention on capability rather than disability.
DeleteGreat conversation. I agree that changing the language -- those/these kids versus our kids -- changes A LOT about how you see your own performance as an educator. Sometimes you may have to make that change on your own; it may not be an institutional change.
DeleteNoguera, Steele, and Hair et. al. each discuss implications of socioeconomic status on academic performance and identity formation. Using his son Joaquin’s narrative, Noguera stresses the ways that students’ developing racial identities impact their values, beliefs, and performance in school. He argues that the stereotypes associated with a specific race or class are internalized as students construct their identities. He writes “As they get older, young people also become more cognizant of racial hierarchies and prejudice, even if they cannot articulate the political significance of race. They can feel its significance, but they often cannot explain what it all means” (p.23). Though Steele’s piece is less anecdotal, he posits that students are not just exposed to stereotypes, but rather that they are threatened by them. For Steele, the danger in stereotypes is the fear and anxiety they produce in those who identify with the group the stereotypes mark. In Hair et. al., data supports the argument that the environmental factors caused by poverty (stress, lack of nutrition, little stimulation) negatively impact brain development. Taken together, it is clear that race and class affect students’ classroom performance. Hair et. al.’s research shows that, when born into poverty, students are at a disadvantage before they even step into the classroom. And in addition to the systemic forces that work against the children I teach, many have to spend time outside of school working or caring for younger relatives. Regardless of the value they place on education, they face obstacles outside their control. Despite this, I’ve watched many students thrive this year. While the articles present a reality-- one that certainly unfairly puts the students I work with at a disadvantage-- many students succeed despite this reality.
ReplyDeleteI think it’s important to note that Steele’s article is almost 10 years old. While many of the stereotypes he mentions have endured, the world they exist in has changed considerably in the last 10 years. I would be interested in reading a discussion of his theory that is situated in the context of today’s world.. That being said, I think it’s difficult to determine whether I’ve seen stereotype threat effect the students I’ve worked with this year. For example, I have one student who repeatedly claims (despite the fact that she’s passed three Regents as a freshman) that she is not going to college because no one in her family has gone to college. The student might be responding to anxiety she associates with stereotypes that say African American students don’t go to college. But I can’t say for sure what motivates the student to speak this way, though she continues to experience academic success. While this student is not an ELL, I did notice that some (not all) beginner ELLs only knew stereotypes of other groups, races and classes. Their knowledge of America was informed in these cases partly by movies, TV shows, and secondhand stories, where stereotypes are an integral part of the script. Endeavoring to eradicate stereotypes might be a lost cause. Students suffer when stereotypes are welcomed without reservation in the classroom, rather than acknowledged, discussed, and critiqued.
ReplyDeleteJamie,
DeleteI think you bring up a noteworthy point about Steele's article being almost ten years old and that the world we live in has changed considerably since its publication. For example, the stereotype of African American students not going to college was more prevalent ten years ago. However, I don't know if your student is claiming she will not go to college because of a stereotype or if college is just not a valued priority in her family/culture. Your story about this student also makes me think of Joaquin's attitude towards academic success during his adolescence and his attempted process of establishing a personal identity when all you know about becoming a man with your skill color comes from racial stereotypes. Perhaps your student thinks this is the correct attitude to have towards high education to fit in her identity.
Any information that contributes to a more complete understanding of students’ circumstances (filling in the many systems in Bronfenbrenner’s view of development, for example) helps to better understand them. I work with high school students, but regardless of the age, students are developing, negotiating and renegotiating their identities in our classrooms. Learning a new language and adjusting to life in a new place, this identity negotiation is arguably at its peak. Noguera admits that to an extent, he had to step back and let Joaquin go through this process on his own. Yet he lists steps educators can take-- things like mixing up classroom grouping, encouraging students to partake in activities they might usually ignore, incorporating culturally relevant curriculum and even simply getting to know students-- that serve as support. I plan to incorporate all of these steps into my teaching practice next year. Additionally, I can certainly do a better job of opening a dialogue about race, class, and the stereotypes associated with both next year.
ReplyDeleteSteele concludes his article by framing his discussion as a “predicament”. This predicament, he writes, is, “something in the interaction between a group’s social identity and its social psychological context, rather than essential to the group itself” (p.627). Delpit’s speech takes Steele’s discussion further by critiquing the limiting labels often placed on back and brown children from poor communities. Her actionable advice is simple-- learn about the students you teach. Regardless of the factors and systems working against them, students come to the classroom full of knowledge and experience. She claims that all children do learn, and unfortunately what they learn is sometimes “what larger society believes them to be”. Part of the work of educating, the argues, is to find out what it is that students have learned and use this to design and drive instruction. She presented this as the “intellectual challenge” of teachers. I appreciate this phrase because I think that often we get bogged down in discipline, behavior management, and administrative duties. It’s surprisingly easy to lose sight of the intellectual work we should be doing as teachers to impart content. I come from a place much different than my students, and because of this I think that it is all the more important for me to buy into Delpit’s argument. Getting to know my students and their families is the first step in designing culturally relevant teaching. This is something I will focus on from day one next year.
ReplyDeleteJaime, the same phrase stuck out to me in that speech; that often children unfortunately learn "what larger society believes them to be". It made me cringe because I sometimes think about how, while school is meant to be a great place, so often it can just be a place where students learn to conform to social norms and expectations. While I'm sure that most teachers are interested in bringing out students' individual creativity and personality, there is often so much stress and pressure in the school environment that teachers obsess more about control and management of the group. It makes our profession a very difficult one to reconcile and be at peace with, but I'm glad that there's clearly a serious and ongoing discussion being had about this, with people offering good actions for bringing us back to connecting with and nurturing who students are.
DeleteJamie,
DeleteYou bring up an excellent point when you said “we get bogged down in discipline, behavior management, and administrative duties.” This is so true, especially for all of us as first year teachers. Delpit’s video showcases why we need culturally relevant teaching. The challenge then comes on how to get to know our students. Each one of us has a culturally diverse classroom different from each other. Its encouraging to see you plan on taking Delpit’s argument on teaching into your practices next year.
Important conversation, and great connections.
Delete1.) All three articles give difference perspectives of the challenge minority students face in the classroom. The Hair article provides an explanation of how the brain of a student who is raised in poverty is affected negatively. Research shows that due to conditions associated with poverty, such as family instability, life stress, violence, and poor nutrition, children receive less cognitive stimulation and less brain development and as a result, lag behind those who are not raised in poverty by up to 20%. The Steel article gives insight on stereotypes and how specifically stereotype threat lowers student confidence which results in poor test performance. The Noguera article highlights racial identity and how it affects behavior and academia, specifically in the adolescence years.
ReplyDeleteAs a second grade push in ENL teacher in Corona Queens, many of my students live below the poverty line. The Hair article suggests that due to the work demands of parents who live in poverty, children receive lower amounts of parental nurturance and less cognitive stimulation. Although I am not qualified to make an assumption that some of my students are unable to answer high order thinking questions due to the lack of cognitive stimulation in their younger years, it is possible. Some students are unable to infer ideas from texts and follow simple routines that have been implemented since September. Although all of my students are learning English as a Second Language, some of them are lacking some cognitive abilities. Again, the ideas suggested in Hair’s article might be an explanation.
After reading about stereotype threat, it reminded me of a day when my students were doing an art project. The main teacher asked the students what color paper they wanted. She happened to have a lot of hot pink construction paper and asked the students to raise their hands if they wanted it. Almost all of the girls raised their hand in addition in one boy. The teacher said, ok all the girls want pink, oh and “Brian” too. I looked up and some of the students started to giggle. “Brian’s” face turned red and he began to cry. The main teacher immediately realized her mistake and tried to address the class that even if you are a boy you can like pink. However, her comments just made the situation worse. “Brain” eventually snapped out of it, but this was a clear example of how stereotype threat can cause a student to shut down and not want to participate in academic activities. In this case, the student’s emotion took over after he associated himself with the stereotypical color that pink is only for girls.
Though the Noguera is mostly aimed at the adolescent years, one quote that I found powerful is “academic success equals acting White.” At my school, on the second grade level, I have not come across this attitude with my students. Perhaps it is because they are too young and would be more prevalent perhaps in our 5th grade classes. My hope for my students is that they avoid this notion into middle and high school because academic success for all students regardless of their background.
2.) As a mentioned in my answer above, I have observed stereotype threat in the classroom. In the case of “Brain”, it was so painful to watch him go through the humiliation of a teacher pointing out he wanted the “girl” colored piece of paper. Although the teacher didn’t mean to make him feel that way, it happened. Before reading Steel’s article, I was not aware that concept of stereotype threat existed. I found it particularly interesting that stereotype threat affects students in the moment and that even those who do not associate themselves with the stereotype are affected.
DeleteAs ENL teachers, we must be aware to avoid stereotype threat to our students. I could see if we are working on oral skills with our students to say, “oh don’t worry, we all make mistakes. Everyone speaks with an accent.” What if a student who was feeling confident in their presentation is now nervous about speaking because they might make a mistake in English? What is someone makes fun of their accent? Again as ENL teachers, we must avoid such situations for students as it can negatively affect their confidence and stunt their academic progress.
3.) Again, as mentioned above, I feel that I had a good cultural understanding of my students coming into the school year due to previous life experiences. Being able to speak their L1 also helped me to relate to the students and also build rapport with my Spanish-speaking colleagues. These articles, in conjunction with the culturally relevant teaching video emphasizes how important is to know our students, not only culturally, but also socioeconomically and what stereotypes they might face.
DeleteIf I were working at a school in which the culture was less familiar to me, I would have had to work harder to understand my students. According to the demographic break down on the DOE website, though Spanish the most dominate L1 of ENL students in NYC, it is followed by Chinese, Bengali and Arabic speakers. If I had a classroom comprised mostly of Bengali speakers, for example, I would need additional research of the culture in order to relate to my students.
I also found the Hair article informative as I was unaware poverty actually affected brain development. Just knowing this is useful to understand why our students from low income areas may need additional support in the classroom, not only is second language acquisition.
4.) Lisa Deplit brings up an interesting point of when sharing her experience visiting Alaskan school children. She explained that when experiencing life, there is a difference between looking, touching and listening to something versus seeing, feeling and hearing. When engaging in the latter, you get to know the world around you fully. In addition, I found it interesting that in our American culture, when someone has a child, we ask the basic info such as how much did it weight, was it a boy or a girl. Other cultures ask, “who came?” This questions of asking “who came” reflects the importance that you can ask your student basic questions, but in order to connect with them culturally, it is important to really get to know them. Deplit also mentions that if we cannot build relationships with our students first, we really cannot be effective teachers. Personally, I feel I was able to build a great student-teacher relationship with one of my 4 classes this year. In this class I knew more about the kids, not only where they were from, but what they missed from home. What they liked to do and where they went on the weekends. I even saw one of my students a Science Museum and I was able to speak with her father outside of the school setting. Unlike most of my colleagues, I also walk in the neighborhood and when students see me they get excited. I feel that they view me as not only a teacher at the school, but as part of the community.
