There are snitches amongst us!

For those of you who may not know what a snitch is, a snitch is one who tattles, one who rats you out. Dictionary.com has a definition of “one who turns informer.”

Now you may be thinking to yourself “But who would do that?” Well, these people know who they are.

These girls (or boys – though I doubt it) refused to be woman (or man) enough to come to those with whom they perceived a problem and address their issues in a mature, open, honest manner. Instead, they chose to tattle; to complain – as though we were the elementary school students, instead of the teachers!

So my message to our cohort is this: If you have a problem with something that someone does or says, or the way a person behaves, it is your responsibility to speak with that person yourself.

We’re all adults, SO LET’S ACT LIKE IT!!!!

But, that’s what the group decided on so I hope the project will be fantastic and I look forward to contributing where and how I can. Good luck to all of us!

One of the most important ideas I took from the reading on Shabazz and his time at Atlanta University as a Mathematics scholar, researcher and professor, is that our power in life, as well as our legacies, come not only from what we directly impact, but from the ripples we leave in our wakes. Looking at what we love and at what we feel could be improved in this program is a rare opportunity to impact not only our own educational process, but also those processes of future teacher-candidates. Our list encompasses some very serious and profound problems, faced by many in the world. Yet, I continue to implore members of our cohort to “think globally, act locally.”

We need to be reminded, constantly, of the fact that we have the will and power to make educational reform more than just another “what if…” conversation by transforming our ideas into reality. We owe it to ourselves, our predecessors and, most importantly, to our students.

Of course that was before Culturally Responsive Pedagogy gave me a new lense through which to view public school education and its effects on students, parents and community.  I was surprised that class sizes were so small.  I think I had the idea that every classroom would be jam packed with students – like 35 students in a room.  I was glad to see the students enjoying recess, even though I wanted more playground equipment for them.  The learning cottages/trailers made me sad.  They seem isolated from the rest of the school and kind of far from the bathrooms.  The air conditioner seemed loud to us, but I guess students and teachers habituate to the noise and press on towards learning. 

Mrs. Cunningham’s students were delightful and I thought their suggestions for how to improve their school were excellent – a swimming pool, swimming lessons, Spanish lessons, other languages, computers on every desk and an airplane complete with beds.  Ok, so maybe the plane with the beds on it will take some extra work and a whole lot of manipulation of the pork barrel politics for Georgia.  Computers, a pool, and foreign language lessons really don’t sound that far fetched.  Sadly, it seems we’ve got a lot of work to do to get there.

How can we encourage our students to seek out different perspectives, critically evaluate them and then forge their own, when half the different perspectives are MIA from the school library?  We can’t. 

Censorship creates intellectual and emotional dependency in students.  It contributes to “good” little automatons who wait patiently and quietly in a single file line for some authority figure to tell them what to think. 

Personally, I’d rather let even the most offensive and hateful ideas and concepts come into our schools, where (hopefully) responsible adults will be available to discuss them openly and honestly with curious young minds, than shut out that one great story that changes the life of a child.