Memories From The Other Lessons

I decided to evaluate an excerpt from the book The Presence of Others. This selection, entitled Keeping Close to Home: Class and Education, was written by Bell Hooks, and is taken from her book Talking Back, published in 1989. Hooks is the author of many other volumes, including Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center (1984), Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom (1994), and Remembered Rapture: The Writer at Work (1999). According to the co-author of The Presence of Others, Andrea A. Lunsford, Hooks is comparable to fellow featured authors Adrienne Rich and Mike Rose for their similar views on education being "the practice of exclusion" (93).

Schools systematically subjugate minority and black students when a school’s enrollment contains a huge racial majority. If students have no exposure to persons of different ethnicities, cultures, races, and religions, then these students will experience culture shock when they confront “other” people. Even in our class, we talk about black and minority students as another group, one that differs from “us.” We think about the inequalities in school systems as problems we need to fix, not as problems that have influenced our thinking and affect us as prospective teachers. For example, a white graduate student with

Newman states, “the most powerful institutional agent of socialization after the family, is education” (Newman 67). The public education system is tasked with not educating, but also socializing and defining student’s sense of self as they mature through

     “Education must become fully student-centered and inclusive of the voices and experiences of the students.” (Paragraph 3, bullet 5) I believe this statement is also very true. If teachers would take the time to get to know their students’ and the experiences they have, they may be able to connect with their students on a more personal basis. Teachers and students aren’t personal enough with each other. I look at it like this, my education is in the hands of the person’s classroom I walk into everyday. I would at least like to make myself known so my teachers can connect with me on a level and have an understanding of my learning capacity.

In Mike Rose’s “I Just Wanna Be Average,” he argues that educational placements stereotypes negatively affect one’s performance. Rose was placed in the vocational program in school, thereby his attitude towards his education was to just get by. He was later placed in a higher level class where he struggled to keep up with, until a professor helped him see the amount of potential Rose had and that’s where his confidence went up, along with his grades. Rose supported his argument with techniques such as ethos, pathos, and attention to detail.

My educational career started from an urban charter school that specifically targeted students of East African descent like me. Most of the students looked like me, talked like me, came from the same home background as me. And it’s where I met and made most of my lifelong friends. I don’t remember talking very much in school, in hindsight I guess that is why my participation grade was always so low. But I was a “good” student if good meant not getting into trouble, not talking when the teacher was talking, following directions without complaint. Then I was a good student. And because I always turned my homework on time and didn’t get into trouble that equated me to goody two shoes status and teachers pet with my peer.

Steele focuses her argument around high achieving, motivated black student’s underachievement rooted in stereotype threat. She argues that students that are of equal intelligent level underperform due to subtle but powerful impacts of stereotypes, and that colleges can lessen these impacts by addressing the issue through creation of identity safety and diminishing of racial divides. This point is strongly proven through the study conducted by Woolf et al. (2008) where minority students underachieve in medical school due to decreased teacher interactions rooted in student classifications. If a safe identity space were created in this institution the classifications and ultimately racial divide would be nullified, leading to equal relationships amongst all students and teachers and ultimately opportunity for equal performance. Upon examination of Steele’s essay and other case studies, stereotype threats biggest disadvantage lies in ultimate creation of unequal opportunities and testing environment

Through Floyd’s Group Development in a High School Adjustment Seminar and Identity and Achievement: A Depth Psychology Approach to Student Development the reader learns about the thoughts of students of color while in a classroom setting. Namely, due to an internalized sense of inferiority, students of color may often have rigid academic standards and expectations of themselves that impede them from speaking in classrooms. The internalized sense of not being worthy, as seen in Identity and Achievement: A Depth Psychology Approach to Student Development, programs dedicated to the individual growth of students of color become