DeleteAs educators, it is important that we are open to learning about the community we work in. I feel very fortunate as I feel I have found a school whose culture I connect with. My school population is 95% Hispanic. I studied Spanish in college and was privileged to live in Mexico for a year working with kids at an orphanage. I was able to experience the culture like no textbook can teach. Working with my current students, I am able to connect with culture and what foods the like. I feel this has given me an advantage to teaching my students because a understand many of them. This video supports the notion that we cannot teach our students unless we know them. I encourage everyone to be open to getting to know the culture of their students in order to produce more learning opportunities and higher academic results.
Holly,
DeleteYour latter response about being part of the community as well as your experiences in Mexico being beyond the textbook brings up a fantastic point. Not only are you extending your own learning by indeed being a part of the community and through past experiences, but you may be able to apply this to your students. I feel that while it is important for students to have strong community ties, they don't often get the chance to reach out beyond the community. Bringing students outside of their comfort zone to see perhaps how another culture lives and immersing themselves in the environment may just be the senses beyond that you mention from Deplit. True understanding truly is beyond a textbook and real life experience can never be replaced in being a vehicle for understanding and an ignition for acceptance. I understand that this may not always be easy to accomplish due to school restrictions and such, but it is something worth considering as an educator of language and a mutual learner of culture.
1. All three articles by Noguera, Steele, and Hair et al., discuss a very important and still pressing issue within our classrooms. The educational impact that stereotypes have on the success of our students. Noguera discusses the disadvantage that stereotypes have on students in the classroom and how educators can rectify this learning gap by becoming aware of it and combatting it through different methods used in the classroom. Hair et al.’s article takes a statistical approach by illustrating the effect of socioeconomic status on students from research performed by The National Institutes of Health Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study of Normal Brain Development. Finally, Steele’s article discusses the different research and experiments he and his team performed on women and African and American’s to demonstrate how stereotypes hinder academic performance on standardized tests and school performance.
ReplyDeleteWhile reading these articles I was forced to reflect on my own practice this year. As a first year I think I could have easily done a better job being culturally responsive to the needs of my students within my classroom. The points that Noguera discusses in his article, about what educators can do is something that I will enact fervently this next year. As stated in the article “understanding and debunking racial stereotypes...challenging the hidden curriculum are tasks not just for teachers but for principals, admin, and entire school communities.” The suggestions posed within the article though brief are simple. First understanding what the stereotypes within our school’s culture are and then deconstructing them. My school the majority of the student population is Dominican. I have noticed this first year that there are certain stigmas within the Dominican population regarding the SES the students had within the Dominican Republic. There are also stereotypes surrounding the students who come from Puerto Rico and the middle east. Pushing for a community that fully understands the stereotypes at hand and then working together to remove them by (as the article states) not allowing students to racially segregate within our classrooms, encouraging students to operate outside of their “racial norms,” push to better understand the “history and culture” of the students, and finally, get to know our students on a deeper level.
Personally, I think we’re making strides in a good direction, by removing certain stereotypes that pervade our students’ academic performance. However, we can always do more and within the school environment it starts with us. We are responsible for their success. If the solution is in some cases as simple as being culturally responsive, then so be it.
2. Regarding Steele’s stereotype threat which he describes as a “strictly situational threat of negative stereotypes...which could apply to oneself in a given situation” is something that I have seen in various forms throughout this year. Specifically, working with ELLs I have noticed that some of my colleagues have labeled many of them “lazy” when it comes to school work. This is unfortunate because when they address the “laziness” issue with the ELLs they then internalize it that stigma and their academic confidence plummets. Unfortunately, what my colleagues are not seeing is that my ELLs are working twice as hard as any gen ed student is. For most of my students the time in the classroom is spent on translating all of the material, in their home language and then into Standard English, from Standard English they are translating that into English that they can more easily understand. This process takes a lot longer than that of a gen ed student, who only has to go through one process. Once an ELL is called lazy for that they get discouraged because they are working really hard and therefore give in to the stereotype by giving up on themselves. Instead of seeing their struggle as a success Teachers and ELLs are seeing it as a failure.
Delete3. The information gathered from the 3 texts would have been greatly beneficial to my work this year before stepping foot inside the classroom. Though a lot of the material presented seems kind of obvious, negative perceptions of our students lead to negative academic performance, the articles help put that into a better perspective. They, in a way, make stereotypes in the classroom more personal. I see my students, I see their struggles, and I see how much of an impact a negative stereotype has on them. Knowing that there is tangible evidence proving that stereotypes can impact their performance so much would have been an asset to helping my students academically.
DeleteKnowing what I know now will help me next year to be culturally relevant. I will better understand the background of my students, their insecurities, their struggles, and how to work to overcome them within my classroom next year.
4. In her speech, Lisa Delpit discusses the reoccurring theme stereotypes within the classroom and its impact on academic success of our students. She brings up some insightful points of how to approach the classroom by being culturally relevant to our students and to their backgrounds. Which I think is very important. Unfortunately, (and I’m sure this will be an unpopular opinion) I don’t necessarily think I will apply her approach to my classroom. I disagree much with HOW she approached the students. The way she talked about the students she seemed to me to be viewing the students as “other.” Her labels of the students as “Alaska Natives” and as other students as “the whites” are insensitive and in my opinion prejudice.
DeleteAdditionally, she kept describing her experience teaching the students as being able “to see through their eyes” in theory that’s nice, but incorrect. As much as one thinks they are able to fully take on the perspective of their students, they’re wrong. We can try as educators to really embody and understand the lives of our students, but because of who we are, our OWN backgrounds, we’ll never be able to. The best we can do is empathize and view our students as people, as individuals. Our students have their own experiences, perspectives, insights, etc. that we can embrace and learn from, but certainly not speak to the level of comfortability that she was.
She was also discussing her approach to the classroom as a cosmos. We’re all spiritual beings “expanding” and existing within this “cosmos.” That's all well, and good, if you believe that, but I feel that that spirit science mentality has little to no application in our classrooms. Our students have very real experiences that occur in very real situations, in most cases doesn’t involve the idea of celestial bodies co-existing in an expanding cosmos. I think that it is relatable to my students.
Good response, Dana. I agree that having this information is incredibly important before you step foot in a classroom, and it's one of my frustration with these types of programs who don't view adolescent development courses as vital to have as one of the first before you go into a classroom.
Delete1. Noguera discusses Joaquin’s story and how “he felt the need to project the image of a tough and angry black man” (Noguera 21). He talks about how adolescence is a time when people discover their racial identities and how that affects their lifestyle and their behavior in school. Hair discusses how brain structure and development are affected by factors such as poverty, stress and nutrition. Steele talks about how different stereotypes influence identity and performance particularly for African Americans. I believe that my students are very aware of racial differences. My school’s guidance counselor was talking to my 7th grade students about high school applications for next year and he was encouraging them to apply to the top schools. He told them that the brightest students get in and that he thought they should apply. Most of the class seemed very discouraged and one student said “They’re probably all rich white kids.” This shows me that they think of education as something that is tied to class and race.
ReplyDelete2. I believe that I have witnessed Steele’s stereotype threat, which is the threat that others’ judgments or their own actions will negatively stereotype them in their domain (Steele 613). I found the math stereotype interesting because as a student I excelled in mathematics and I remember living that stereotype. Many people found it odd that a female was the top math student. Specifically working with ELLs, educators should always highlight the importance of culture diversity and focus on celebrating all cultures. No student should ever feel ashamed of their country or origin. Educators should create gender and race equitable classrooms that welcome all students. Teachers should make students aware that their challenges in school are often part of a normal learning process rather than something that is exclusive to them or their racial identity. This requires a great amount of respect and self reflection.
3. Yes, this information would have helped me better understand my students. I am a White female and I have not felt the oppression that many of my students have experienced because of their race. I think these articles would have led me to better understand the stereotypes that my students face and to explore what can be done to abolish these stereotypes. Moving forward to my second year of teaching, I can focus on how to show my students that their racial identities matter and that I believe in them no matter what race they are. Through patience and kindness I can connect to my students on a personal level and this will help me to work with them and to inspire them.
I identify with what you said in response #3. I am also a white female, and cannot even begin to imagine the oppression that many of my students have faced. Because I was part of the majority, powerful group, developing my racial identity was not so much of a struggle. I also what to affirm my students' racial identities. I was encouraged by Noguera's comment that "Differences in race, gender, or sexual orientation need not limit a teacher's ability to make a connection with a young person" (pg. 29).
Delete1. There is no doubt that a student’s race and class impact his/her performance in the classroom. The reasons for how and why race and class impact student performance is what varies. Noguera seems to argue that when students struggle to create/accept their racial identity, their academic performance is negatively impacted. Noguera points out that in adolescence, students are trying to establish an independent identity, and that identity is very dependent upon being accepted and affirmed by their peers. Therefore, when students feel that because of their race or class, they are expected to act a certain way, they live in to it. His approach is all based in the social aspect of a student. Steele also backs up a social explanation as to why race and class impact students. He stresses that the causes of achievement are situational, especially when the situation involves stereotype threat. Hair et.al takes a much different approach, and provides evidence showing how race and class can biologically alter the brain, causing students from lower SES to perform at lower levels. In my classroom, I see a combination of the arguments offered by Noguera and Steele. I think that both social/environmental factors impact the ways in which my students learn. This year, I’ve had experiences with many adolescents (I teach 7th grade) who are more than capable at achieving academically, but do not view their grades/school/learning as an important part of their lives. It has been difficult to motivate these students! I’ve heard these students express that doing well in school isn’t “cool”. Because of their current developmental state, what their peers think of them strongly informs their actions!
ReplyDelete2. I have definitely seen the stereotype threat at play, especially during testing season this past April. All year, my students express fear of the test, saying that they always fail. As the tests loomed closer, many of my students were anxious about it weeks in advance. I had one student (who earned a 70% in math class this year!) have to leave the room during the math state test because she was having a complete melt down. This student was capable of passing the test, but she has learned (over her time in the public school system) that students like her don’t (minority, female, low SES) do not do well on tests.
3. The information (especially from the Noguera article) definitely helped me better understand my students. I have watched many minority students seemingly waste their potential and not make school a priority this year – and I’ve struggled to understand why. I think I’ve been witnessing exactly what Noguera saw with his son. Many of my students are struggling to understand their racial identities…all the while, they are being sent many social messages and cues from the world around them. As I go into my second year of teaching, I hope to support positive racial identity in my students. I will use Noguera’s suggestion of having students from different backgrounds work together – as, “…this approach is often far more effective than holding an abstract conversation about tolerance or diversity” (pg 28).
4. Lisa Delpit gives a very active way of employing culturally relevant teaching. She says what really matters is getting to know who your students are – not what they are. I like how she emphasized that we need to se our students are inherently capable, knowledgeable, and brilliant. I also liked when she said, “I cannot teach you unless I know you.” I see myself as a teacher who more naturally takes this approach. I want to get to know my students, and I hope that my classroom is a place where they feel affirmed and valued.
Rachel,
DeleteI definitely connect with you on the topic of testing. My students were terrified to take the NYSESLAT as well as other state tests (math, ELA, science). They have a fear of failing and they often do not think they are smart enough to pass. They know they attend a school that is in a low income neighborhood and they internalize stereotypes. They think that smart students go to schools in rich neighborhoods. Their thoughts on this topic are heartbreaking. I will continue to push for their motivation and their inspiration to increase and show them that they can do anything as long as they believe in themselves and work hard.
