Curriculum Project: Time in Prison

Curriculum Project: Time in Prison

My curriculum project is designed specifically for my Praxis placement – a book group in a women’s prison in Philadelphia. This particular educational setting has predetermined structures that limit what our book group can do/mean in the lives of the women, and cannot be considered or planned for in the same way as one would design curricula for a high school class. There are many limitations on educational access and identity education that are out of our hands as educators: logistically, access to the full 2 hours/week is inconsistent from week to week; in a purely longer-term practical sense, there is not a ‘tangible benefit’ such as credit towards a college course like us BMC students receive, from participating in this group. The value of book group is rooted entirely in communicating and thinking with one another, bringing in knowledge from lived experience, current circumstances, and outlooks on the world. This isn’t to say that there isn’t any real learning or takeaway from this class (the opposite is true), but that it is learning that manifests in new ways of thinking and interpreting the world and not in the form of learning to a standard or obtaining a letter grade. In book group, identity and access are mainly issues of creating an environment each week in which our discussion topic(s) accounts for the individual and promotes a positive connection with others and with education in general.

In considering the dislike in reading and discussing Push, I want to explore a more universal topic in a more ‘neutral’ way. Precious’ narrative made many women in our book group uncomfortable. I speculate that this was because her character hit a little too close to the realities of their lives or of those of people they know, and set a predetermined perspective from with to explore language and code-switching, the concepts that caught the interest and attention of the book group. While identifying with a narrative can be really powerful, as was with reading Kindred, it really hindered what and how we talked about the societal issues relevant in Push.

I would like to spend several weeks focusing on the concept of “time”, and how time is simultaneously within ourselves and in the world outside of ourselves. Time takes many different forms in our lives, and I would like to explore this concept through lenses of science and literature, through listening to and reading podcasts, articles, and short stories. A major limitation of teaching in prison is the regulation of materials and media that can be brought inside. Though it may not be possible to bring in audio material, I feel strongly that podcasts and audio media in general would be very meaningful within our book group in terms of identity education, and I would like to try to make it happen.

Pinkert’s Holocaust education in prison curriculum has influenced my understanding of what and how identity education can be present in our book group. Incarcerated students formed new ways to think about their own identities as people in the prison system through considering how the identities and experiences of people that lived through the Holocaust are unintentionally discounted in the way they are defined in society as ‘survivors’ and ‘victims’. “This collaborative research model…empowered the incarcerated students to develop their own voice and perspective regarding the strengths and limits of higher education in prison” (Pinkert 65). The stories of others are a powerful tool in developing ones own ‘voice and perspective’. I think that bringing other voices into the classroom – in the very literal audio sense – could be very powerful within the context of our current dialogue about language, and “The Art of Black English”. We have been focused on how language acts as a sort of code for how we fit into society. Bringing in this new medium could help shape our understanding of voice and influence how we as individuals perceive our own voices.

An overarching theme within our book group seems to be about valuing people; what makes people matter, and how do we determine who is more important than someone else? Language and time are intrinsic to how we (“society”) values people. I want to explore the intersections between our discussions about language and those about time, rather than explore the two as separate concepts. I like the idea of the curriculum focusing on ‘time’ while the actual material we use implicitly echoes our conversations about language.

Time holds a very particular role in their lives and inmates and in the prison system in general. I want there to be room for expression and discussion about time and imprisonment, but I want these connections between the two to come out of choice and self-determined interest rather than from a pre-determined topic of discussion. Through this curriculum I want us to be questioning what time ‘is’, how time is in many ways socially constructed, how we value our own time and that of others and how we learn to value and respect people differently as a result of how we value and respect ‘their’ time.

Week 1:

1. Intros: Names & first thing (word, thought, feeling) that comes to mind when you think of ‘time’.
2. Introduce and listen (or read script if not able to) to part of Radiolab podcast (about 10 minutes in) “It’s All Relative” http://www.radiolab.org/story/91586-its-all-relative/ in which neurologist Oliver Sacks talks about patients that experience time differently.
   1. Thoughts? What did you think about the podcast as a media form? Should we bring in more in the future?
   2. What is time? What do you make of the patients in the podcast, and about time being ‘yours’, being relative? What does it mean, how is it represented in our lives?
3. 10 minutes to write about a moment in our lives in which we experienced time ‘differently’, slowing down, speeding up, stopping.
   1. Share and talk about our stories
4. Introduce a short story (or several) to read for next week.
   1. I don’t have one in mind, but perhaps a story that was read for this Selected Shorts podcast http://www.selectedshorts.org/2014/08/about-time-with-guest-host-jane-curtin-and-the-hosts-of-radiolab/   
   2. Read a section out loud.
5. Collect writing & return writings from last week.

