I intern every Friday at Spaziano Elementary School in Providence, Rhode Island. I was put at the same table every time I visited there to engage and work with the same students in order to track their progress for mine, and their, benefit throughout the semester. There was one little boy in particular that I became very close with from the beginning. He was a slow worker and learner, and struggled very much with his letters and phrases (such as: I am …) from Day One. On Friday November 18th while I was visiting the classroom, he pulled out a book they had been working on since September, and started reading it to me. This was such a proud and joyful moment for both of us because I not only felt proud of him, but there was a part of me that felt there was a chance I contributed to his success. Right there in that moment, I realized that literacy was the aim, and he was able to achieve it. Universal Literacy is, and always will be the aim. If we really think about it, being literate is the only way to ensure survival in todays world since education, technology and power are all closely intertwined. Power is partially derived from advanced technology, and advanced technology relies on literacy. Now this is kind of a scary and alarming due to the fact that 26% of the world’s adult population is illiterate. This is due to the two differentiating education systems that are instilled in society today: empowering education and domesticating education.
“President Kennedy once said that he hoped that a person’s chance to become president was not determined on the day he was baptized (referring to the fact that some said a Catholic could never become president.) I’d like to hope that a child’s expectations are not determined on the day she or he enter kindergarten, but it would be foolish to entertain such a hope unless there are some drastic changes made.”
I chose this quote because I think it relates back to not only first impressions, but more importantly to family backgrounds. It only takes 7 seconds to form a first impression on someone. Yeah, there are always people that claim that they don’t “judge” anyone and all that bull crap — but we all do it! Why? Because its INEVITABLE, my friends! In the reading, Finn discussed the case studies of the five schools in the beginning. Moreover, how each school had ranging themes. Ranging from the “focus school, to the “executive elite school”, the themes he recorded were: Resistance, Possibility, Individualism, Humanitarianism, and last but not least, Excellence. The first four themes are the schools that operate with a domesticating education system; Meaning that these children are brought in, thinking that if they work and study hard, it will pay off. Basically we are instilling a false sense of the American Dream in these children from a young age which is cruel and unfair. These domesticating education schooling systems are pretty neutral and mingled together for the most part. Whereas the empowerinh education schooling systems are mainly: white, rich, privileged children, where children have an inheritance passed down from generation to generation. The children that receive an education from here are personally guaranteed success that leads to positions of high power. These children come from good family backgrounds, and more importantly white skin, which works in a white person receiving an empowering education favor, over a colored person receiving a domesticating education favor, when it comes down to making first impressions in the long run. I know that sounds pretty awful, but it’s the ugly truth.
“The proper role of people is to be active and to communicate with others – not to be passive or to be used by others. Proper communication between people is dialogue between equals.”
When I first read this quote, the first thought that popped into my head was, “Okay, but teachers are an authority figure, which means that rule over us, corresponding to INequality.” Finn then went on to discuss if we truly are all equal persona. For example, are a police officer and a convicted law breaker equal? You tell me. The short story that Finn talked about involving Pablo Freire, a famous Brazilian educator who attracted attention during the 1960’s and 1970’s for his ideas concerning teaching literacy to poor adults, really caught my attention on this one as well. This movement was so revolutionary, and it infuriated me to just learn about Freire and his efforts toward helping those illiterate individuals today! This might just be me, but I think that maybe we believe that literacy can only be taught during a young age — possibly due to the fact that children are like sponges and absorb every bit of information aimed their way from the ages of 4-6 years old. An illiterate adult learning how to read and write in their older years is unheard of in todays world. Some individuals who received empowering education may think, “What’s the point? Teaching the adult, poor how to read and write wont make any difference in in MY country, let alone the world. Might as well just keep them illiterate.” The truth is, is that no one wants to go through their life being illiterate, and the power class doesn’t want a “suppos-ed” domesticated, illiterate adult to receive an empowering education because it creates beliefs that challenge the status quo. Hence, Literacy with an Attitude! Freire wanted to communicate to the power class that everyone is EQUAL and entitled to receive an empowering education, no matter the background. But of course, it takes energy to make change the rich class is comfortable with the way things were, and did not act upon such controversial ideologies.
“If we teach children to critique the world but fail to teach them to act, we instill cynicism and despair.”
This might be a little off topic, but this quote stood out to me the most in this entire reading because we relate to it so much in todays society. Each and everyone of us are all guilty of logging onto Facebook and watching some biased political video that bashes a certain something. Now some of us may just watch tis video, rant to our family members or friends on the accuracy of how corrupt our world is today – and that will be the end of it. Some may go a little farther than that and share the video, causing some disagreements that may begin personal attacks with other people on Facebook, and end in the removal of being friends with one another – and that will be the end of that. I will say that probably about 1% of the people that watch that video will go out into the world to take further action to protest something that they viewed in a Facebook video. We are all so unaware of the fact of how cynical we are, how we all have our personal beliefs and how one persons opinion does not trump another persons. I really just felt the need to state that right there. Moving along, if we do not act on what we learn in school, what good will come of this? Things are constantly changing, and we shouldn’t be faced with despair as the ultimatum in any situation. The great thing about America is that we have Freedom of Speech, but I feel like it hardly gets put to use anymore. Sometimes it feels as though we’re living in GroundHog Day, again. Just living the same day over and over again without acting on, or challenging, the corrupt two-sided education system.
Something to think about:
Is it true that teachers are seen as superior oppressors?
Link:
https://onemeanmfa.wordpress.com/2012/10/14/teacher-oppression-an-american-epidemic/
Schooling in a Democratic Society 
Great blog! The connecting link was interesting.
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I loved how you connected this to your volunteering experience!
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I felt exactly how you did because my little girl at my school can finally write her name and watching her do it I was like..wow. I helped her learn to write her name, like she will never forget how to write her name and its just a good feeling so I totally see where youre coming from with your child and his book!!
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