Question: How is this experience shaping your teacher identity? Give specific examples/stories
This experience as a whole was a pretty wonderful experience that I am honored to have had. Experiencing the time that i did with the children in my classroom has truly helped prepare me for a career in the educational field. In starting the class and learning that I would be teaching a classroom that was primarily composed of children of a Latino American or African American descent, i found myself a little bit out of the loop. As much as it pains me to say, i had wondered whether or not i would be considered less that adequate because of my cultural standpoint, as well as my skin color. In my classroom, and although i myself have no semblance of racism in my mind, i was concerned about whether i would be considered uncool because of my culture. I had wondered about whether I would be able to fit in with a community that did not have a culture that was my own.
In doing this project, however, i was faced almost every Friday with a real life example of change. Even though i was the only white person in the room, i had honestly not been treated any differently that any other person in the room, and that was comforting. Fears that related the idea of "The White Mr.Hogan" were shown to be unfounded, and it was exhilarating. I was simply a teacher to these children. Over the past weeks, i had grown quite close with some of the students, and they were oftentimes just as excited as i was to be able to see me on Fridays. It was refreshing to see that the youth of my classroom were coming into an existence were white, black, and Latino were not distinguishing factors among classmates, but rather the three delicious ingredients that came together to form this incredible "Educational Gumbo" of today's society.
Certain stigma's that pertained to how I envisioned the children of a certain culture have been rectified in my mind, as i have come to terms and see that these children in my classroom are not a diverse group of culturally composed individuals, but rather a representation of American Children. Generally, all of my students appear in my mind, albeit with a subtle sense of divergence, as well adjusted members of a society working at change. My service learning experience was a wonderful thing, and it has taught me so many lessons that i will need in order to become the teacher that this culturally diverse nation needs. I have learned that we are all together in this struggle, and we must do everything we can to stick together.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Service Learning Prompt #3
Question: The culturally competent teacher should be able to use a variety of assessment techniques appropriate to diverse learners and accommodate sociocultural differences that affect learning. How might the teacher be responsive to the linguistic, ethnic, and sociocultural characteristics of the students in his or her assessment practices?
The children of today's society are engulfed in a sociocultural tornado that shapes and personifies how they see the world. Children in the classroom depend on the media to understand how to project the images of cool and not cool onto those that are supposed to be their classmates. When children are taught from the media that seemingly improper ways of speaking are considered cool, it is clear to see why some children would attempt to emulate such. In my service learning experience, i found it impossible to misconstrue the fact that most children in the classroom were thoroughly involved, and henceforth shaped, by the use of video games, television, and computers. Their dialect is seemingly derived from a mixture of television shows like "Jersey Shore" and what can heard by common rap music. In my opinion, in order to most adequately reach the children of today's society, we should attempt to level with them, in order to teach them in a way they can more easily understand. of course, this would be a very difficult thing to do, as oftentimes curriculum's are a preconstructed existence that is developed by school districts.
One example that i have found in my particular classroom that i found of relavance, was used by the reading textbook that was used in the classroom. The text depicted a journey of a boy, his friend, and an old man of a toy store. The old man had magical powers, and would take the boy and girl on trips around the globe into different places. The old man would teach them something new every time, and the children would pay for the trip by taking a test about what they had learned. The text book was a perfect example of inclusion, because the races of the three people in the book were, Latino, Black, and White. I thought this was a perfect way for the curriculum to help include various forms of culture in the day to day learning processes of the class.
Another thing that i noticed was a very interesting way of interacting with the children on a social level, was the teachers use of an Easter Egg Hunt as a way to distract children from the everyday stresses of the classroom. This helped to keep them behaved, because their eligibility to participate in the hunt was granted by their ability to remain well behaved. I thought it was clever to almost kind of bribe the children into behaving, because it helped get them to learn in a more organized fashion.
All in all, i feel that various techniques can be used in order to more accurately reach these children on an ethnic and social level. We need to stop seeing these children as objects of learning, and instead see them as human beings who are doing their best as a product of their society. We are making steps in the right direction.
The children of today's society are engulfed in a sociocultural tornado that shapes and personifies how they see the world. Children in the classroom depend on the media to understand how to project the images of cool and not cool onto those that are supposed to be their classmates. When children are taught from the media that seemingly improper ways of speaking are considered cool, it is clear to see why some children would attempt to emulate such. In my service learning experience, i found it impossible to misconstrue the fact that most children in the classroom were thoroughly involved, and henceforth shaped, by the use of video games, television, and computers. Their dialect is seemingly derived from a mixture of television shows like "Jersey Shore" and what can heard by common rap music. In my opinion, in order to most adequately reach the children of today's society, we should attempt to level with them, in order to teach them in a way they can more easily understand. of course, this would be a very difficult thing to do, as oftentimes curriculum's are a preconstructed existence that is developed by school districts.
One example that i have found in my particular classroom that i found of relavance, was used by the reading textbook that was used in the classroom. The text depicted a journey of a boy, his friend, and an old man of a toy store. The old man had magical powers, and would take the boy and girl on trips around the globe into different places. The old man would teach them something new every time, and the children would pay for the trip by taking a test about what they had learned. The text book was a perfect example of inclusion, because the races of the three people in the book were, Latino, Black, and White. I thought this was a perfect way for the curriculum to help include various forms of culture in the day to day learning processes of the class.
Another thing that i noticed was a very interesting way of interacting with the children on a social level, was the teachers use of an Easter Egg Hunt as a way to distract children from the everyday stresses of the classroom. This helped to keep them behaved, because their eligibility to participate in the hunt was granted by their ability to remain well behaved. I thought it was clever to almost kind of bribe the children into behaving, because it helped get them to learn in a more organized fashion.
All in all, i feel that various techniques can be used in order to more accurately reach these children on an ethnic and social level. We need to stop seeing these children as objects of learning, and instead see them as human beings who are doing their best as a product of their society. We are making steps in the right direction.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)