Educators of a Growing Multicultural Student Society - Literature review Example

Unit 1 – Assignment # 02 [Name Of Student] [Name Of Institution] Unit 1 – Assignment # 02 Introduction Of all the creatures that exist, man alone walks erect. This straightness of stature can be taken as an indication of the fact that man is the most supreme of all living forms that exist. Yet people are the most difficult subject to understand. Irrespective of their expertise, education or whatever environment they had earlier, they all have various kinds of familiar sense, sensitivity, intellect, nature, awareness, experience, insight, understanding, acumen, opinions, judgment or even thoughts. Everyone has the capability to generate and this talent is based upon all the above-mentioned factors. In this paper I will present a critical review and insight on three books: Other People's Children: Cultural Conflict in the Classroom, Identifying race and transforming whiteness in the classrooms and Critical pedagogy -notes from the real word. The books have transformed me as a person as it has exposed me to a totally new direction. Book Reviews The book that really served as an eye-opener was “Other people’s children”. The book is actually a compilation of nine well-written essays that advocate that a lot of educational problems accredited to children of color in reality stems from a supremacy arrangement through which the general world viewpoints of individuals with opportunity are assumed as the only existing truth, while the views and traditions of those less influential are sacked as insignificant or poor. The first part of this book reveals the debate about the relative virtues of literacy teaching either based on process or skills for Black children. It further points out that instructors of the minority-groups and also their parents are time and again left out of such negotiations, and supports that the schooling of children of the minority-group should be based in their individual traditions and backgrounds while also providing open training so that they are well adjusted to the codes of supremacy of the leading civilization (Delpit, 2006). Essays in part 2 describe village primary schools in Papua New Guinea that give children a solid base in their own language and culture while preparing them for later Western-based schooling in English, discuss personal observations of culture conflict in Alaska classrooms and of ways that Alaska Native teachers adapt the curriculum to local circumstances, and report the views and painful memories of African-American and Alaska Native teachers of their teacher-education and teaching experiences (Delpit, 2006). The later part focuses on problems of cultural difference and fairness in innovative performance-based educator judgment, which also covers the politics that is involved in teaching English language and improving writing skills of the African-American children. It clearly puts down that education imparted to a multicultural classroom should be free of bias and involve equal respect for each individual’s culture and background. "...what we actually desire to get to our schools [are] experiences that are so enriched in life, so complete of connectedness, so integrated in the meaning of all communities, so intellectual in the insights that we carve and the conclusion that we form, that each one of us, both students and instructors at an equal level, can cope up to lead lives that give us a true feeling of satisfaction." (Delpit, 2006) Have we ever wondered what picture would an animal present if it were given a chance to narrate a tale of any hunt. Its the same with education too. We, being brought up in our own culture, are not even properly aware of the others’ , let alone respect it. And when such individuals become mentors inside a class the picture is obvious. The book provides such an enlightening and though provoking view point on key problems that arise due to diversity. The author has a certain way to deal with words and bring them to life, so much so, that you can feel that incident yourself. The author has highlighted sevral fators through different incidents that supppress the learning chnaces of non-white children are portrayed. Delpit's observations and proposals have a strong basis in both theory and also in real practice. Having worked as a sociolinguist and also as an educational anthropologist, she portrays a very intellectual and a true analytical curve to this book. This book reveals her decades of experience as a tecaher for a vast variety of people which includes students in Native Alaskan schools, in ethnically erceptive preschools in the Papua New Guinea, in also in the mixed schools of Inner-City, America, and a lot other diverse yet huge educational environments. Delpit brings to attention based on her diverse international experience the facts that demonstrate two major problems that urgently need to be resolved in order to boost efforts that target to amlify the potential of students that come from different colour communities. These are: the true worth of context as compared to the decontextualizing rites practised in the key schools (narrated in "`Hello, Grandfather'”: In the essay “Lessons from Alaska"), the importance of connectedness against the culture damaging and inhumane progressions in the text and content in the key educational institutions.(discussed in "The Vilis Tokples Schools of Papua New Guinea"). (Delpit, 2006) Anyone can clearly observe that there exists a lot of power imbalance in nearly all American classrooms, specially in the richly diverse urban schools . It is mostly noted that Blacks and people from other colouor races are usually kept away from key educational posts. Since they do not exercise power, they don’t have any say in the way their children are schooled and educated. This book “ Other people’s children “ is wonderfully thought provoking on this subject. Another book in this regard is “identifying race and transforming whiteness”. The book is composed of experiences of educators that have worked in different and racially diverse settings, hence they bring together a well- researched collection of experiences of different cultures, race and whiteness that effects classroom activities. The fact that as educators, do we actually challenge and disrrupt the social layout of whiteness within ourselves and in our educational environments? The authors of this book have taken a road down the memory lane and have thoroughly explored their own lives and have traced the roots of their assumptions, How and why they were formed and what the social forces that led them to interpret the world around them, as they then believed (Lea, Virgina, Helfand, 2004). These people have collectively propesed great alternative supporting blocks and pedagogies that help to better reflect and teach children from different ethnic backgrounds and yet identify and transform the white factor that exist in multicultural classrooms. The book