Final Reflection

Dear Blog,
In terms of ending this blog for the purpose of the class ending this will be my final post. I would say I have changed a ton over the few short months I have been learning to understand and care about all sorts of people.  I am serving a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints this upcoming Fall sometime. I won't know where I am going until mid-may and then around September I will be going to this place to serve the people there for 18 months. This class has reached out of the bounds of classroom preparation and prepared me to go teach any culture anywhere I am called. I'm anxious because I don't know where yet but I'm mostly excited. What I have become after taking this class is more aware, patient, and accepting. I look for ways to talk about hard issues with people I care about, I am excited to share what I have learned and am more willing to listen to what others are willing to tell me. When you are more aware of race and ethnicity you realize when others are less aware and the uncomfortable circumstances this can put people in. I've realized I have to be patient, not everyone wants to talk to me, surprise! But really, getting to know people is a two way street and when they are ready to stop and talk I am ready to meet them there. Dr. Draper put it this way talking about teaching kids, "This is the day that they are ready to learn fractions so do it again!" We are teachers, excited, energetic, and passionate about our work. If a kid asks me how to write a thesis am I really going to say, "We just went over that!" If an investigator on my mission asks if we can talk about that Joseph Smith story again am I gonna say, "ugh I've told that story like 5 times today!" That's clearly ridiculous. Patience and understanding and love for these people I haven't even met is what comes out of studying ways to teach others. I am most excited to be taught by my kids, my coworkers, friends, family, and the spirit. That's what this class has me thinking about, pondering, loving.
Carly

Five Good Terms to Know:

Five Terms:
Here are five terms that I have come to understand in my multicultural Ed. class

Culture is specific to a person or a group of people. It is the activities you do,how you celebrate, how you are together, how you do daily chores, activities, how you are with strangers, with your family... it is essentially how people outwardly interpret their experiences and how they create things and reactions to things. I often think of a certain type of music as representative of a culture. One thing I learned from class was that cultures are conservative, they want to maintain the norms of the culture, you don't really see huge shift in culture because it is such a big part of who we are. In our classrooms we can notice how our kids are perceiving each other. There are a lot of different perspectives on just one culture and getting the kids to talk about this will help there to be more understanding of others.

Funds of Knowledge is what the kids come to the classroom already knowing. I think of it as your savings account of knowledge. We can always add to it and it just keeps getting bigger. So kids come to school with a set of values, a set of codes of conduct on how to behave, and a way of learning and acquiring new information. They come with bias just like we do and they come with interests. As a teacher it is important to tap into their funds of knowledge in order to reach them and expand their horizons. What they already know can be a starting point to build of off and a million points to compare new experiences to. This is why getting to know your students is so important. You, know besides being inherently important.

Inclusive Learning Teaching to reach all students regardless of their background or culture. Kids are differently advantaged. Maybe there capitol doesn’t serve them well in school. We have to take into consideration what they do know and then we can teach them what they need to know to be successful in this society. Part of teaching inclusively is questioning the canon and going out and finding what is missing or what needs to be changed. Often the kids in the school you work at live near each other and they share some specific cultural present. I think incorporating this reality into the classroom can be a powerful tool and way to teach in an inclusive way. As teachers we have to be able to adapt to what we learn from our students but also be able to use the resources we have to help those same students realize there are answers to questions that they have right now. If they want to learn about something they can learn it from someone. This to me is the most exciting piece of inclusive learning. We get to show these kids that they can learn from everyone.

Race is the physical appearance of a particular group of people and Ethnicity is the cultural traits of the group. So someone’s race is determined by their skin-tone and many other things that are typical of that race, certain hair, eyes, facial features, body types etc. 

Ethnicity is determined by things other than how you look. Your ethnicity is most often determined by where your ancestors came from and from your language, religion, and culture. This brings up the problem again, of defining people by making assumptions. One of the big problems in classrooms is that we assume we know things about a certain race or ethnicity and we start acting like we know who some one is by what they look like or where they are from. A kid can be a good student and not be asian and an asian can not be hardworking. We learn these stereotypes and they factor into our teaching and how our kids learn to treat each other. This can't happen, so we institute inclusive learning.

All of these terms are interrelated and not solely related to the classroom setting. They are good for all people to understand and appreciate.

