RES 5535: Race, Class, and Gender in Literacy Research (summer 2010)

Maria,
You have pointed out a problem that is all too common in education. The lack of connection between school and home. It is hard for us to tell students how important education is when they hear and see something different at home. I don't think there is any one thing we can do to eliminate this problem. It is going to be a slow process of getting kids to trust us and see we belive in them and want more for their lives. As they continue to get older those seeds are being planted that hopefully one day they will realize the have the ability and desire to use education to achieve another life. However, I think we need to respect their parents lives and choices so we don't push them evern further away from shcool.

Michael Lemke

I like how you pointed out that you would not have realized the challenges children face if you were not in a classroom each day. Many people do not see this as they are looking at the performance of teachers. They do not see the challenges we face as teachers. Many people do only look at literacy as reading and writing, instead of all the factors that play into the learning for children; anything from the worrying if a child has food to eat each night, if they see violence at night, or if they even get a good night’s sleep. If we could trade a day with any other profession and then we would realize the challenges others face, and maybe they would be able to see the challenges teachers face when teaching students. This is a case many schools even face between grade levels. How do we appreciate what everyone is doing and contribute in order to make the big picture better for everyone, not just ourselves and situation? Hick’s does a good job pointing these issues out in chapters 1 and 2. I am looking forward to reading the next few chapters on these student's lives.

Meredith

When I began my teaching career, I had no idea the level of adversity I would face when I looked into the eyes of my students. Some came into my first grade class independent, reading well, and talkative. Some came in shy and clingy to Momma, beginning to read....and still others came in roudy, hard to focus, and not reading anything. I was amazed to know that some of my students were not read to at home, some were read to every night, and some did not even have books at home. All the diversity classes I took as an undergrad taught me about CULTURAL diversity...none had prepared me for the SOCIAL diversity I was to face.

The connection between school and home has not been thought of much until lately. I had always tried to just teach the students with little thought to home. Now my eyes have been opened probably too much and I begin to notice more the baggage each child brings from home. Some home situations are good while others are not. I think that we as educators could spend a lot of time trying to diagnose all the problems a child has at home, but our main job should be teaching. We are not going to change things overnight. We have to take them with what they bring to the classroom and teach them.

Maria,
My former principal had a saying in reference to students in situations you were talking about; those with little or no literacy support at home. He always said, "We can talk about how bad they have it and 'bless their hearts' all we want, but that doesn't change anything. We have no control over what they don't have at home, but we do have control over what we can give them here. We just have to do everything possible that we can do here and hope it's enough to make a difference." I had a hard time with this at first, because it made me feel like I was giving up on those students. I felt like I should be able to change the world for them. What I finally had to admit to was that he was right. I had to for the most part accept them for who they were and where they came from, and do everthing in my power to work with them at school to influence them in a positive way. I can't change their home discourse (although I can have positive interactions with their parents and hope to have some influence). What I can do is give them all I've got while I've got them.

Maria,
I, like you, never thought about all of the many things that affect children in terms of their literacy. I also never thought about all that literacy encompasses. I never made the connection that storytelling is a part of literacy. I'm amazed that there are so many facets of literacy that I never thought about before. It almost makes me feel guilty. I had a principal once that sounded a lot like your principal. She said "we take them as they are when they come in and go from there" and that "all we have control of is the teaching that goes on in our classroom." This was always tough for me to accept- that not all parents help children with their homework each afternoon, read with their children, etc. My eyes have definitely been opened. I try to compensate for lack of parental support at home by having more parent volunteers in my classroom who work with the students I know aren't getting support at home.
Marsha Warren

The teacher I did my student teaching under told me to make friends with the parents immediately. She said if you earn the parents trust they will support you in educating their child. Of course, you cannot win over all parents. The partnership helps from the connection between classroom and home.