explores difficult subjects such as Teaching about Whiteness When You're Not White, Challenging Eurocentric Classroom Norms Through Passionate Discussions of Racial Oppression, Deconstructing Whiteness: Discovering the Water – and above all Naming Race and Racism as a Problem in the classrooms. While teaching againgst racial discrimination, the book focuses on how we should actively change and challenge our wide-spread perceptions on whiteness that end up in dividing people as children, develops impartial behaviours, inequities and injustices within ourselves, in our syllabus and above all in our general pedagogy which ultimately results in disharmony in the American society and hence across the world (Lea, Virgina, Helfand, 2004). Loss of insight and invisibility has conventionally illustrated the creation of white individuality and as a consequence, understanding must be the primary and essential element in restructuring whiteness. For those educationalists that are growing more and more alert of the critical task deconstructing whiteness plays in demanding community injustice and who value the significance of rebuilding a constructive but honest and right white identity for their learners, this is a very important and useful book. We are all exposed to a time when white annoyance is fueling traditionalist assails on positive deeds and added social fairness projects. White anger no matter in public or in classrooms is chalking whites as victims. Parallel to this, guiltiness- generating anti-racist education has made many whites powerless, whose dedications might, below other conditions, oblige them to effort for social integrity (Lea, Virgina, Helfand, 2004). Not just educators but significant theorists too are establishing to distinguish the want to shift away from self- condemnation and deconstruction to a more practical and positive position. Whiteness in its true essence is more about just than race and discrimination. To a certain extent whiteness cuts transversely a variety of axes of communal classification, including race, class, sex, and period. For this motive, whiteness must be measured generally as a "normalizing skill, " that is, as a medium for the making and maintenance of domineering principles and norms (Wertsch, 2003). This is an imperative point because it has repeatedly been viewed only as an attribute of individuality politics, as an aspect of individualism on a par with traditions or skin-color. It is necessary for teachers to understand this phenomenon for effective and impartial teaching in multicultural settings (Lea, Virgina, Helfand, 2004). Without such a division the suppression of whiteness might be conflated in the midst of the likelihood of converting white identity in a manner that does not destroy it. The book “Critical Pedagogy: Notes from the Real World” develops a far insight in todays educational system and helps the reader to understand why things rae the way they appear. If there is a general agreement that its time to interrupt partial race and class-based education, then first, we all should be aware of the magnitude and nature with which whiteness has penetrated in our classroom settings and how it rules all our cultural contents and works and that are well outside impartial and socio-cultural ecnomic standard (Wink, 2005). The book outlines the racist powers and also the neo-colonial that are still being exercised even in this present day world. Virginia and Erma Jean’s observation set a new meaning to the philosophy of culture role in education and how it acts as a tool to change the bare conservative scripted dialogue (Cole, 1996). They contibute a large share on educultural forms of art, systems that they have formed to aid pre-service school instructors have contact with deep-seated social and cultural norms and take it to a counter-hegemonic area in which crucial realization of whiteness can be shaped. They motivate participants to bring to class their individual examples of how to positively particiapte in activites and hence reduce the cultural gaps that exist in classrooms. “.... Critical education is learning, reading and putting into words, but it's not just this, rather much much more. It incorporates knowing rather than just reading, and that too, lots of knowing. It also encompasses seeing, lots of seeing, but not just seeing but in truth observing. It helps us to read the cultural practices of the entire world very clearly.... Critical literacy also means that we comprehend how and more importantly formed, and By whom, for whom and under what circumstances.” (Wink, 2005) Conclusion Our key responsibility as educators of a growing multicultural student society is to learn to recognize our own concepts and biases. We need to educate ourselves as we deal with students of different races and cultural origins. It is also important thay we search for clues that indicate our own biases, to ensure that we are dealing with all students on equal bases. Though less thought about, but after reading the books I realize that what is common is not always right. If I am not aware of a certain child’s custom or tradition that does not mean that I will not respect his opinion inclass. Above all I understand as a teacher the importance of having such a content to teach in the classroom that helps each child to nurture and grow and not just children from a certain race. I value "dialogue" a lot in my class as I believe that it nurtures horizontal relationships among students and their teachers by which they effectively communicate, enjoy experiences and develop understanding of diverse cultures and traditions while respecting each one of them. These books firmly challenge our deep-rooted beliefs and hence open our minds to promote questioning in classrooms, effective debating, even efficient arguing, only to discover that what we always have faith in or know about is not essentially true. References Cole, M. (1996). Cultural psychology: A once and future discipline. Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Delpit, Lisa (2006): Other people’s children, cultural coflict in the classroom, Newyork: The new press. Lea, Virgina, Judy Helfand (2004): Identifying race and transforming Whiteness in the classroom.Newyork, PeaLang. Robinson, G.L.N. (2001). Crosscultural Understanding. New York: Prentice Hall. Rueda, MacGillivray, Monzó, L., & Arzubiaga, A. (2001). Engaged reading: A multi-level approach to considering sociocultural features with diverse learners. In D. McInerny & S. VanEtten (Eds.), Research on sociocultural influences on motivation and learning (pp. 233-264). Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing, Inc. Wertsch, (2003). A sociocultural approach to agency. In E. A. Forman, N. Minick, & C. A. Stone (Eds.), Contexts for learning: Sociocultural dynamics in children's development (pp.336–356). New York: Oxford University Press. Wink, Joan (2005) : Critical Pedagogy: Notes from the real world, Boston, Pearson education inc. Read More