This particular Radiolab podcast is what gave me the idea to focus on time as a theme for book group. It places a very common idea – that time is relative – in a new scientific context that has you simultaneously entertaining ideas as both a social scientist and as a neuroscientist. It leaves the topic very open for interpretation and doesn’t determine the direction or vantage point of discussion.

            Since the conversation has many directions it can take, it is problematic for me to try to form the following weeks around particular questions and material. Instead, I will imagine additional pedagogy that could be used to communicate with each other in different ways, activities that may take into account different types of learners in book group. Something Dr. Fluellen said during the Innovative Educators panel in our class (November 4^th) was that as an educator, he has learned to recognize how his students learn differently than he does (as an auditory learner), and that it is important for him to teach in ways that account for the different learning styles of his students. Upon hearing this, I decided to focus my attention in our next meeting on the groups’ dynamics and different ways in which women are interacting within our group as individuals, and to consider additional learning methods we could try based on these interactions.  The ‘script’ that book group currently follows accounts for full group discussions, individual writing time, and sharing/presenting individual stories again in a full group setting. I would like to introduce some possible structures to book group format that would allow us to spend time in small group discussion and interaction.

A time in book group that often feels chaotic or unsettled is during individual writing time. This past week, when the prompt was introduced – to write about a time when you code-switched, and what you were trying to accomplish in doing so – many people (myself included) turned and talked with their neighbors. This is demonstrating an interesting of many people to have space in book group to talk with one another in a way that is less pressured than addressing the whole room.

Structure of Lesson Plan (A):

1. Intros
2. Talk about reading material that was given out last week.
3. Hand out a new article
   1. Take turns reading to the whole group
   2. Turn to the person(s) next to you, and in groups of 2-3 talk about it
4. While still separated into groups, bring people back to listen to writing prompt
   1. A minute or two to get everyone resettled into their new ‘objective’, time to turn to their group with any initial questions or impressions about the prompt
   2. 10ish minutes of silent writing time
5. Return to full group, share stories if interested
6. Introduce and hand out any new reading for next week

One problem that arises often, especially near the end of the two hours, is an urgency to speak that results in people speaking over one another, interrupting others while they are speaking, and an increase in the volume level in the room. The pace of our discussions moves quickly; one comment can change the trajectory of the conversation completely. I think this fuels the sense of urgency that is felt in the room to ‘get your words in’ before the conversation moves on and what you were going to say is no longer relevant in the conversation. These outbreaks of talking demonstrate a need for time spent in smaller groups.

 Structure of Lesson Plan (B):

1. Intros
2. Talk about reading material that was given out last week.
3. Hand out a new article
   1. Take turns reading to the whole group
   2. Discuss
4. Writing prompt, 10 minutes of silent writing time
   1. Turn to the person(s) next to you, and in groups of 2-3 talk about your stories
   2. Return to full group, share themes and connections found in one another’s stories
   3. Share stories with full group if interested
5. Introduce and hand out any new reading for next week 

            Structuring class time to have both full group and small group time could be beneficial to creating an environment that accounts for the individual whilst producing a greater sense of community within book group, which are both goals intrinsic to the ideals of identity-based education.

Pinkert, Anke, Michael Brawn, Jose Cabrales, and Gregory Donatelli. "The Transformative Power of Holocaust Education in Prison: A Teacher and Student Account." Radical Teacher Number 95: 60-65. Project MUSE - The Transformative Power of Holocaust Education in Prison: A Teacher and Student Account. University of Illinois Press, Spring 2013. Web. 12 Nov. 2014. <http://muse.jhu.edu/login?type=summary&url=/journals/radical_teacher/v095/95.pinkert.html>.