Regarding your response to question 4. I agree with you and Delpit's sentiment about not being able to teach students unless we "know" our students. However I don't necessarily think that its accurate either. People can learn from others without knowing them. As the articles have demonstrated its about being confident in yourself, not believing negative stereotypes about yourself and not embodying them. I think that knowing our students is a huge asset to their success in the classroom, but it's not the only asset that gets them to learn. People give talks all the time, people teach all the time, I don't "know" all of these people, but I learn from them.
Delete1. Hair’s central argument is that children born in lower SES tend to have less developed gray matter in the brain; the cause of this deficiency has been linked to “environmental circumstances of poverty, such as stress, limited stimulation, and nutrition.” Steele’s argument is that there are various “negative stereotypes” that exist in society. These stereotypes regarding race, gender, and SES tend to pose a “stereotype threat” that can really endanger the identity of an individual in a process known as “disidentification.” These negative stereotypes usually surround the cultural assumptions that certain races, genders, and SES cannot or should not hold a particular identity (or career path) because it goes against what is acceptable or encouraged by society. Steele provides data to prove that these stereotypes have a measurable impact on individuals’ lives. Common predictors of success, such as graduation rate and SAT scores, are not as predictive amongst certain races, genders, and SES. In other words, although a student might graduate or have a high SAT score, they statistically far less likely to experience success when compared to their white, high SES, male counterparts. This is believed to be the result of negative stereotypes. Noguera’s article holds a similar argument to Steele but with a first person narrative approach in explaining personal experiences and the experiences of his son from a parent’s perspective. He argues that he and his son struggled in school due to the fact that the identity of the African American male youth around him pressured him to act in a similar manner.
ReplyDeleteMy argument, quite similar to the argument of these three authors is that my students certainly are affected in various ways by their race and their socioeconomic status. Over the course of the year, I have had the opportunity to really get to know my students as they have shared a great deal of information about their culture, community in New York, and families at home and in their home country. Many have shared that being from a lower SES has caused them and their family personal stress as a result of language constraints, economic constraints, and social constraints. It is clear from what my students have shared with me and what I have seen, that they struggle academically and socially as a result of SES and race. They consistently ask me about my views on Donald Trump and the negative stereotypes that many associate with immigrants. Living amongst this political sentiment, it is not surprising that many of my students do not feel as though they are entirely welcome. Thus, their hesitation to adopt American cultural norms of college and high school academia are not particularly surprising. My students have shared that they often face criticism amongst their community and (predominantly) Dominican culture if they are too dedicated to schoolwork or academic career goals. The reality I have seen is a mix of the bio-neurological differences (often caused by stressors and environment) discussed by Hair and the socio-cultural influences (stereotyping and identity formation) discussed by Steele and Noguerra.
2. I teach 9-12 grade predominantly low-income students that have arrived from the Dominican Republic in the last five years. When I get to know these students on an individual level, I can see that they have profound career and academic goals for themselves. However, being a strong student that does all of their work carries a negative stereotype for many students. I have seen that this stereotype is stronger for boys than it is for girls as well. Boys in class that perform well may be teased and mocked for doing well. It is often linked in a negative stereotype to masculinity, that they are less masculine because of their academic drive. There is also a negative stereotype that some of my students have discussed surrounding college aspirations. Because many of my students come from families where neither parent has attended college, it is common for many students to assert that they are not going to college in order to escape the negative stereotype of being somewhat elitist that is at times associated with college.
ReplyDeleteAs educators, I think that it is crucial that we consider how the choices we make and the things we say may affect our students. I think one of the ways that I and other educators can further the use of negative stereotypes to shape the identities of our students is by not addressing them. I think that we should share this information with our students, allow these stereotypes and their effects to be known by our kids. By equipping our students with this knowledge, they are more likely to make a conscious choice not to be effected by them.
3. Based on my work this year, this information would have most certainly helped me to better understand my students. Coming in to the school year, many teaching fellows had an abbreviated introduction into the classroom that equipped us solely with techniques provided by the “Teach Like a Champion” (TLAC) textbook. These TLAC techniques focused on the standards and “student growth” in terms of numbers and performance but did not address culture at all. There was no discussion of the effects of negative stereotyping, culturally responsive instruction, or developmental differences of the brain along class and SES. It is largely through trial and error and reading articles such as these at the end of the year that I am recognizing how critical this information is for any educator (particularly those that teach minorities and students of low SES). Without this information, we cannot truly understand our students and what drives them to be the individuals they present themselves as in the classroom. I remember how difficult it was for me to understand why some students would be eager to demonstrate their intellect in certain settings while refusing to show their abilities in other settings. It was not until I got to know these students and recognize the negative steretypes they are affected by, and the stressors that they regularly face that I began to understand why they acted this way. As I move on to my second year of teaching, I recognize that this information is very important for me to continue to consider. I realize that if I am going to be able to help my students to succeed, I will need to understand their identity and what causes the development of their identity in various ways as a result of various factors (of which SES and race plays a huge role).
I think your mention of TLAC is crucial to our development as teachers. Last summer, we were trained in a way that works very well in schools that do not need to address cultural or socioeconomic differences. These robotic methods do not allow us to fully understand the needs of our students or how culture affects them both inside and outside of the classroom.
DeleteGreat responses. Thank you!
Delete4. I really enjoyed Lisa’s examples of how students (from Alaska, Africa, and various places in the U.S.) learn differently based on their culture. The examples helped me to tangibly recognize some of the problems with the admittedly non-culturally responsive teaching methods that I may be using. One thing that really resonated with me was how an extensive focus on the standards can inhibit culturally responsive teaching. Being as my school is so focused on standards based instruction and I am striving to receive high teacher ratings, I am always crafting lesson activities to fit the standards in order to help my students achieve. Lisa’s commentary on how an unending focus on the standards actually inhibits our students’ learning because it limits our connection to our students really resonated with me. I think this resonated with me so profoundly because I have experienced it throughout the course of the year. It took me a considerable amount of time throughout the year to really get to know my students because I was so standards focused. It was only when I really knew my students and they understood my motivations as their teacher that they truly started to show growth. I need to continue to build time into my lesson to understand my students and the culture they bring with them into the classroom. As Lisa points out, I need to ask myself “who is coming in?” rather than the traditional questions of just what NYSESLAT score do they have? what does their IEP state? What do the other teachers say about them? These types of questions really limit my ability to connect and understand the cultures and types of learners in my room. And so, although I may feel the administrative pressures of standards, grouping, and generalizations, I must hold true to taking the time to get to know my students so that I can be truly culturally responsive.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete1.) These three arguments can be applied to my classroom and possibly any classroom with a student that has a different SES, gender, ethnicity or culture than another student. Differences in achievement based on standardized testing, graduation rates and teacher retention is why all of us Teaching Fellows are here. If there wasn’t this achievement debt between different ethnicities and socio-economic statuses of students, then the DOE would not have a need to subsidize and fast track our teacher education. But the idea that all students should learn at the same rate and have the same level of success if they are in the same class is preposterous, and these articles seek to find answers to what is so different about the preposterous. Hair et. al looked for answers in differences in the structure of the brain, Steele looked at the effects of stereotype threat and Noguera looked at the effects of self-identity within a group of associated with a certain stereotype.
ReplyDeleteHair et. al, performed a study to check out if there was a difference in the structure of the brain of children with low SES that was equating to the low standardized test scores and achievement gap. Their study found that there was significant atypical gray matter development that affected the areas (like frontal lube, hippocampus and and temporal lobe). The stresses of poverty, the lack of stimulation and lack of nutrition translates into deficits in these parts of the brain that help process educational functioning like sustained attention, focus, cognitive flexibility. Of course we can all clearly see the that nutrition, lack of adequate sleep and emotional stress end up affecting student behavior and educational success, but I never thought it actually affected the brain.
Though I don’t believe we can pay back the achievement debt with Doug Lemov’s die-hard discipline at the tip of his disco finger, I do believe that a teacher can help lower the affective filter by having routines that alleviate stress. Those students with low SES brain functions are already prone to structural differences because of stress, so my job is to make it a calm and consistent environment.
I also took that lowering stereotype threat and aiding in the students’ negotiation of their identities go had in hand, by creating a classroom culture of a community of learners symbolized in a persona that is absent of racial ties (i.e., superheroes, scholars etc.) that say “We rock!” or “We can conquer anything!”
Steele’s article articulated the findings of a couple studies done with both females in math achievement and african americans on standardized testing, both which are domain in which those two groups of people have been stereotyped as inferior, and thus do poorer on tests compared to the male gender for the females and white for the african americans. This is because, as Steel acknowledges, that the threat of the stereotype reflecting the group in which they identify is enough to lower performance. They are especially low performing when the tests are difficult or the test questions have race specific examples.
One of my colleagues, in a 5th grade class with a mix of Dominican, african-american, puerto rican and middle eastern students, has the highest math test scores of the school and the Bronx. Kids at this school range from 1-3 on the state tests, but her students across the board get no less than a 3 and mostly 4’s. She uses group work in almost all her classes, as well as created a culture of “nerds”. They call themselves “nerds” proudly and have the classroom decorations and parties as such. I think their high level of achievement is in part because her classroom culture is known throughout the school, and being in that class begins to create a positive stereotype for the students in it. The students do well regardless of gender, SES or ethnicity and their community is based on something culturally neutral like nerds.
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ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed Deplit's speech on diversity in education. Deplit discusses the importance of teachers finding joy in teaching students of diverse backgrounds. I agree with this statement because all students matter and it's a great thing when different cultures come together and learn from one another. Deplit stresses the point of seeing, hearing, and feeling rather than looking, listening, and touching. She makes a significant point by telling us that we have to be open to the world and let the world come to us to truly understand and learn from our environment. This reminds me of the African term Ubuntu which means that each of our humanities are tied and connected to one another. What we do as individuals doesn't just affect us but it affects everyone. I always keep that in mind because I want to connect to the humanity of my students and I want to be empathetic towards them. By putting myself in their shoes, I can see the world through their eyes and receive a different perspective that will help me to teach them more effectively. I try to see my students as individuals and not just as a group of students. Deplit raises a good point about new babies and how they are referred to as "things". This is wrong because we need to recognize humans as individuals from the time they are born; not just when they become adults. We have to ask open ended questions such as Deplit's "What do you know?" rather than "Do you know what I know?". This will allow us to make further connections with our students and enhance our teaching.
1) These three articles have to do with the effect of socioeconomic background and race on a child’s development and success in school. In the article by Hair et al., low financial resources are tied to structural differences in the frontal lobe, temporal lobe, and hippocampus of developing children. In the tests they performed, they found children from financially disadvantaged families had lower gray matter volumes in those areas of the brain. The hypothetical causes they offer to explain this phenomenon include higher levels of stress, lower levels of nurturing, worse nutrition, and less cognitively stimulating environments.
ReplyDeleteThe Noguera and Steele articles are centered on the effect of race and identity on a child’s performance in school. Noguera discusses the way children begin to develop an awareness of race, and how that emerging awareness, intermixed with stereotyping and bias, can affect their own identity and relationship to school. Steele discusses what he calls the “stereotype threat:” basically, the influence of a negative racial stereotype on one’s self-identification, peer grouping, and relationship to school.
