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I had my first field placement on Friday, and it went extremely well! I got to speak with the teacher for twenty minutes before the students came back from Spanish, and I was immediately able to tell how much she loves to teach and how much she adores this school. She has a great deal of experience, and she was very eager to have me help out in the classroom (she is co-teaching with a teacher who I have not met yet). The children (first and second grade) came back and, after introducing me to the students and having the students introduce themselves to me, the teacher gave them a spelling test. This gave me the opportunity to see what level the children are at in their spelling, and to learn a new way to set up a spelling test: the teacher glued illustrations of Native Americans on the top of the page to remind the students about what they are studying (each year they alternate between studying Native Americans and People of the World).

One thing that I did notice was, when the teacher read a story, there was a part that read, “You fight like women! Can’t you fight like a man?” I was a bit concerned that the teacher did not have a metaconversation with the students about gender stereotyping, as that simple sentence can have a serious impact on the way students think about their own strength in relation to their gender.

During one of discussions last week, we talked about how teachers often get frustrated with their students when they aren't doing they things they are asked to do. We also talked about students who are demotivated, not unmotivated, but demotivated from school work because they are struggling to connect. Thus, the challenge that I would like to focus on is how does learning happen when there are so many other situations that the learner faces outside of the class. Here, the learner is both the teacher and the students. 

Teachers and students are both people and sometimes when our basic needs aren't met we tend to feel frustrated about other things that we think we can control. For example, in our small group discussions we talked about how teachers have no bathroom or snack breaks. Even the students have a bathroom visit limit and a restriction from eating in class. As we all know, these are some basic calls to nature that we all must abide by to be healthy. Yet, students and teachers are often shackled down from these needs. Without energy from the food, our inhibitions go down and we can't learn. So, is there really a point even to be in class if no one can focus? Without our inhiitions, we get frustrated easily and channel anger towards those who aren't even part of the situation. As outsiders, we can judge and say that the angry person is incensitive, but how will that solve that fact there's something else in the lives of the students and teacher that requires more immediate attention?

(I'm sorry if this is long, my real journal entry is longer).

I wrote my post this week on chapter 3 of the book our class is reading Teaching for Social Justice by Connie North. In one of the chapters one of the characters, Joe, acquires his social studies gig as a teacher and it is clear that he would not have gotten it if he wasn’t a minority. The district didn’t want a “blond, blue-eyed woman” despite the fact that she had masters in African American history and Joe did not. The idea of reverse racism is a prevalent one these days as I have heard some of my friends wonder if they actually have to fight harder because they are white, and some councilors joke about how colleges need minority students so that can make it more likely that a student who is a minority will be accepted into a school of their choice. I’m not sure where I stand with this issue. I am a political science major and last semester we talked about descriptive and substantive representation. In the first, constituents want their politician to not only stand up for their beliefs but also look like them, and in substantive constituents also want a representative who will advocate for their best interests, but the person doesn’t have to look like them.

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Through my observations in the classroom and the subsequent examination I have made of myself as a possible future educator, I have thought a lot about the specific role of compassion in the school environment. I often tend to have a negative initial reaction to teachers who are brusque with students, even though I consciously recognize that it is part of maintaining discipline in a classroom that they, but not I, spend hours in every single day. I think it is easy from an outsider’s perspective to expect that every classroom interaction should be compassionate, and to think this isn’t happening when a teacher is short with a student who keeps asking to go to the bathroom, for example. I think that there is something to be said for focusing on creating relationships of caring and concern in a broad sense within a classroom environment, which is something that takes time and energy on parts of the student and teacher. A truly compassionate educational relationship, like any relationship, would be characterized by being able to deliver and accept criticism while also feeling safe and ultimately supported in one’s endeavors. I think this speaks to Margaret’s point that deeper relationships exist where the desire to please is put aside. 

How is the notion of some students as "bad apples" (from chapter 6 of Whatever It Takes) resonant -- or not -- in your field setting?  Who gets categorized in this way, and by whom? what are the "criteria" for this kind of label, or to put it another way, what are students labeled this way like?  how they treated? If this "bad apples" idea is NOT relevant to your setting, consider why not -- and what that might suggest about what's happening there.  Finally, you could consider these questions on a specific, classroom- or school-based level or more systemically, depending on your site.

Field Notes: March 5th, 2013 

I haven’t really noticed the “bad apple” theme come up in my field placement. However, I think the lack of clear “bad apples” says something about student-teacher relationships at my school and the type of learning environment there, although some might argue that it also is reflective of my school’s highly selective student body. I’m interested in talking about this issue more with others in my group and in class, but my field notes this week touch on a wide variety of issues that came up this week for me. 

"I talk to my student teachers about failure all the time because they don’t need my help with success.  Success is actually a naturally occurring phenomenon.  If something’s not going well, you know it and roll with it.  You need preparation for failure, not success.” (North, 26)