Maritza's Connections
Kohn: What to Look for in a Classroom
Throughout all of my visits to my Service Learning classroom I have had many Kohn moments, because every time I entered the class I saw new signs or examples that reminded me of Kohn, resulting in me having to review his chart, What to Look for in a Classroom, many times. As I looked at it more and examined it more I became more convinced that what’s listed on it certainly makes up a good classroom and learning experience. Being in my Service Learning classroom helped me get more convinced as I saw evidence of what he lists as good signs or bad sings there with my students and classroom.The pictures included in the slide show, provide a series of examples I found in my Service Learning class of what Kohn says that must be present or not in a classroom.
Robert F. Kennedy: Room 208 - 4th Grade
Rodriguez: Aria
During my Service Learning I experienced many events that made me relate back to past readings we have done in class, but my Rodriguez moment is that especial one that has impacted me a whole lot.
My Rodriguez moment didn't take place in my usual classroom, but instead in a class nearby. I was sent there because my regular class was taking state testing, and Ms. X welcomed me in her classroom that day. As nervous as I was to enter a new place, with new students that I didn't know, I went in eager to help out who ever I was placed with, and so I did. I walked in during science time, but eventually it was time for writing. Part of what I was supposed to do was to help student D, who is of Hispanic/ Latino descent, correct his autobiography. The first thing I noticed was that student D based a lot of his writing talking about his dad. Almost everything talked about moments with him, which made me smile. I mentioned to student D that it was great how he talked a lot about his dad, and he agreed. Yet, my curiosity came when I did not find his dad’s name anywhere on the paper. I mentioned to student D that he had used a lot of “my dad” or “he” and that we should replace that with his name, but he didn't want to. He told me his name is “Quique” which I believe must come from Enrique, and I told him it was a nice name, but he responded that he thought it was “funny and ugly [and that it was in] Dominican and no one [there understood] Dominican”. The following button takes you to my Wideo video that shows this, my Rodriguez moment:
My Rodriguez moment didn't take place in my usual classroom, but instead in a class nearby. I was sent there because my regular class was taking state testing, and Ms. X welcomed me in her classroom that day. As nervous as I was to enter a new place, with new students that I didn't know, I went in eager to help out who ever I was placed with, and so I did. I walked in during science time, but eventually it was time for writing. Part of what I was supposed to do was to help student D, who is of Hispanic/ Latino descent, correct his autobiography. The first thing I noticed was that student D based a lot of his writing talking about his dad. Almost everything talked about moments with him, which made me smile. I mentioned to student D that it was great how he talked a lot about his dad, and he agreed. Yet, my curiosity came when I did not find his dad’s name anywhere on the paper. I mentioned to student D that he had used a lot of “my dad” or “he” and that we should replace that with his name, but he didn't want to. He told me his name is “Quique” which I believe must come from Enrique, and I told him it was a nice name, but he responded that he thought it was “funny and ugly [and that it was in] Dominican and no one [there understood] Dominican”. The following button takes you to my Wideo video that shows this, my Rodriguez moment:
Once you click on the button it will bring right to my video, and once you finished watching it ,
you can just click the going back/ return arrow to go back to my page.
you can just click the going back/ return arrow to go back to my page.
What happened with student D flashed right in my mind as a Rodriguez moment, as well as a moment with many authors all interconnected with one another. Student D was utilizing one of the “two ways a person is individualized” according to Rodriguez and that way is by “diminishing [the] sense of private individuality by becoming assimilated into public society, [making] possible the achievement of public individuality”. Student D as well as Rodriguez think it is more important to leave behind one’s private identity which is made up of who we are, the culture we come from, and the language we speak, all so that one can be accepted in society and form a public identity that is acceptable. At that moment my mind was blown away and my heart broken. That child in front of me preferred to not talk about his dad’s name at all simply because he thought it was “ugly” and he preferred to just call him by “dad” of by “he” so that he would be accepted in his class. As much as he was deciding to keep his dad’s name in private to achieve what Rodriguez calls a “public identity”, I think his decision is a combination of many aspects we have learned from other authors that greatly connect to this Rodriguez moment
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Student D was displaying an action that is the result from many aspects that come together. First of all there was no safe space for him in his classroom to feel safe and accepted even though he is from a different cultural background. There was no safe space for him to feel that he could say all of his family members’ names even if they sound different from the typical English names. Although in Safe Spaces, Gerri August advocates for the acceptance for LGBTQ people in our schools, the topic of creating safe spaces also relates to other students that have experienced “marginalization that youth receive from family, peers, teachers, media, and community members that include jokes or prejudicial comments” simply because they are different, or like in this case because they have Latino family members with Hispanic names that don't sound common to most people. As August said “classrooms lay the foundation for an inclusive and safe society: a just community where common interests and individual differences coexist”, therefore it is important to have safe spaces for students like Student D, so that they feel like they belong, and most importantly that they are welcomed and accepted even though they are different. It is important for them to understand that there is nothing wrong with being different or like in this case there is nothing wring having a dad with a unique and nice name like “Quique”.
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Another connection that I made with my Rodriguez moment was what we learned from Finn’s reading, Citizenship in School: Reconceptualizing Down Syndrome, where we saw that in order to from a community it “requires a willingness to see people as they are - different in their minds and bodies, but not different in their spirits and ability to contribute to the mosaic of society”. As we saw from what Student D said, he was not completely part of his classroom community, because his voice was “deterministically silenced” because he didn't feel as he belonged in that class, simply because he came from a different cultural background. There was nothing set up in his class for him to feel that he was part of that classroom community just as everyone else was, and that he could express where he came from, and those nice unique names his family members have without having to worry about what others might say. Simply, there was nothing set up so that he felt that himself and his differences were being valued as much as everyone else’s differences were being valued as well.
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The lack of safe spaces and lack of reassurance that everyone is valued in a classroom community were some connections that I made with my Rodriguez moment, but this moment is not complete without thinking of ways that Student D would have been able to feel less worried about expressing with pride what his dad’s name is. The key in all of this as Collier puts it, is the teacher’s ”true appreciation of the different linguistic cultural values that students bring into the classroom”and this was exactly what was missing. In that classroom were Student D was in, there was no evidence on the walls that gave “information about the people who spend time together in [the] classroom” as it recommended by Kohn, thus not creating a welcoming environment for students and most importantly not creating a classroom where students learn where they each come from as well as to appreciate each other’s different backgrounds. It is important for teachers to establish a system where students like Student D, that come from different cultural backgrounds and that might be exposed to more than one language, feel appreciated and welcomed, because just ignoring that or trying to eradicate it is only “effective to turn off students from schooling and has never served to encourage school achievement of minority students” as Collier clearly established it in her article Teaching Multilingual Children.
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In conclusion, all of our class readings have definitely prepared me to see education with fresh eyes full of information that will enable me to become a better educator someday. Although my main authors were Kozol, Kohn, and Rodriguez, there is no doubt that every single reading we have done was reflected in more than event during my Service Learning helping me see things better and clearer.