The issue of how race and class affect student performances is one that no one has a great answer to. In the end, there is a very complex array of factors by which race and class affect academic ability or output. I could tell you that I am sure the socioeconomic status of my students has a negative impact on their performance relative to state standards. I could make claims about stereotypes and expectations of Latinos growing up in urban environments. But those seem like very large brushstrokes to use for an issue with so much individual and familial variation.
I do not have brain images for my students, so Hair et al. is not a great jumping off point. However, I can absolutely speak to their lack of nutrition, and to the fact that many of them have stressful home lives. My kids are in 4th grade and predominantly Latino. I don’t know that they have a strong grasp on racial issues. I know that they are aware of race, and that it connects to inequality (they would not use those words) but I don’t think they have a very nuanced understanding yet. I also don’t think they are at the stage of adolescence where a lot of what Noguera and Steele discuss comes into play.
2) As for Steele’s stereotype threat, I don’t really see that where I work. The students are young and the vast majority of them are Latino. As Noguera notes, kids growing up in less diverse contexts will be slower to develop their racial schemas. I think that situation may apply to my students. I don’t think they have really reached the developmental stage in which they might be strongly affected by negative bias towards Latinos. When they are, I imagine the strongest negative stereotype they will have to encounter will mainly have to do with expectations. I think in general, growing up Latino without too many resources, the general expectation is that they will grow up, graduate high school, have a family, and work lower-class jobs. Seeing and setting a path beyond those expectations is a difficult and ambitious task that could set one in opposition to his/her peer group.
3) I don’t think this information would have helped me better understand my students. I think it is clear that socioeconomic status and race have a profound effect on children’s development. Negative stereotypes can have a sinister effect on expectations and identity. But at the same time, each student has her own microcosm. I think the best way to attempt to understand anyone is to start at zero. Over the course of 180 days together, you end up learning a lot more about people through experience and interaction then you could have possibly surmised from the outset based on demographics and probabilities. Yes, it is important to understand the influence all these factors could and probably will have on someone. At the same time, I don’t know that it makes you a more prepared teacher coming in with all kinds of notions about disadvantage and stereotype threat and all these lurking, insidious beasts that lay in wait of poor, unsuspecting urban youth. It makes you a better academic, a better social scientist, not necessarily a better teacher.
ReplyDelete4) As Lisa Delpit says: “if we really want to educate low income and culturally diverse children, I believe we must learn who the children are, not focus on what we assume them to be.” She goes on to say that as teachers, we have to work to counteract the negative stereotypes that kids will begin to internalize, consciously or not. She says we have to understand our content areas, and our students, in order to teach them effectively. We have to see our students as already full of knowledge and capability, and meet them where they are. “If we don’t take time to know students and build relationships—standards just don’t work.” I think these points are incredibly important. At many points this year, wielding a curriculum I didn’t understand, plowing determinedly through units of study, I missed my students completely. A masterful teacher will look closely at these units, look closely at his students, and then adapt the units in a way that interests the students, draws on what they know, and pushes them towards appropriate areas of development. I think you can only do that well if you really know your students—both academically and personally.
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ReplyDeleteAfter reading these three articles it is evident that race and identity play major roles in our students’ learning process and futures. In Hair et al’s article we see that poverty can greatly affect the brain development of a child. Poverty can have a severe influence on language. Additionally grey matter tissue in the brain is likely to be vulnerable to early environments. If this grey matter is affected, these areas of the brain are believed to have an important role in cognitive abilities that are critical for school readiness. I read this article and then considered the students that I taught this year. Many of my students live below the poverty line. My entire school qualifies for free lunches and in many cases, our students rely on the school as a safe haven, where they can grow and develop. For example, one of my (African American) students would come to school in a tee- shirt on a daily basis. In the middle of winter, he would turn to me and say he was cold. I would continuously tell him that he needed to remind his dad to provide him with a warm sweatshirt. The next day he would arrive without said sweatshirt and I wasn’t sure why since it seemed that he wore different clothes each day. He seemed tired and cold and was clearly distracted from the day’s lesson. While his background was even more complicated than I can state here, this small thing, like a sweatshirt was unfortunately distracting and taking away from his daily learning time. I quickly became frustrated but knew that my only option would be to keep this child moving. I began implementing more TPR in my lessons so that he would keep moving and thus more distracted and more physically active. He no longer had time to think about how cold he was.
Noguera argues that racial identity also plays a crucial role in school-related behaviors. Students try to identify with their cultural background while either fitting in or diverting from stereotypes at school. In kindergarten this is not very prevalent but I did have to deal with this last summer when I taught 8th grade history to my summer school students. I found it very interesting that they would rather identify with their peers than with “a scholarly identity.” Many of my students were so afraid of doing well and standing out that they acted out just to “fit in”. Noguera argues that Joaquin was in fact trapped by stereotypes, and they were pulling him down. Even though his father and family was aware of the situation it was hard to get through to him and really attack the issue at hand. I think this is extremely relevant especially because I tried to get through to my students last year. I wanted them to want to be in school because it is in fact “the cool thing” and I had to figure out ways to make answering the questions correctly or raising your hand, the right thing to do and not the “white thing to do”. It also helped that I had a co-teacher in the room who came from a very different background and could relate to my students and encourage them as well.
1. These three articles discussed correlations between race and academic achievement from three different viewpoints. The first, in Joaquin’s Dilemma, the author spoke about how identity is a major factor in how students develop themselves throughout schooling years, especially for minority students. “Black students from all socioeconomic backgrounds develop ‘oppositional identities; that lead them to view schooling as a form of forced assimilation to White cultural values,” (Noguera). Steele’s article looked at racial and gender inequities from the standpoint of stereotypes and how they directly threaten the achievement of women and African Americans. The third, Hair, et al., correlates the biological brain developments of students living below the poverty line with their academic achievements.
ReplyDeleteThese three researchers talked about something that is known in many educators’ periphery. Over the course of this year, I have seen how each of these developments has affected my students in the classroom. It is important to note, however, that within each one of these rules, there are a great many exceptions. According to my own observations this year these conclusions are valid and observable. However, the students that decided to deem education as valuable break all of these molds and have done exceptionally well this year.
Some of the studies talked about in these articles look at the students from racially integrated schools. At my school, which is mostly Black and Latino students (with one Asian student, one Middle Eastern student, and no White students), I wonder if the study about identity (Noguera) would at all be altered because the students are working to achieve within their own racial group and are not being filtered to higher or lower level classes based on race. All of the classes are integrated with the population that we have.
I found all three of these arguments important as an educator, especially as a first year. It’s important for us to remember that there are many factors that are at work within our educational system—not only as a country but as a city as well. And we have the power to alter that reality.
2. I have seen many societal stereotypes threaten my students’ ability to do well in the classroom. In terms of non-ELLs, I have heard some teachers make offhand comments (not in the presence of the students) about how they’re not going to be able to do well because of their background or where they come from. I see the preconceived biases becoming a detriment to the students’ academic achievements.
In terms of the ELL population at my school, throughout this year, the most prevalent stereotype that I’ve witnessed about our ELLs by other teachers is that they “can’t understand.” Teachers have told me that there’s no way that some students will understand what’s going on because they don’t speak English. After reading the article, I suspect that I’ve seen the stereotype threat hinder some of my ELL student’s ability to achieve in classrooms where there is no ELL co-teacher or classes where they do not have support to breakdown the material.
1. (continued)
ReplyDeleteIn Steele’s article, he argues that African Americans and women face achievement barriers due to the idea of domain identification. Again this is not something I deal with in Kindergarten but it definitely made me think about how I’m going to look at my students as I continue to move up and work with the older grades. Unfortunately many of these stereotypes are in place and either must be broken or challenged. I think that as educators we have the responsibility to inform our students and speak openly about these stereotypes. I found it interesting to learn that if the student identifies with a certain domain they may in fact do poorly and this pressure may actually affect their performance. In many respects I believe this holds true. For example, last summer many of my students had very little faith in their academic achievements. They figured they would fail anyway, so why try. The tests and assignments given out were challenging and they thought they were already destined to fail. This was obviously upsetting but made me realize that so many of these students either had no role model or did not identify with school. As Steele discusses, academic identification is important. He further explains that school achievement depends on identifying with school. This means students must form a relationship between themselves and the domains of schooling. I agree with this argument and realized that even last summer, in my first few weeks of real teaching, that I tried to reach my students and engage them in such a way that would inherently make them want to keep coming back. This could be through a cultural connection, an anecdote from their teacher’s life etc; forming some sort of bond or allowing them to make that connection was critical.
3. Looking back over the year, this information would have definitely helped inform my teaching practices. I believe that I had these ideas in my head since before I started teaching but perhaps only a surface understanding of why minority students struggle to achieve in school. I think that being able to read this information from a scientific point of view breaks it down so that educators can pull from the data and create supportive and unbiased classroom environments in which students can grow and learn. I believe if I had read Steele’s article previous to the school year, I would have been much more cognizant to the severe detriment preconceived notions can be on a student and a population. Over this year, my students have shown me how wrong people can be about a social class. Many of my students struggled and continue to struggle with many of the factors discussed in these articles, and yet they refuse to let being from a certain SES or racial group stop them from achieving their potential. I am so glad that I saw this during my first year of teaching. Many say that the first year of teaching is extremely difficult, especially in Title 1 schools. However, after watching my students achieve more than what society expects of them, I can take these lessons that my students taught me and give them to my next set of students, and maybe those students can go even further then their predecessors.
ReplyDelete4. “I cannot teach you unless I know you.” This beautiful quote from Lisa Delpit was one of the most important takeaways I got about how to integrate culturally relevant teaching in the classroom. She talked eloquently about ways for educators to really teach the children, instead of just talking at them. I believe that understanding and really knowing the students is one of the best practices that we can do as educators in order to truly intrench our teaching with culture. This stems from her other important point--asking the students what they know, instead of asking them to know what I know.
Building these two together, educators can build responsive and inclusive classrooms that use knowledge from each student rather than just the person standing in the front of the class. I am firm believer, and have told my students quite often, that every person you meet in this life will know something that you don’t. I tell them this in reference to myself, in reference to their friends, in reference to their families because it’s one of the most important pillars of education for me--we each must be willing to listen to others in order to grow our horizons and expand our thinking. It is a struggle sometimes to not just take the easy way out and teach students in the way of “you should know what I know” and move on down the Common Core State Standard list. Everyone should be open to learning what others know; especially as educators we need to show that what our students know is relevant and important to our world both inside and outside the classroom.
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ReplyDeleteRegarding Steele’s stereotype threat, I believe this is something I may have witnessed a few times this year. Some of the classes I sat in on at my school and subbed for were full of Asian students. In many situations, it was evident that the Asian students were stereotyped as the “smarter ones” in the classroom. I could feel tension in the room rising if I called on a student and they could not give an answer or did not have one. In this case, Steele refers to this as “spotlight anxiety”. Thus students felt anxiety because they were in a situation that has relevance to their own self-definition. In no way did they want to be looked down upon but they felt pressure to answer correctly and achieve success because that is what the stereotype portrays.
