Sherman Alexie Indian Education Summary

Education has been a topic of controversy for many years now, and will continue to be for years to come. The modern American society is best defined by its education. A good part of the average person’s life is spent at school, going to school, and paying for school. However, even though education is so obviously very important, there are many groups in America that are getting shorted. The Native Americans are a key group that has struggled the most. The largest obstacle they face is lack of proper education. The standard educational practices being used for the instruction of Native American peoples are not effective. There are many pieces to this road-block, and many solutions. This can be rectified by having more culturally

Sherman Alexie, in “Indian Education” tells his experiences in school on the reservation. Some of his teachers did not treat him very good and did not try to understand him. In his ninth grade year he collapsed. A teacher assumed that he had been drinking just because he was Native American. The teacher said, “What’s that boy been drinking? I know all about these Indian kids. They start drinking real young.” Sherman Alexie didn’t listen to the negatives in school. He persevered and became valedictorian of his school.

In the story “Indian Education by Sherman Alexie, he gives the reader a quick narrative of his school experience starting from first grade and continuing all the way through twelfth. It is suggested with many exquisite and not so exquisite points about growing up and being schooled on an American Indian reservation. After reading the story for the first time much of the subliminal messages in it passed me by and the story came across as rather negative and bitter. However, after reading it again I was able to pick up much of the humor such as the analogy to Dr. Seuss' Green Eggs and Ham at the conclusion of the second grade. Such concluding remarks come at the end of each chapter and give the story a poetic tone.The story almost reads like

Adjusting to another culture is a difficult concept, especially for children in their school classrooms. In Sherman Alexie’s, “Indian Education,” he discusses the different stages of a Native Americans childhood compared to his white counterparts. He is describing the schooling of a child, Victor, in an American Indian reservation, grade by grade. He uses a few different examples of satire and irony, in which could be viewed in completely different ways, expressing different feelings to the reader. Racism and bullying are both present throughout this essay between Indians and Americans. The Indian Americans have the stereotype of being unsuccessful and always being those that are left behind. Through Alexie’s negativity and humor in his

The short story, “Indian Education” by Sherman Alexie, is a summary of Alexie’s childhood during his twelve years of school. For each grade, a brief racist flashback is mentioned. Each flashback indicates why Alexie felt “lost and insignificant” (Alexie 320). Alexie is on an Indian Reservation, which makes things more difficult. He suffers injustice from his community, teachers, and classmates. This story is a biographical perspective of Alexie with a strong use of structure, setting, and diction. He uses these elements to help the reader understand his experiences throughout his childhood.

Education —an institution for success, opportunity, and progress — is itself steeped in racism. In Sherman Alexie’s short story “Indian Education” from his book The Longer Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven is set in two places, the Spokane Indian Reservation and a farm town nearby the reservation. The story is written in a list of formative events chronologize Victor’s youth by depicting the most potent moment from each year he is in school. Alexie addresses the issue of racism in education by examining examples of injustice and discrimination over twelve years in a boy’s life. Victor faces his initial injustice in first grade when he is bullied by bigger kids, but his understanding of injustice becomes much more complex in grades two through twelve as he experiences discrimination against his American Indian identity. Familial experiences of a Native woman, Alexie’s style and humor, and Victor’s awareness of discrimination from grade one to twelve all reveal the grim reality of growing up and being schooled on an American Indian reservation.

The greatest country in the world still has problems evenly distributing education to its youth. The articles I have read for this unit have a common theme regarding our education system. The authors illustrate to the reader about the struggles in America concerning how we obtain and education. Oppression, politics, racism, and socioeconomic status are a few examples of what is wrong with our country and its means of delivering a fair education to all Americans.

Influences come from anywhere- teachers, family, peers, school, the list goes on and on. In his narrative, “Indian Education”, Sherman Alexie depicts moments and people in his life that have impacted him. His stories range from bullies at school to life on the reservation. Each section varies in topic, however each connects to one common theme. For instance, avoid conforming to stereotypes is a theme of “Indian Education”.

