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January 23, 2008
January 15, 2008
Culturally Contested Literacies: America's "Rainbow Underclass" and Urban Schools
Today I attended a lecture on campus given by Guofang Li, who was promoting her new book, Culturally Contested Literacies. I found the session very interesting, especially since I am familiar with her work. This new book appears to build upon her previous research, while taking it further than has been previously explored. (For more information on Li's work, click here for an excerpt from Multicultural and Multilingual Literacy and Language.)
The origin of the book comes from the discontinuity that occurs between home and school among America's "Rainbow Underclass" (as termed by Li) and Urban School Systems. During her investigations, Li was led to the conclusion that culture and class are of the utmost importance when considering urban experiences towards literacy. The book explores the intersection between global and local, following six culturally and racially diverse families (Vietnamese, Sudanese, and white American) as they attempt to navigate the inner-city education system, focusing primarily on issues of race, gender, and class.
Li established early on that there were huge gaps in terms of poverty, race, and achievement. Urban schools are under increasing racial and residential segregation. This was hardly a surprise after reading Kozol's Shame of the Nation. However, Li explores the effect that family and culture have upon students, especially border-crossing students. She investigates the role of school in students' home literacy practices, but also the role of family and culture on the school's literacy practices. Unsurprisingly, there was a drastic disconnect between the two.
Li found that parents and schools were often giving children contradictory messages; in one example, a boy was referred to the ESL for Arabic speakers program and given an Arabic-speaking tutor to facilitate his transition to English. However, his parents had stifled his comprehension of Arabic, as they didn't want to impede his English language skills. So the boy was left without a language, so to speak, hanging uncomfortably between Arabic and English and not attaining proficiency in either. Further complicating these kinds of problems is the school's implicit need to "fast track" its students through ESL programs as quickly as possible, both for economic and educational reasons. Without the support and resources necessary, children are often pushed through the program too quickly. Li made a comment here that I found particularly interesting, saying that schools often don't know who will be returning and who will be "dropping out." This attitude is disturbing to me, as it seems to contain an implicit assumption of failure.
To complicate things, many parents are resistant to the types of support the school is attempting to provide. Differing pedagogical views leave many parents wondering what exactly their children are even going to school for. Some parents even resist the ESL classroom pullout support services, as they feel it removes their child from the "content" (read: purpose) of school. Often these parents have taken a drastic socio-economic step downwards in their move to the US. Li documents stories of middle-class lawyers, teachers, and professionals turned meat-packers and factory workers in an attempt to provide a better life for their children. These parents understand issues of access and the importance of education; however, due to their newly-acquired lower-class status, they are forced to rely on free (and often difficult to find) resources.
In conclusion, Li finds that literacy is culturally contested, and requires skillful and successful cultural translation. Finally, socio-environmental factors are often limiting factors in this attempt at success.
The origin of the book comes from the discontinuity that occurs between home and school among America's "Rainbow Underclass" (as termed by Li) and Urban School Systems. During her investigations, Li was led to the conclusion that culture and class are of the utmost importance when considering urban experiences towards literacy. The book explores the intersection between global and local, following six culturally and racially diverse families (Vietnamese, Sudanese, and white American) as they attempt to navigate the inner-city education system, focusing primarily on issues of race, gender, and class.
Li established early on that there were huge gaps in terms of poverty, race, and achievement. Urban schools are under increasing racial and residential segregation. This was hardly a surprise after reading Kozol's Shame of the Nation. However, Li explores the effect that family and culture have upon students, especially border-crossing students. She investigates the role of school in students' home literacy practices, but also the role of family and culture on the school's literacy practices. Unsurprisingly, there was a drastic disconnect between the two.
Li found that parents and schools were often giving children contradictory messages; in one example, a boy was referred to the ESL for Arabic speakers program and given an Arabic-speaking tutor to facilitate his transition to English. However, his parents had stifled his comprehension of Arabic, as they didn't want to impede his English language skills. So the boy was left without a language, so to speak, hanging uncomfortably between Arabic and English and not attaining proficiency in either. Further complicating these kinds of problems is the school's implicit need to "fast track" its students through ESL programs as quickly as possible, both for economic and educational reasons. Without the support and resources necessary, children are often pushed through the program too quickly. Li made a comment here that I found particularly interesting, saying that schools often don't know who will be returning and who will be "dropping out." This attitude is disturbing to me, as it seems to contain an implicit assumption of failure.
To complicate things, many parents are resistant to the types of support the school is attempting to provide. Differing pedagogical views leave many parents wondering what exactly their children are even going to school for. Some parents even resist the ESL classroom pullout support services, as they feel it removes their child from the "content" (read: purpose) of school. Often these parents have taken a drastic socio-economic step downwards in their move to the US. Li documents stories of middle-class lawyers, teachers, and professionals turned meat-packers and factory workers in an attempt to provide a better life for their children. These parents understand issues of access and the importance of education; however, due to their newly-acquired lower-class status, they are forced to rely on free (and often difficult to find) resources.
In conclusion, Li finds that literacy is culturally contested, and requires skillful and successful cultural translation. Finally, socio-environmental factors are often limiting factors in this attempt at success.
E-Notebook Submission
Determine two personal goals you would like to pursue during our time together. What will you gain from this course? Provide an explanation of why you chose these goals.
1. Learn in practice and take risks!
One thing that has most impressed me during my time at MSU is the ability to take risks with the practical application of a given theory. Sometimes, it is too easy to isolate these, and we miss valuable opportunities for learning. My goal during this semester is to take risks with these new theories and ideas in my classroom. As teaching candidates, we have an incredibly valuable opportunity in that we are able to separate ourselves from the logistical details of implementing certain strategies. Often, we (myself included) are so afraid of failure that we tend to play it safe during the best opportunity we will have for theoretical execution.