I believe that as educators working with ELL’s we may tend to reinforce certain stereotypes but we must be aware of what exactly we are stereotyping. For example, going into this school year thinking that Asian students were going to be more obedient was not necessarily true. I found this out fairly quickly and had to come to terms with the stereotypes in my own head. Ultimately, whether we realize it or not we are doing this with all of our students. We need to be aware of their situations and how we view them. Students will notice how they are treated in comparison to the other students in the classroom. We do not want them to resent us for picking on certain students or challenging others because we think they might have more potential than another student of another cultural background.
3. Based on my work this year, this information would have definitely helped me better understand my students and their futures or at least their parents and family situations. What really struck me was when Steele divulged the various features of stereotype threat. He goes on to explain that to experience stereotype threat, one need not believe the stereotype nor even be worried that it is true of oneself. The quote in the article references the social psychologist James M. Jones and how he feels self- conscious when he goes to the ATM and sees a woman there. He immediately thinks about his actions and how that woman might see him. I think it is important to consider that as much as we are worried about how our students view us as teachers, our students and their parents are equally worried about fitting a specific stereotype. Many are concerned about their child and want to make sure they are on the right reading level. They get embarrassed if they cannot speak English and try to distance themselves from their child by even questioning how their child learned English in the first place. I find this to be very interesting and realized quickly that many parents do not come to parent-teacher conferences not necessarily because they don’t care but because they don’t think there is a way to communicate with the teacher. Even some parents are intimidated by the teacher because in their culture teachers are considered prominent characters in society.
4. After watching the speech by Lisa Delpit and listening to her talk about culturally relevant and culturally responsive teaching it made me think about how we cannot take our responsibility lightly. Our job as educators is the most challenging but can also be the most rewarding. In her speech she brings up examples about a specific group in Alaska. Unlike America, when a baby is born they say “who came”. I found to be very interesting because it isn’t just about the weight, size or gender of the baby. It is a deeper connection to who they are and who this human being will turn into. With that being said it reminded me to continue learning about my students. Their likes and dislikes in addition to their culture makes them who they are. We cannot be close- minded and make excuses for getting to know our students. I also agree with when she says “if we don’t take the time to get to know them, no curriculum will work”. Delpit finally closes by speaking about a healer that she met years ago. The healer said to her upon their initial meeting “I can’t heal you unless I know you.” I wholeheartedly agree that without knowing who are students are and connecting with them at this deeper level we will not be able to teach them and impart knowledge in a way that will actually expand their minds.
ReplyDeleteThis all seems obvious, but it is so crucial to our work as teachers. We must be able to look past stereotypes and know each student as an individual.
Delete2.) This year I worked as a push-in teacher and worked with 6 different co-teachers, which I had to work around the culture that they already created in their classroom. One class in particular I saw my that the teacher calling of the ELLs as “low” or making such a big deal of the reading levels created a culture that allowed for my ELLs to start independent work with groans, and comments like “I’m dumb” or “yea, we’re the dumb kids”, “we can’t read” or “we’re the lowest levels of the class”. This translated especially into their tests. These kids have already felt the negative affects of stereotype threat of being ELLs at a low reading level, in many eyes, destined to move slow and fail the state exams.
ReplyDeleteThe baseline tests were the most frustrating, my kids would get these baseline tests and then yelled at for not trying. I always asked the general ed teachers why they needed to be handed rigorous 4th grade material at the beginning of each unit when my kids were still learning sight words in English. I feel like those baseline tests should be given at the teacher’s discretion or given an alternative one in which you could ask similar questions about the Boston Tea Party or whatever content they want to gain prior knowledge on, with the aid of pictures and simpler text. If the point is to assess their knowledge on the material yet they don’t have access to what they’re being asked, then how do we know what they know? What are we doing if not just giving them unneeded anxiety and creating a stereotype threat for the sole purpose of making sure we have data to prove that they grew?
3.) I touched on this with questions 1 and 2. I want to incorporate a more consistent culture that starts off right from the beginning of the year that engages the students in a community-minded vision through three things, 1, daily affirmations that create a team mentality like, “we can do it!” 2, a class decor/ theme or materials that don’t have an outwardly specific connection to one’s ethnic identity, while continuing to support exploration and honoring all the cultures in the class. 3, Consistency and concrete expectations to alleviate unneeded stress.
ReplyDelete1. I teach at a high school where what this country calls “minority” students are in the majority. The students are primarily Dominican, Puerto Rican, Central and South American. A smaller population of students is West African, African American or Afro-Caribbean. We also had two Indian and one Vietnamese student this year. According to Noguera, a mixed school causes African American students to have more difficulty in excelling. I think what he meant by “mixed” included Caucasian students, or at least had a population of students stereotyped as being on the higher end of the achievement gap. There are no students classified as Caucasian in my high school, but I noticed that the students who were naturally expected to do better were the Indian and Vietnamese. I heard other teachers and students commenting, saying that, of course these students would perform higher on the end-of-year math or science exams. Further comments throughout the school year also highlighted higher expectations from the West African students and the South or Central American students. The students who were more often stereotyped as low-achieving students were: Puerto Rican, Dominican and African American or Afro-Caribbean. Similar to the story about Joaquin, some students wish to maintain or identify with that stereotype because they are seen as the cooler and tougher group of students.
ReplyDeleteNinety-five percent of these students qualify for school lunch, meaning that they come from low income households. According to the Hair study, poverty has a physical effect on brain development due to circumstances like “stress, limited stimulation, and nutrition” (828). I definitely see the effects that stress has on learning. I personally can’t concentrate when I’m nervous about something, and I often understand why my students have such a hard time focusing in class when they have so many external stressors that they have to digest on a daily basis. During the year, I realized that it wouldn’t help for me to raise my voice or add to the stress of their lives. I learned how to teach in a more calming, soothing way to reduce the amount of stress and nervous energy within the classroom, and I feel that this has really helped!
2. I’ve heard many students at my school remark to others or to other teachers: “it’s because I’m black, isn’t it?” They use “black” in a loose way…not necessarily referring to skin, but to a culture that they identify with. These statements show that students are aware of the social and racial injustices, but, frustratingly, they use it as a joke or as a way to “play” with the idea of being a victim. Another phrase that comes up often is “Mr./Ms., you racist!” in a slightly joking way. I’ve seen teachers back off from these statements, while others respond with “Because I want you to try harder, I’m being racist?” All this to say that students are clearly aware of stereotypes, and they’ve even verbalized that it’s an excuse not to try harder.
ReplyDeleteTeachers can project these stereotypes in subtle ways, even when it’s framed positively: “I didn’t know YOU were good at math!” “Look at you, being so smart!” “It’s okay, that subject probably just isn’t for you”, or even “It’s harder for students of color”.
I think you make a very important point -- that the color of our skin is also a reference to a larger culture at work, and this strongly affects who we are as students.
Delete3. I feel that most of the classes we took in this TESOL program promoted cultural sensitivity and pushed back ethnocentric views. I studied Cultural Anthropology for a previous graduate degree and the same mantras were being repeated. Anthropologists going into the field would be participant observers, carefully learning about the culture they were studying. Looking back on my life living in West Africa, I then understood why so many organizations working to give “aid” and “assistance” to African communities didn’t actually work. The foreigners were assuming, through their own ethnocentric lenses, what was valuable and useful to the people they were servicing.
ReplyDeleteThese articles added to this great philosophy that I’m working towards embodying more and more as I teach: learn from your students. Take time to get to know them!
4. I really enjoyed listening to this speech because it gets to the core of a craft that often gets misguided or lost under constrained policies. Delpit gives great advice: teachers must resist seeing kids as numbers or labels, and go the extra mile to find out WHO these children are, “body, mind and spirit”. It may be wrong to use a marketing metaphor, but in order for a product to be accessible to its consumers, we must know who the consumers are and what they need. The question she provides: “What do you know?” is essential to ask students, and as I go into my second year, I have to remember to have that question in the back of my mind, motivating me to better motivate others.
ReplyDeleteI believe that teachers can be more effective if they learn how to be more present. As Delpit says: Seeing, feeling and hearing allow you to be more open to the world, and not just an agent in the world. Grounding practices, like exercise, meditation and learning how to breathe can actually help (teachers and students). Many studies have shown the benefits of bringing mindfulness and team-building activities to the classroom. As a yoga instructor, I would have loved to do more of this in my classroom, but became too intimidated to try it in my first year, given the time constraints and fear that students would find it uncool. I lead an advisory – a group of 15 students that I have already built a good relationship with and will continue to meet with until their graduation. This would be an especially great situation for teachers to practice mindfulness and bonding activities.
Moreover, knowing how to appeal to students’ individual intellects and focus on their “spirits” makes us see beyond race and class. This practice will bring us closer to erasing negative stereotypes and assumptions that hamper or “threaten” students’ school careers.
1. Hair talked about how “Poverty is tied to structural differences in several areas of the brain associated with school readiness skills.” In relating this to other readings, essentially macro systems may affect the physical properties of the brain. Noguera examines the relation between racial identity and academic proficiency, settling on the conclusion that “the stereotypical images we hold of certain groups are powerful in influencing what people see and expect of students,” including the students themselves. Steele argues the same as Noguera supported with studies done on Women and African Americans. In regards to what Hair says about poverty it makes perfect sense that poverty can lead to stunted brain development in that children may not have access to proper nutrition or are living in an academically interrupted world. Hair states that “Children living in poverty have lower scores on standardized tests of academic achievement, poorer grades in school, and lower educational attainment.” This is perfectly understandable because these children have less educational resources as well as advantages in regards to physical development. It is also understandable because, just as Steele and Noguera argue, the outside social forces on children (whether they come from the ‘racially oblivious’ in Albany or the stereotypes and prejudices prevalent in today’s culture) have a negative effect on their motivation and sometimes capacity to learn.
ReplyDeleteMy students are very self-aware when it comes to racial differences. They love to joke about what makes someone Black or White and how Dominicans are neither black nor white. While they enjoy making the distinctions, I sense a lot of animosity towards an external force or system. One student in particular relayed to me that he gets bothered by the nomenclature of all of this because according to him, “they all live in the South Bronx and none of them have a voice that can be heard by others.” Where Hair, Steele, and Noguera talk about stereotypes being damaging even to those who cannot fully express their significance I feel that my students hope to overcome these stereotypes and be looked at as people who have valuable input.
2. The student with whom I talked to about race, economic status, and multilingualism exhibits the idea of the stereotype threat. He knows that he lives in a poverty stricken area, one where “immigrants go because they got no money or other choice.” He understands the severity of his and his peers’ disenfranchisement. He frequently says things like “the white Manhattan kids got it better because they get the best teachers and nicest laptops and we don’t get shit.” He often attempts to combat this by trying to convince me and others of his intelligence though too often do I see him failing to raise his hand for a question that he knows or give his opinion on something he would be otherwise vocal about. It seems that he does not want to be perceived as a “dumb poor kid from the DR” as he puts it. His vernacular is indicative of a lack of consistent education but his ideas are evidence of brilliance.
ReplyDeleteI came into teaching with an idea of how harmful stereotypes could be, especially on children. For this reason I shut down any generalization, whether positive or negative, the students may pitch during class. No one is smart because they can do an algebra problem and no one is dumb because they cannot. I find that many other teachers use these generalizations and more. They openly talk about the capabilities of certain groups over others. “White kids in Manhattan work harder than you guys” or “you Puerto Ricans are always on welfare.” These comments reinforce a social construct, creating a vicious circle.