The human mind is perhaps the greatest object on the earth, animate or inanimate, but without the proper training, the mind is a relatively useless tool. Through the development of formal education systems, humans as a whole have tried to ensure the training of all minds so as to continue prosperity for the world. Most of the time, though, education systems do not realize the harm they are doing to developing minds and the subsequent negative consequences. Among the largest of these inadequate education systems is the American primary schooling system. The American education system is in fact failing; it continues to deplete children of their natural creativity and thirst for knowledge while preaching conformity, which in turn creates an

Through the years minority groups have long endured repression, poverty, and discrimination. A prime example of such a group is the Native Americans. They had their own land and fundamental way of life stripped from them almost unceasingly for decades. Although they were the real “natives” of the land, they were driven off by the government and coerced to assimilate to the white man’s way. Unfortunately, the persecution of the Natives was primarily based on the prevalent greed for money and power. This past impeded the Native American’s preservation of their culture as many were obviated of the right to speak the native language and dress in traditional clothing. Because of this cultural expulsion, among other

There has also been a need for quality teachers in Indian schools. However, due to rural isolation, teachers have lower salaries, higher poverty rates, and a difference in languages and cultures. With compiled data, it shows that 22 percent of Native American ages 25 and older have not finished high school, and only 13 percent have a bachelor’s degree, according to the findings from the National Center for Education Statistics. The standards are lacking for natives on education, and along with crime in schools it becomes difficult to recruit and retain quality teachers in Indian schools. Schools aboard reservations continue to be plagued with safety concerns, high suspension and expulsion rates, and the highest percentage of all groups to report injury with weapons and fights on school grounds. Furthering the need for special education teachers is also growing since representation of students in special education is at 18 percent, almost double the rest of the student population in the country that is at 10 percent. Many officials have notice the problem, The Bureau of Indian Education states “those that we fund, are historically some of the lowest performing

Sadly, I noticed a delay and slow learning process of the public American education system, and it took me less than a day to realize the education I had would help me overcome language and cultural barriers. On the other hand, I noticed many social problems with different kids I had as classmates; some of them had drug problems, family problems; it is ironic that I was witness for the first time of a fight between two boys in the country that my parents brought me for own safety, when I never saw one back home ( a “dangerous”

That tunnel vision becomes emblematic of a larger problem, that a select group of people have the solution to gauging development. As a result, how can I avoid the same mishap as the Indians invited in 1744 by the commissioners from Virginia to send boys to William and Mary College (Rogoff, 2003, p. 22)? While the children received education in that climate, upon their return to their region, their new acquisition of book smart was inadequate for what they needed to survive. It makes me question the value of education. Furthermore, it cautions me to avoid placing my doctrine of education upon my students, with no consideration of culture and environment, to the point where what they receive in the classroom has no weight in their real

From the time I was a small child my family has always stressed the essentiality of education, but I’ve learned that the process of acquiring knowledge in this country comes with a steep price. The loss of one’s identity while being forced to assimilate into “American culture” is the price many of us must pay. This barbaric process of cultural genocide occurs in the schooling system because in order to be perceived as fully human, minorities are obligated to forfeit their history and lose a piece of themselves with the hopes of acceptance. This is fundamental when constructing agents who will just go out into the world and perpetuate the same nauseating racial, social, economic hierarchies which we call freedom in this

Many Americans believe that even though the U.S. education system is meant to be integrated, but there are still examples of racism and the imbalance of educational opportunities among the different classes of people. In an article published by the U.S. News and World Report, it was stated that “lower wealth, lower health, lower parental education levels, more dealings with the justice system and other circumstances create a perfect storm that leaves blacks [and other minorities] without the same educational opportunities as whites [and individuals with a steady income]”(Cook 4). These disparities begin to influence a child as soon as they are able to have the capacity to learn. Although there are only pieces of Aristotle’s works on education, he develops a clear point on the importance of education and how it is the path to happiness.