Some things cannot happen in an instant. Some things take time to blossom and grow while others can happen in seconds. Changing personal beliefs or the personality of a person themselves, is one of those that is a process of time. Time that is more detrimental than most of the characters may realize. Throughout A Lesson Before Dying we see changes, whether they are in the form of structure, theme, or even characters, which is one of the most prominent changes we see. Ernest J. Gaines created a story about Jefferson, a young “boy”, who is sentenced to death for a crime he did not commit. Who then can supposedly only become a “man” with the help of another “man”. This “man” is Grant Wiggins, a teacher who is only trying to help others but doesn’t

Marginalization is good because it prepares children for the outside world. “'Mutual dislike' [is a way that] … students [can] develop healthy social and emotional skills” (Derbyshire

Dugan’s teachers understand this reality, and believe that making personal connections with students, many of whom have felt invisible or alienated at their former schools, is central to their work” (81).

Good character is defined by a man that follows his true beliefs, not one that stands with the crowd. Standing up for what is right when others hide in the corner showcases a person’s courage and honor: “Less than two hours ago, Baba had volunteered to take a bullet for the honor of a woman he didn’t even know” (118). By putting the woman’s life ahead of his, Baba proves that he acts upon the honor and pride rooted deep within his heart (114). Baba does not do things for the bettering of his social status, he does honorable duties because it is the right thing to do. He realizes that by sitting back and simply following the crowd, he is not staying true to his own ethics. When Baba talks to Rahim Khan he says, “A boy who won’t

I chose Urie Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological model of child development to reflect on my stages of development. In the microsystem of Bronfenbrenner’s model, my early childhood family structure included my uncle, his wife and their five children. I went to live with my uncle after my mother passed away. By middle childhood, my uncle and his wife migrated to the United Sates and I went to live with one of his daughters( Erica) and her two children. They became my construct of what a family represent. Although I was welcomed in Erica’s family, I felt as if I did not belong in their family. The only place I felt accepted was at school. The classroom represented a place where I expressed my feelings without being ignored or judged by my peers. Also, I had very observant and understanding teachers who had the best of my interest. I had one teacher , Mr. Francis, who believed that I was capable of improving academically. At the end of his class, he noted in my report card that I had potential to be academically competent, however, I needed to settle down and apply myself to learning. His comments motivated me to do my best throughout elementary school. During elementary school, I maintained healthy relationships with my peers. There were never any reports of misconduct of any misunderstanding amongst my peers. In fact, interactions with them thought me how to engage in fair play, wait my turn, build trust and explore my environment. In exploring my environment, I

A conversation after learning about the condemning words of a 1st grade teacher. “I do not understand your concern. Most children DO NOT start learning how to read until third grade. And he’s not even a gifted student,” said the principal to my mother. The principal’s remarks left my mother despondent. I vividly remember sitting in a class of 1st graders encamped around the teacher as she read; eager to learn. I stood up next to her and attempted to follow along when she gave me a gelid stare and said “Sit down, you couldn’t read if you tried!” In an instant, I was deemed stupid. It was my welcome to the term disadvantaged youth, which essentially means an aberration of whilom peccadilloes one way or another. It is far from the most dramatic encounter of my youth, but it forced me to think deeply about how easily I could be stripped of my individuality, of my jones for knowledge, about how easily hypothermic social preconceptions could render irrelevant any truth about who I truly was. In my educator’s eyes, I was another low-performing student in her class.

Great lessons are learned from small things that happen to us in life. Last week I stood at the bus stop waiting for a vehicle to convey me to work. It was raining and there was no bus. I considered taking a bike but I also realized that wind would make it difficult for me to use an umbrella on top of a bike; so, since I didn't want to get drenched I opted to wait for a bus. Forty minutes later, there was no bus. People formed clusters according to their various bus stops. And as time passed the crowd grew in number. Suddenly I looked by my right and saw a private vehicle parked about twenty metres away loading passengers. Out of desperation I left my bus stop and walked towards it. On getting there I discovered that it wasn't going my route. As I