"And Still We Rise"

I just finished a book called "And Still We Rise: The Trials and Triumphs of Twelve Gifted Inner-City Students." It is a book by Miles Corwin an acclaimed author who was a reporter for the Los Angeles Times. He knows the L.A. area really well and is able to candidly narrate the stories of 12 High School seniors as he goes with them into the ghetto and less glamourous parts of L.A.  One of the stories he follows is a young women named Olivia as she struggles to stay in school and fights her way through foster homes until she is able to go off on her own. Another story talks about Toya a young women who took her little sister and went to a group foster home after her father killed her mother. Sadikifu another brilliant student was in a feeding group for one of the biggest gangs in L.A. and nearly escaped being convicted of a murder he didn't commit. This quote pretty much sums up the views of many of the kids in the book: "What makes South Central L.A. so complicated is the fact that good-hearted, honest people share the same streets with drug users and thieves which causes daily anxiety for those of us who want to get ahead..."(68) If I learned anything from this book it is to know our students back stories. We have a whole year to get to know as much as we can about them. In the first few weeks of school we need to find what motivates them. Maybe it is their ownership over something and keeping that ownership, their personal satisfaction of expressing themselves through music, the affirmation they get from peers when they excel in competitive sports, the need to keep their families afloat, the need to be seen, heard, remembered. Motivation can be seen very early on in meeting someone if we look at what they want to accomplish, where they are heading, and how they are getting there. This book helped me think of my survey I want to give to my classes on the first day of school. Who are you? Where do you want to go? and How can you get there? I think this last question is especially important. We can show our kids that they don't have to get there alone. I'm also grateful we don't have to do it alone. One class at a time, one student at a time, doing the best we can, really our very best. That is what this book shows in it's portrayals of struggling students and the striving teachers that help them.

My First AA Meeting

            Today, (Wed. April 3^rd) I went to an AA Meeting (Alcoholics Anonymous) at St. Mary’s Church in Provo, Utah at noon. I was nervous but only because of the newness of the situation; I had a very stereotypical view of what an AA meeting was like. Basically, they sit and talk about how they are overcoming alcohol addictions right? When I walked in all of the people were seated at round tables put in a larger circular formation. I took a seat next to a red headed, middle-aged man and introduced myself. Kelly and I talked about where we were from and why I was there and he explained how all of the meetings are run. First the man running the meeting had a moment of silence for those suffering from alcoholism, I was rifling through The Big Book at this time. Then they read Chapter 5 pages 1 and 2 of The Big Book and the Twelve Steps in the back of the book. I was well acquainted with The Big Book by the time I left. That is literally the title of the AA Recovery Guide, The Big Book. Kelly let me borrow his for the meeting.

            As we progressed throughout the meeting, Don awarded coins to those who had been sober for a day, two days, a week, two weeks, … all the way to a year. Dennis got up and celebrated his 60^th day of sobriety and Jim celebrated a sober life of 28 years. After awards, we passed out cake for Jim’s birthday. Then we began what most people think of when they think of AA Meetings. The open floor, “never-ending testimony meeting” as Kelly called it. Jim went first and told us the story of how he cleaned up his act 28 years ago yesterday. None of them forget the day they stopped drinking. He said his wife and family kicked him out of the house they had bought in Salt Lake and when he returned from a rehabilitation center clean and ready to start over a month later they said, “ We told you it was better without you.” This broke my heart. He said his wife died of alcoholism 6 years later and he is now on good terms with his kids.

            There were many heart-wrenching stories that were told and many good people trying to change. Josie had been off alcohol for two days. This skinny, little, smiley, maroon headed girl was so beautiful and put together you never would have known she had any problems at all let alone an alcohol addiction. This is what I got out of the whole meeting: we can’t judge and when we do because sometimes we do, we have to be willing to listen to what someone has to say. For example, I judged Jonathon by his ragged appearance, gruff voice, lack of hygiene, and eight bags of groceries he brought with him, full of donuts and milk. The man was scary; he was the only part of the whole meeting I was nervous about. Then the “Never-ending testimony meeting,” as Kelly called it, started and he got up and spoke: “Hi, I’m Jonathon and I’m an alcoholic. ‘Hi Jonathon’ I know we need Him everyday, it’s the way we get through everyday, He reminds us that we can do this. Thanks” After he spoke I realized that he was not that different from me at all. I need my Savior every day, all day too; I just don’t have a vivid reminder of what it is like to not have that constant spirit with me. That was the coolest part of the meeting was realizing that everyone’s story matters and if you let people speak you can learn so much more about people. This can directly relate to my kids in the classroom but, I had an epiphany about something else as well. Not many kids have alcohol problems, but their parents might. Being introduced to the AA program today has made me an advocate. It is an inspired program with a purpose full of tolerance, compassion, and understanding for others.  I definitely understand what these parents are going through and from most of the stories, what kids have to go through when a parent is an alcoholic. I can not only refer them to an AA meeting in full confidence of it’s helpful affects, but I can sympathize and promise them they will receive empathy from a community full of wonderful people. We can tell our students about groups in the community like AA groups that can help their home lives. We can make a difference, and it doesn’t just have to be in school. Kids face real-world problems. It was fun to go and be the other. I can help students more than I thought.