I feel the same way about some of the other teachers at my school. They talk about reading levels as if it's where you are on your religious journey, and those who are not moving fast enough much be shunned. The totally disregard for how long it take to learn a language baffles me, but as the limits the teachers started me out with we're totally under projected. about 5 students in particular other teachers said, don't worry about them, they won't grow or, if they grow 4 levels that's a success. Well, some went up three, but some went up 8. And some didn't move at all, and were the one's begging for more homework because I cared about them, and talked to them parents, and had them write papers about relevant material, and for the first time, sone one treated this particular student as a student, not as a kid that won't grow. He might not have grown a reading level, but he wrote the best he could and through it came original ideas and brilliance, just like your student. He kept me keeping on.
DeleteIt's incredibly disheartening to see and hear that constantly from your colleagues. The effect it has on your students is HUGE, and absolutely shapes students' academic self-concept at a minimum and their personal self-concept on a more crucial level.
Delete3. In reading these articles I thought about the utility of disallowing any stereotypes or generalizations and opening up discussion when these things are brought up. This past year has been a real battle in learning about what it means to be educated. Do facts or essay writing indicate a good education? Does growth in empathy? If students understand that the stereotypes so often held against them are not true and that the world and its rules are malleable is that more important than passing a state mandated test?
ReplyDeleteI hope to continue exploring these questions in the coming years. I think that having these articles as reference, especially when facing a crisis, is a useful tool in fighting against the ignorance that continually kills our students’ motivation.
4. Delpit talks about seeing through the eyes of those native Alaskans she taught. This empathetic viewpoint is crucial to teaching. What do the students want to learn? What is useful to them? These are the questions that are most important to developing a culturally relevant curriculum. She says that the teacher must be convinced of the capacity of the students and then goes on to stop with the limiting label of students. Many times these labels used by the DOE limit what other teachers think students are capable of yet a lesson based on student interest or prior knowledge will demonstrate the true capacity of this student. As a teacher it is our job to make sure that our students can navigate the world and exhibit some sort of change. Not understanding who your students are is counterproductive and only leads to pushback. I am currently developing a curriculum based on a shared history of my students’ cultures with room for them to teach me about things I want to know. I plan on using what they know to expand their own knowledge.
ReplyDeleteJordan, I like how you are creating a curriculum to expand on what students already know. Often there is such a push to just get students ready for the tests that they will have to take, and not help students utilize the knowledge they already have. Allowing students to build on the foundation they already have will help them appreciate their knowledge as valuable which is essential for developing self esteem. I think about what it must be like to thrown into another culture and expected to jump right in and know the history, culture, social norms and all without any background. Not only would I imagine that to be terrifying, but I can see how one could feel like their culture wasn't valued.
DeleteGreat discussion!
Delete1. All three articles address the role of race and class in the classroom. In American, race and class relations are beneath almost all social systems, including education. Steele addresses what he coins as the stereotype threat and how certain stereotypes become internalized. Noguera reflects on the story of his son Joaquin and his struggle creating his own identify. Finally, Hair examines the physical differences in the brain between different classes. Noguera (2003) addresses the racial segregation of students suggests that teachers encourage students sit with other racial groups. This is something that I struggled with earlier in the year, but I did get better at later on. While teaching newcomers, allowing students to sit with others who are from the same background can be a tool because they can use their L1 in addition to English. One suggestion that my professor made during my observations was to mix up my seating to encourage students to speak in English. This was hard at first, I didn’t want the students to feel like I was taking away their language or identify, but I was able to change the seating arrangements more regularly. As the year progressed I was able to mix the groupings more to encourage discussion between students who might not interact with one another. I believe this helped students to appreciate one another, and like Noguera proposed, friendships evolved naturally. Moving forward to next year, I plan on making different groupings the norm from the start. Although I did cover stereotypes and prejudices in class, we did not cover it on a deeper level. I would like to find the space to incorporate deeper discussions surrounding stereotypes in my class.
ReplyDelete2. Although I have not officially inquired, I do think there is evidence of the stereotype threat is alive and well in my school. Students are identified by their language group and each group comes with a specific beliefs. I have noticed that there is a common belief among teachers, guidance counselors and students that ELLs from one country are thought of as being “better” students than the other group. The staff mostly just attributes this to differences in culture and the importance of education, but it is likely that the effect of the stereotype threat occurs here. Students of one group are believed to be better students, and therefore students from the other dominant group internalize the inferiority. This creates a cycle that requires students to become empowered in order to break. Having lower expectations for one group is a self fulfilling prophecy. Steele offers many suggestions for teachers in practice. He believes that the work be challenging, the teacher student relationships be optimistic, showing role models from the identified group. There are teachers from both language groups in my school and they need to all continue to be positive role models for the students and encourage them to keep seeking knowledge.
3. After reading these articles, I would have liked to know what my students expected of themselves. It would be interesting to see what they believe their intelligence level and capabilities are. It would have been interesting to know, but I don’t think this knowledge would have changed how I interacted with the students much. Regardless of what they perceived their ability to be, I would want to do my best to ensure that my students had high expectations for themselves and always tried to learn more. Steele (1997) suggests that teachers should stress “the expandability of intelligence” (p. 625). The insight to how students perceive themselves and their abilities could be a tool to help me determine which students need more motivation than others.
ReplyDelete4. Lisa Delpit identifies two types of questions, “do you know what I know” and “what do you know?” Generally, curriculum is set and the teaching that occurs follows the “do you know what I know” questioning, but to teach in a culturally relevant manner, the information students have needs to be valued. Another article regarding culturally relevant teaching suggested incorporating various residences. This would allow the parents and members of the students communities to share their knowledge with the class. This provides for the positive role models Steele suggests and would fulfill Noguera's suggestions of adding cultural information into the curriculum while getting to know the students better. Setting up this residency as suggested in the previous article might not be supported by the school, but I could incorporate some kind of cultural share. Being that I teach ENL and the curriculum is flexible, I imagine that it would be possible to weave language objectives and have students share their own knowledge with one another.
4.) So Lisa Delpit rocks on my account. I grew up in an Alaska Native village where the everyone spoke Yupik, and she’s absolutely right about the intersection of teaching with healing. It breathes in everything there. People don’t ask what you do, but ask how you are and pause and wait and listen until you answer. When I moved to the city, it ran home crying everyday, as everyone talked so fast and made fun of natives. I had never actually known about racism towards natives until I left the village. Though I was white, I always wanted to be like the native kids, I was the top of my Yupik class to show it. This is important because it shows how much society changes your view of yourself. I didn’t know natives were considered “less than” in the city because they were the majority and larger society.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, what Delpit is saying is, you have to get to know your students, their stories and their families. You have to understand who they are if you are going to be a healer, which, I agree, is what I teaching is. You can be a culturally relevant teacher with pretty pictures of tribes on your wall and use rap music in English class, but if you do not actually connect with who you are working with, if you are not actually convinced of the immense capacity of the student’s ability and character, then you as a teacher will continue spreading stereotypes and acting upon them subconsciously.
Hi Tara, I agree that building connections with students is crucial to helping them to achieve academic success. Teachers must maintain a balance of finding and exposing students to culturally relevant content as well as giving them opportunities to reinforce and share knowledge of their own culture with their teachers as well as their classmates. This allows students to find relevance from their home culture through sharing, and allows teachers to gain a deeper understanding of their students, which helps to eliminate the subconscious stereotypes that you mentioned are present.
DeleteYeah, Lisa is a pretty amazing woman. I want to be her when I grow up.
Delete1. These articles address the ways in which economic and social factors affect brain development, identity and how students perform in the classroom. In my school, the overwhelming majority of my students hail from the same province in China. They speak the same Chinese dialect and most of their families know each other, due to the fact that they all now live in the same neighborhood. Students are seemingly aware of the fact that they have these similarities, and that they make up the majority of the school. However, there is definitely economic and social disparities within the student population. Students bully one another over material possessions, and pick on one another over who they currently live with. Many of my students have single parents, step parents, or live with paid caregivers. Students who have an intact nuclear family all living in this country are the minority. These students act negatively towards students who do not have the same familiar support. For other cultural and ethnic groups within the school, there is a lot of interaction with Chinese students as they are the majority, but there is little discrepancy in their behavior towards one another based solely on race. Noguera explains that these racial tensions within schools can affect a student’s identity, as students discover who they are. Racial stereotypes also play into this, as students feel the need to play into their stereotypes. My students often play into the “smart Asian” stereotype, feeling extremely disappointed in themselves if they answer a question wrong. Non-Chinese students often comment on one another’s answers saying things like “I thought Asians were supposed to be smart”. The school itself tries to be inclusive of all races, cultures, and languages, but sometimes fails to address the needs of their “other” students. This is seen through a lack of communication between the school and parents that do not speak Chinese or English. There are not many translators for Chinese, but even less for Spanish and other languages. This affects the parents and children, and their understanding of different cultures.
ReplyDelete2. As mentioned, my students believe wholeheartedly that as Asians, they are somehow supposed to be smarter than their peers. This stereotype often arises in my classroom. While almost the entire school took part in ESL at some point during the elementary school years, the students that are currently beginners are still looked down upon or considered to be less than. These comments are made by teachers and students alike. Teachers often refer to their students as “low” or “behind”, when the issue is not truly based on intelligence or understanding, but simply a language barrier. These students grow discouraged with the comments, as teachers grow frustrated that they are not completing school work at the same rate as their peers. Students are hyper aware of the comments that are made about them, and bring that understanding with them to the classroom and on tests.
1. Hair et al., Noguera, and Steele all describe the effects race and class have on brain development and academic learning. The authors explain how the formation of adolescent identities are vulnerable when racial stereotypes inform behavior and place less value on academics. Noguera explains, “For racial minorities, adolescence is also a period when young people begin to solidify their understanding of their racial identities” (p. 28). This solidification, however, is counterproductive when these identities are based off of racial stereotypes. Reading these three articles together shed light on the multiple levels of disenfranchisement students of color and students living in poverty experience in academic settings.
ReplyDeleteClearly race and class affect my students when they are in the classroom just as it does everywhere else in society. I see these racial and economic disparities most when I check homework. The students whose parents work three jobs and are not home before they go to sleep obviously can not help their children with their homework in the same way that a parent with one job or a partner can.
3. This information would definitely have helped throughout the year. While most of it seems to be straightforward and sensical, it is important to always have these ideas in mind when entering the classroom. It is important to remember that stereotypes cannot and should not define our students, rather we need to get to know each student individually. Regardless of stereotypes and cultural differences, students need to feel listened to and respected in order for them to learn anything past the preconceived notions of their abilities.
ReplyDelete4. This video forced me to recognize the importance and severity of our work. These students look to us not only to educate them on curriculum, but to help them develop into productive, informed, members of society. The preconceived notions they have, can be broken down and erased regardless of their age, if teachers are willing to help. Given the fact that my students are young, I need to take this discussion and apply it to my classroom next year. Students, from a young age become aware of the political and social standing in which they fall, but we must work to remind them that they are more than where they come from or how much money they have, and how they can work towards breaking stereotypes and further their own educations.