This goal is especially important to me because it seems that often in fieldwork, it can be easy to take advantage of an especially helpful CT. A “good CT” (as espoused by many teaching candidates) will often tell you exactly what is necessary from your lesson plan, how he or she would like it taught, and provide materials necessary for your success. However, this does not really teach us how to evaluate different pedagogical choices to predict their success or failure. Also, we must remember that what works with one group of students will not work with another, so it is important that we think about all of the ways that something can be done so that we can choose the most effective learning strategy for our particular group of students. Without the confidence to take risks, this skill will never be learned.
Essentially, there is a safe way and a risky way to get through this course. I choose the path of risk, as I feel it will pay off in the long run. The more risks that we take in the field, the more learning opportunities we create for ourselves. Playing it safe ensures that we develop a stagnant pedagogy with little room for development.
2. Be a reflective learner, while maintaining the emphasis on student understanding.
A second area of importance, that I feel is much too easy to skip over, is the reflection on a given strategy. Without this reflection, the risk is meaningless. Being a reflective learner means evaluating myself, my students, and the effectiveness of a given task. Self-evaluation is perhaps the most difficult part of being a reflective learner; objectivity is difficult to come by. However, a few simple questions can reveal much about you not only as a learner, but also as a teacher. For example, “What helps you to learn? What hinders your learning ability? How do you respond to the following: Criticism? Praise? Insults? Compromise?” These questions are important; however, the most important question to ask is, “What do your responses say about you?” Essentially, you must reflect on your own self-reflection. Once you know how you respond to different stimuli, you can begin to perceive yourself as others might see you. This ability to step outside oneself is invaluable to any teacher. Also important is the ability to question whether or not your beliefs and ideologies about education are supported and modeled by your behaviors. Teachers are constantly leading by example, even when we might not think so, and therefore must be extremely careful that our words are supported by action.
While self-evaluation is important, we must remember that it is student-learning that is our main goal. Hence, the most important question that we can ask about a given strategy when evaluating its effectiveness is not, “Did I do what I said I would do?” but rather, “Did we have the impact we hoped we would have?” It is easy to think of ourselves as students when evaluating our pedagogical choices; my goal is to retain the emphasis on my students’ learning, while being cognizant of my own.
I chose this goal due to my prior experience in College of Ed courses. Often, there is so much material to cover that the semester becomes a whirlwind of due dates, rubrics, and angel submissions. It is easy to lose sight of why we’re here in this environment. The chaos of our own learning often supercedes the real goal, evaluation of our students’ learning and how this was impacted by our choices.
1. Learn in practice and take risks!
One thing that has most impressed me during my time at MSU is the ability to take risks with the practical application of a given theory. Sometimes, it is too easy to isolate these, and we miss valuable opportunities for learning. My goal during this semester is to take risks with these new theories and ideas in my classroom. As teaching candidates, we have an incredibly valuable opportunity in that we are able to separate ourselves from the logistical details of implementing certain strategies. Often, we (myself included) are so afraid of failure that we tend to play it safe during the best opportunity we will have for theoretical execution.
This goal is especially important to me because it seems that often in fieldwork, it can be easy to take advantage of an especially helpful CT. A “good CT” (as espoused by many teaching candidates) will often tell you exactly what is necessary from your lesson plan, how he or she would like it taught, and provide materials necessary for your success. However, this does not really teach us how to evaluate different pedagogical choices to predict their success or failure. Also, we must remember that what works with one group of students will not work with another, so it is important that we think about all of the ways that something can be done so that we can choose the most effective learning strategy for our particular group of students. Without the confidence to take risks, this skill will never be learned.
Essentially, there is a safe way and a risky way to get through this course. I choose the path of risk, as I feel it will pay off in the long run. The more risks that we take in the field, the more learning opportunities we create for ourselves. Playing it safe ensures that we develop a stagnant pedagogy with little room for development.
2. Be a reflective learner, while maintaining the emphasis on student understanding.
A second area of importance, that I feel is much too easy to skip over, is the reflection on a given strategy. Without this reflection, the risk is meaningless. Being a reflective learner means evaluating myself, my students, and the effectiveness of a given task. Self-evaluation is perhaps the most difficult part of being a reflective learner; objectivity is difficult to come by. However, a few simple questions can reveal much about you not only as a learner, but also as a teacher. For example, “What helps you to learn? What hinders your learning ability? How do you respond to the following: Criticism? Praise? Insults? Compromise?” These questions are important; however, the most important question to ask is, “What do your responses say about you?” Essentially, you must reflect on your own self-reflection. Once you know how you respond to different stimuli, you can begin to perceive yourself as others might see you. This ability to step outside oneself is invaluable to any teacher. Also important is the ability to question whether or not your beliefs and ideologies about education are supported and modeled by your behaviors. Teachers are constantly leading by example, even when we might not think so, and therefore must be extremely careful that our words are supported by action.
While self-evaluation is important, we must remember that it is student-learning that is our main goal. Hence, the most important question that we can ask about a given strategy when evaluating its effectiveness is not, “Did I do what I said I would do?” but rather, “Did we have the impact we hoped we would have?” It is easy to think of ourselves as students when evaluating our pedagogical choices; my goal is to retain the emphasis on my students’ learning, while being cognizant of my own.
I chose this goal due to my prior experience in College of Ed courses. Often, there is so much material to cover that the semester becomes a whirlwind of due dates, rubrics, and angel submissions. It is easy to lose sight of why we’re here in this environment. The chaos of our own learning often supercedes the real goal, evaluation of our students’ learning and how this was impacted by our choices.
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