Hello Rachel,
DeleteThank you for your post. I appreciated how you mentioned that we need to get to know our students individually. That is what most resonated with me in Lisa Delphit's talk. It is difficult because there is always so much to do, but our students are not just numbers. Each one is an individual trying to make sense of the world, and as educators, we can be an important component in helping them understand it and navigate it to gain some success.
2. I teach first grade and luckily from what I have seen most of my students are not fully cognizant of what Steele describes as stereotype threats. However, when I do see the outcome of stereotype threats in my classroom they are mostly gender stereotypes. For example, I have female students who have clearly heard the stereotype that girls are weaker than boys because when I ask them to help me with heavy lifting they opt-out or volunteer a male classmate whom they believe would be a better fit for the job.
ReplyDelete3. I believe the information within the three articles is helpful to contextualize how race and poverty affect student achievement and brain development. However, Lisa Delpit brilliantly illustrates that teachers are asking all the wrong question when they ask “what” their students are. "What is their nationality?" "What is their socioeconomic background?" or "What languages do they speak?" Delpit argues that the question teachers need to be asking about their students is “Who are they?” Yes, it is crucial for teachers to be educated on the racial and economic injustices that affect their students’ learning because that information does need to inform their practice. But Delpit explains that this information cannot be the only way that we view our students. This narrow lens on “what” your students are often hinders teachers’ ability to see their students’ capabilities.
Noguera’s article in particular made me think about my practice and gave me ideas about what I want to do with my students next year. Noguera challenges the idea of “acting White” and describes how that phrase only re-enforces racial stereotypes. He illustrates the power in actively trying to challenge racial stereotypes and to purposely attempt “... to redefine...racial identities by showing that is is possible to do well in school and be proud of who [you] are” (p. 24). I agree with this strategy and would like to design classroom projects that foster this mindset. One project idea could be to have students conduct research projects on role models that share their racial or cultural backgrounds. This could help bridge the gap between academic success and pride because their figures of study all did well in school and represent their racial identity.
ReplyDelete4. Lisa Delpit’s speech reminded me a lot of Ladson-Billings’ article “But that’s just good teaching.” Delpit’s whole framework is simple. She believes the entire purpose of education is to help student succeed. She argues that teachers need to be humble and willing to accept the fact that teachers have an equal opportunity to learn from their students than students have from their teachers. I liked the part of her speech when she said there are two types of questions. Type one was “Do you know what I know?” and type two was “What do you know?” She explains that the second type of question allows us to see the brilliance of our students and what they have already learned. This mindset illustrates her active ways of being a culturally relevant teacher. I see myself using more type two questions next year and allowing students more opportunities to teach me and their peers. Creating an educational environment in which students know that you are just as open to learning from them as you hope they are eager to learn from you illustrates that you recognize their intelligence and backgrounds.
I agree with you and even quoted the same part of her speech! I appreciate the way she phrased the difference and how it can impact our teaching because we get to know our students better. I like to sight a quote in class sometimes when the students are picking on each other (for example, when they say that a certain student can't answer me because he can't do it or isn't good enough), that quote is "Everyone knows something and no one knows everything". So now we can incorporate Delpit's speech and ask what do they know?
DeleteYour connection to Ladson-Billings' article was also spot-on.
All three articles concern how the social and societal structures around race and class impact students’ academic performance. Pedro Noguera and Claude Steele focused on how race and racial stereotypes influence how students view themselves in relation to academic subjects. Noguera, primarily looking at adolescents, explained how the implicit messaging that students receive about race informs their attitudes toward school and their motivations to do well. This article resonated with my experiences in a middle school setting. In my small school, the ELL population at my school is particularly low compared with other K-12 schools in NYC. In the larger classroom setting, most of the students that are teach are black Americans and, to a lesser but still significant extent, Latinos. Middle school is the age where students are aware of the social landscape through which they move and get the positive attention of their peers in order to be accepted. While school culture may attempt to define positive attributes as scholars as academically motivated and engaged, the wider culture may not offer students the same definitions. Instead, as Noguera mentions with his own experiences with his son Joaquin, students attempt to fit into the models available to them in their communities and among their peers as a way to affirm their racial identity and allegiance to one particular group. I see this especially with a lot of the young men of color with whom I work who attempt to posture and talk back to teachers to exert what power they feel they have in situations when they feel powerless. This may be when they are not able to understand a concept, or they have been addressed for bad behavior. There are times, of course, when they students are more vulnerable, and we see these students open up and share or even break down and cry. As their teacher, I witness them navigate the uneasy terrain of adolescence especially as they come to terms for themselves with what it means to be “a man” and a “man of color” in particular.
ReplyDeleteI navigated the same terrain at their age with the additional layer of figuring out what it even meant to be black as a British Jamaican in the suburban U.S. south where there were no others who claimed my identity. Like everyone else, I also wanted to belong and tried to follow the unwritten rules (i.e. the hidden curriculum) that dictated this place that I had to live in and that my parents could not help me understand. I learned what I “could” and “couldn’t” do based on my peers’ reactions to whom I spent time with and what I did. Many of our ELL students learn the same way, and I think it is important for us as educators to be more intentional about what students’ learn.
Nevertheless, I did not recall this experience during my first year of teaching. While I found myself nodding in agreement with these articles, I think it would have been helpful to have been reminded of all the various educations our students are absorbing in the classroom and in the world. Particularly when working with ELLs, it is important to remember that we are not just language educators. We also teach culture. There is no monolithic American culture that our ELL students need to learn and navigate, and I think it is important to be aware of the various cultures that they will be encountering. It is also important to expose students to models that break stereotypes for the groups that they belong to as well as other groups.
ReplyDeleteAccording to Steele, stereotypes can hinder students’ performance for those students who are invested in achieving in a particular field where stereotypes exists. I have tried to be intentional about bringing images and examples of persons and materials that reflect my students’ realities. This is incredibly important to gain buy-in from the students, who are mostly living in poverty. Given the implications of poverty in Hair’s study, students need to be invested and included in their education. As Lisa Delpit says in her talk, “we must learn who students are and not focus on who we assume them to be.” We know exactly what obstacles students are facing systematically, but I think it is important to approach each student as an individual. We need to think thoughtfully about the hidden curriculum and how to create a culture that uplifts students. She also mentions that students come in with knowledge that can be utilized in the classroom. While some of this knowledge are the stereotypes of society and the negative messaging of the world, some of this is positive and ripe to be used in the classroom, as suggested by Delpit.
1.A) In regards to the first article, by Hair et al., I found it difficult to relate to my students. Its main argument is the effect of poverty on the brain and academic achievement. That being said, in my experience in the classroom I have no looked at brain scans or too far into their personal records enough to find this study useful in analyzing my students. I’m not exactly sure why my students might be testing lower but I think it has more to do with the fact that I only teach EBLs and they are struggling with the language first. Maybe if they had been in a wealthier family, they would do better on tests but that to me seems impossible to measure? One of my highest-level EBLs, who has made the most progress isn’t the wealthiest but has support at home and she works harder than many other students.
ReplyDeleteB) I had more of a connection of the Noguera article to my classroom and school experience. Although a great majority of my school comes from a Spanish-speaking background, sometimes there is a divide racially and culturally between the classified EBLs who the other students, and some teachers, call “The Spanish Kids”. When I would go to the gym, I would see my EBLs sitting separate from the other students and then I began noticing that it was like this all around school in different settings. So unlike the article, where it focuses on African American segration in the school, I find the barrier lays between the EBLs and the other students. The American Sign Language Students (ASL) and the two self-contained classes are also separate from many mainstream social landscapes. Some of these students have or had classes together but when they get into bigger groups, they tend to flock towards their “inner group” and perpetuate that stereotype.
C) The Steele article focused on the stereotypes and challenges faced by females and African American students in particular. Steele suggested that students might be associated with a certain negative stereotype associated with race/gender etc, and then identify with that stereotype and that in turn might actually negatively affect them when it might not have been so if that stereotype had never existed. The stereotype can become an internal battle and hinder the development/ achievement of that student. In my classroom, I have definitely noticed some sexism that has negatively affected some of my students and thus can relate to this article. Some of my students have defined “women’s work” and what “boys are better at” to me at different times of the year. Sometimes when a girl speaks up about a topic boys are supposed to be more familiar with, they get “shamed” and made fun of. This isn’t allowed in my classroom and I try to teach respect for all peers as much as I can but who knows what impact it had on her development. It also goes both ways and boys can be made fun of for liking or doing something too feminine. Boys and girls in my school seem to be equally competitive though across the subjects. Our 8th grade valedictorian was a girl and salutatorian a boy, both of whom spoke perfect English but threw in some Spanish into their speeches.
2.As stated above, I think my school is competitive beyond gender stereotypes for the most part. According to Steele, “where bad stereotypes about these groups apply, members of these groups can fear being reduced to that stereotype. And for those who identify with the domain to which the stereotype is relevant, this predicament can be self-threatening.” Besides the sometimes racist and sexist comments, I think at the middle school age in my school, students are all competitive. I had a conversation a couple of weeks ago with some of my 7th grade students about who was best at each subject and why. The conversation was between three boys and one girl and the girl was either the highest or second highest in almost all subjects. I think as an educator, I can reinforce this competitiveness that will help diminish gender stereotyping. I also teach my EBLs that they have a competitive edge, not a disability (as they sometimes feel they have compared to the general education students who are better with English). I tell them that they just need a little more help with the English but that the world has much need for bilingual and multilingual people. I try to use French sometimes just to motivate them with languages.
ReplyDelete3.Yes, I think this information has helped me analyze some behaviors and internal/external influence on my students I may not have been aware of. I also think this information and all the information I gathered this year will definitely help me be more prepared next year to better understand my students. One thing I mentioned before was that I spent majority of the year getting to know my students and understanding how to better work with them. I hope to spend a good amount of time getting to know my students next year (many of whom I will have again) but hopefully less time learning how to work with them better (classroom management wise). I learn from them and reflect on them when in my grad classes almost every class.
4.Her example of the type 1 question (do you know what I know) and type 2 question (what do you know?) really spelled out culturally relevant teaching in a simple but effective way. We need to use what they have already learned and connect it to additional information, which is what we’ve been taught in the Fellows program. But then we need to shape it based on the worlds the students come from before they entered our classrooms. And if we focus on test prep instead of getting to know “who they are”, then we might never gain as much or do as well on tests. I see myself definitely using her wise words as mentioned, by focusing on who they are before test prep.
1. The race and class of students can have detrimental factors on student performance. The Hair article discusses a study that examined whether childhood poverty had an effect on structural brain development. To do this, they examined gray matter tissue in the parts of the brain that “are likely vulnerable to early environments” and “have an important role in cognitive abilities that are crucial for child readiness”. Steele examines the “stereotype threat” that is present and inhibiting for all members of interactions. To study this, he examined predictive score measures on student achievement on the SATs to see that statistically, students of certain races have performed better than others. Noguera writes about the period of adolescence when students are struggling to build their self-identity get “trapped by stereotypes” and adopt the expected behavior of their racial background. He reflects on his experience witnessing his son going through this stage for 2 years, and how their grades dropped drastically.
ReplyDeleteI agree that exposure to language outside of the classroom can most definitely affect cognitive development in children. Several of my students come from single-parent households where the mother/father works several jobs. Some have described their time spent at home beyond sleeping at eating as playing videogames. I have found these students who have had less exposure to language at home during their childhood to encounter more difficulty with setting goals and finding motivation in classroom activities.
Middle school students often struggle with understanding their emotions and developing identities. This can prevent them from staying focused in class. Furthermore, I have noticed one or two newer/isolated ones have often tried to copy the stereotypical cultural behavior of the more popular students in class, even though their own culture’s behavioral stereotypes are much different. Therefore, I feel that although many students adopt the stereotype of their culture that can lead to both success/failure in school, there are also cases where the students that are not part of a group or culture that has a familiar stereotype will attempt to adopt the stereotypical behavior of a more popular classmate in order to gain acceptance.
2. I have noticed instances of stereotype threat with one of my 6th grade classes. We received a new student from Honduras in May. At this late stage in the school year, social groups have already been established and it can be difficult for a new student to find friends. This particular student had been entering their 3rd school in 2 years, with the last one having a predominantly Asian student population in Queens. Within his first few days, he quickly found and associated with the other 3 Hispanic students of darker complexion. The general behavior of all 4 students is very similar. I had a conversation with him after administering the NYSESLAT speaking test and asked how he was adjusting and if he liked it here. He seemed very comfortable with his classmates, and when asked why, explained that he had felt lonely being “the only black kid” in his previous school. Unfortunately, this group that he latched on to have struggled academically and behaviorally in school. He seems to be not too concerned with this, however, because my efforts to get him to work with other students has always been met with from both sides. He does not want to associate or talk to any other students, possibly due to fear of being cast in a negative light with his new friends, and the other students do not want to work with him because he is part of the group of students that caused the most disruptions in the class. Perhaps when teachers sit new students near classmates that share the same language and culture, we as teachers are enabling them to limit themselves to associate with only these students as well.
3. I feel that awareness of the unintentional bias that exists with regards to teacher expectations for student performance was not one of the priorities that I was often considering during my first year teaching. I feel that creating opportunities to examine student work without knowing their identity can help teachers to maintain an objective attitude when grading student work. This should not be done all the time, as it is also important for teachers’ to learn each of their students’ unique strengths and struggles. However, creating chances for both teachers and students to also engage in these types of activities can be helpful to remove stereotypical expectations in the classroom culture. Also, being careful not to express shock or a clear lack of shock when a student of a particular background succeeds in a classroom task. These reactions can foster a classroom culture of expectations that are driven by stereotypes.
ReplyDelete4. Lisa Delpit points out that teachers must ask students “what do you know?” as opposed to “Do you know what I know?” As a teacher, I need to make more opportunities in one-on-one or small groups to get to know my students individually. According to Delpit, focusing on test scores, labels of disability and stereotypes will hinder the teachers’ ability to maintain and strive to achieve equally high expectations for all of their students, regardless of their background or class. I feel that is important to explain this to students at the beginning of the school year. It is therefore necessary to allocate explicit time in September for getting to know students in small group or one-on-one sessions. This supports Delpit’s viewpoint that educators must “know who a child is at a deeper level” in order to build effective scaffolds to help the student achieve success in school.
1. I think perhaps my classroom is unique in that there is no single race represented; instead, my high school is comprised entirely of recently-arrived immigrants from across the globe. The one idea that stood out most vividly was Steele’s idea of over-prediction, that marginalized students begin school on-level with their white counterparts, but their testing grades decrease markedly with each progressive year. For me, this is most obvious during Regents testing. Because my students are all ELL’s, the Regents exam – if not purposely structured to do so – all but guarantees failure for our students, especially since Common Core standards have been implemented, which increased focused on reading and writing. Though my students may enter the classroom equally prepared as their American peers, the tests immediately put them at a disadvantage. The exception to this rule is that my school – because it’s a consortium – has been granted alternatives to Regents testing in Living Environment and Social Studies, which in a way makes the testing environment more in-line with their capabilities than the standardized version their non-ELL peers take. While most teachers don’t reflect the ethnic or socioeconomic status of our students, I’ve rarely seen an environment in which educators have taken an active and prolonged investment in our students’ well-being to undue the over-prediction and dis-identification that can easily occur.
ReplyDelete2. While I have doubtless seen it throughout my life, including personally, I cannot recall an instance in which I experienced or observed stereotype threat in my school or classroom. Because stereotype threat involves external influences projecting onto student success, the environment in which I work has been exceedingly forthright in their fairness and egalitarianism. However, I have nonetheless heard educators refer to “those students” in ways that denies them equal opportunity even before they step into a classroom. Because my students are immigrants, stereotypes about their abilities abound. The most obvious is the confusion that ELL’s are less intelligent or capable than their English-speaking peers, to the degree that many are incorrectly dumped into Special Ed classes because a “deficiency” is somehow presumed. The stereotype that they are somehow less capable simply because they’re yet to master a new language is ludicrous, and can cripple an ELL’s chances to succeed in a classroom indefinitely. There is also an assumption that many ELL’s who’ve been SIFE-designated “can’t do anything”, by which they mean don’t have the necessary skills we assume they should have. However, thinking of these terms already puts the students at a disadvantage, as we try less to understand them on their terms but ours.
ReplyDelete3. I’m not sure whether this information would have informed my teaching any further, because my school works under the assumption that these things are true, and does what we can to circumvent them. Going forward, I think it’s important to reinforce the worth of our students, to allow them a place to develop as individuals in a world that may work to keep them stunted. This is true of any student, regardless of race or economic status, that the instant we make an assumption of them is the same moment we’re limiting their growth.
4. Delpit reinforces what I believe to be true about teaching, that it’s as much about content as it is about developing the whole of the student and making ourselves as open to them as we hope they will be to us. While there is a difference in an educator’s approach to a social worker’s, we nonetheless must find ways to engage our students beyond content, and to incorporate other aspects of their person into the classroom. Whether that’s culturally-relevant teaching or advisory-based discussion, I think she’s correct in arguing that meaningful classroom instruction ought to go beyond content teaching. I don’t agree that students need to be referred to in the possessive (my students); we all share the burden of educating the students, and we are not substitutes for parents. However, they are nonetheless a part of our lives and we, in whatever limited capacity, must strive to be a part of theirs.
1. Noguera finds that in order to bridge the achievement gap and better understand children of color, educators must understand the role that their racial identity plays in the classroom. He offers a brief literature review of theories of the identity-achievement connection. The idea is that as students become more and more aware of themselves, they begin to adopt attitudes and behaviors that align with stereotypical views on their race group. These stereotypical views, particularly in the case of black children, create an atmosphere where academic achievement is looked down upon and discouraged, namely from other peers who have also subscribe to such racial identities. Noguera urges educators to learn more about these stereotypes and suggests several strategies to promote healthy connections between students’ racial identity and academic achievement.
ReplyDeleteSteele in attempting to better understand the achievement gap, namely what is keeping children of colors back, looks to identity-achievement connections. He focuses on the role of stereotypes on achievement. He finds that achievement is greatly different for the different racial and ethnic groups in the U.S. not necessarily because of social economic reasons (though, he accounts for those sociocultural structures in his study), but mainly because there are certain stereotypes associated with certain groups that prevent students from making a healthy and deep connection with the different educational domains.
Hair et al. in their research found a strong connection between educational achievement and poverty. They found that students from poverty experience developmental deficiencies in their brains that make hampers educational attainment.
I find that educators’ expectations, especially those based on stereotypes, greatly hamper our students’ educational attainment. I recall sitting in one of our PDs on accountable talk and listening to way some of the teachers in my school spoke about our students. One White teacher asked if it was even worth our time teaching our kids accountable talk. He specifically noted our students’ demographic as an impediment to their ability to use accountable talk. He mentioned how it may make sense for kids in Westchester, but not for our students. I can only imagine how his perspective informs what he teaches our children and what he doesn’t teach them. It is our responsibility as educators to empower our students not to view them as inept or unable to excel. I have found that many of my young men of color often view academic excellence as some how less masculine and not for them. They do not view academic achievement in any of the educational domains as being an integral part of who they are. In other words, how good they feel about themselves is not tied to how well they do academically.
2. Unlike many other student groups in my school, Ls in my school are often viewed as hardworking and compliant in terms of behavior. That said, there are less likely to be challenged and some teachers find that their inability to fully express themselves in English makes them not academically strong students. While some of these stereotypes appear to be positive, it presumes that the Ls are passive and that their silence in the classroom is some how welcomed because it helps to maintain order in the classroom. They are essentially being denied the same education that other non-L students are acquiring. Therefore, they are not being prepared for college. The students perceive this as well and do not try as much as other students because they are not being held to the same standards.
3. I must say that many of the readings reaffirmed what I already knew about the connections between race and achievement. Steele’s work is interesting to me because his theory of domain identification touches on something that I had known little about. Domain identification assumes that in order for our children to be academically successful they must make a deep connection between their identity and the different educational domain. It made think of how I can help students who have yet to make these connections between their identities and the different educational domains.
ReplyDelete4. Finally, watch this speech by Lisa Delpit. Many of you were interested in culturally relevant teaching, and she's a rock star. Her work is very much worth exploring. After watching the video (it's about 20 minutes), how is she not just reinforcing what we are talking about, but also giving us activeways to apply this work to the classroom? How do you see yourself fitting in to her discussion of reaching students in the classroom?
I greatly enjoyed the speech by Lisa Delpit. I identified with the comments she noted that other educators had when told that building relationships with students is key. It is incredibly difficult to manage relationships while you are in graduate school and have other responsibilities, not only to yourself, but to others. That said, I was comforted by her reinforcement of this idea that we cannot teach those that we do not know. In the beginning of the year, it was suggested to me that giving students surveys is a great way to get to know them better. I did, but I glanced at them and did not take them very seriously. I was more worried about my lessons and being prepared for class visits by administration. Moving forward, I feel stronger about stressing this part of the educational process. I need to know my students and I need to have multiple experiences with them, not just in the classroom.
My school' although highly dysfunctional with staff, is quite amazing with offsetting stereotype threats. My school is a predominantly black male school. Administration and teachers work really hard to build and rework students stereotypes and predominant social thoughts about people who look like them- black, male, poor, and "bad". When students messed up or exhibited negative behavior, the principal or other staff members would say "Michael I get it your cool for getting detention. Class did you know that Michael plays the cello professionally? Another example is when a fist fight broke out in my room and the principal came in to grab the instigator of the fight and reminded the class that he got the highest score on his math Regents in all of Brooklyn. The classes are filled with black history and we are constantly filling students minds with positive reinforcements.
ReplyDelete2. All three articles discussed how students are affected by the social environment that they are brought up in. Hair eat al speak about how students in lower income houses do poorly on standardized tests because of things like consumption (healthy v unhealthy). No guess explains how racial groupings inside and out of the classroom inside and out of the classroom produces stereotypes and skewes students perception on why students are separated to begin with. Steele speaks about how stereotypes feed into student achievements. The most powerful instance of this happening is when one of my ELLs turned around and thanked me and credited me with helping her pass all of the Regents. She would say every day "Miss A, I can't do this. I can't read/write/speak English. I don't like this. " I would let her vent and re-affirm her ever time that she could pass the tests she would pass the tests as long as she tried her best and put in as much effort as possible, she would be fine. However, other teachers wrote off my students
3. I don't think knowing this information would've helped me because I was already aware of the effects of stereotypes and he need to build up students