RES 5535: Race, Class, and Gender in Literacy Research (summer 2009)

Hi All!

I apologize in advance for any oddities you may find in this post. I am a seventh grade Language Arts teacher, who spent the morning in another teacher’s very hot classroom with twenty-five of my favorite people retaking the 7th grade Reading EOG. We played musical classrooms in order to accommodate mod groups. My students were complaining not only about the heat & the funky air-freshener in our borrowed space, but also about the stark white walls. Our room rarely has naked walls because I love color, art, and evidence of student work. We keep 705 highly decorated with middle school flair.

All of that to say I have a rough sinus headache that is still lingering now. I’ve never actually left school early and come home to bed…before 1 in the afternoon. Today was a first! I am going to self-diagnose with the EOG sickness. I love my kids, but think the EOG is a gross misuse of time, funding, and the word “assessment”. How’s that for a political beginning of the semester? 

Reading has never been optional in my family. My parents are both teachers, even if not employed as such. My Mom is a suburbanite from outside of Philadelphia. Dad is from Duplin County—the land of hogs & tobacco—in Southeastern North Carolina. They met one another while working in a home for children in New Jersey. So, Mom packed up her things and moved down South, where she underwent a cultural revolution (or perhaps initially revulsion), learned that hushpuppies weren’t just shoes, and had to figure out language patterns like, “I liked to have got…”

We lived in a rural area of the state where literacy resources were minimal. However, my parents had shelves and shelves full of books on a range of topics. My big brother, who is five years older than I am, was reading when I came into the world. So, when I was old enough to have a competitive nature—which, according to my mother was probably around 5 days old—I wanted to read like Matthew. I would get so upset when we would go to restaurants and he could read the menu but I couldn’t. Not only did I want to be able to read like him, but I wanted to do it better!

Each night, when my Dad would get home from work, our family would all crawl into my parents’ bed to read. (This sounds really cozy, but we lived in an old house with no air-conditioning, except in their bedroom and the living room…so it was cozy born of necessity.) We read Bible stories, picture books, travel brochures, etc. Discussion was always encouraged. We also took weekly trips to the Kenansville library during the summer. We would load up our old, raggedy blue station wagon (the kind with hideous wood paneling) and drive the 30 minutes to the library. I can still remember the dank smell of the old green carpet in the children’s section. Heaven on earth!

Now, as an adult reader, I see those habits carry over. My bedside table is generally overrun with nighttime reading options. I have to be careful to choose a book that is not overly engaging or stimulating, or I wind up staying awake too late. I live in Greensboro and one of the primary reasons I chose the corner of town I live in is the great public library close by. I have a country girl’s heart with a twist of city girl’s desire for cultural diversity. So, to me there is nothing better than a public library with wi-fi, a porch full of rocking chairs, and landscaping done with rain water caught in eco-friendly barrels!

I teach seventh graders. We spend a lot of time talking about reading skills & about the power or writing and self-expression. This year, I started to share more of my personal writing with them. It’s made such a difference in my confidence as a writer and in my relationship with my students. I journal, write poetry, and sometimes write expressive short essays. I had considered a career in photojournalism and still sometimes toy with the idea.

The older I get, the more I realize how integral literacy has been to my life. It—along with wonderful parents and public school teachers—afforded me opportunities I would not otherwise have had. Literacy provided “an out” from Duplin County. (I’m allowed to say that because I’m from there.) It continues to give me a way to process my reality and sometimes escape from it. I treasure my shelf full of journals, that I’ve kept since high school and love nothing better than to stay inside on a night like tonight to read, well, just about whatever.

I’m looking forward to this semester & hope to learn ways to better serve the diverse students that I get to spend each day with. For now, it’s time to take some more Advil & hop back in bed. It’s almost time for “So You Think You Can Dance” my one summertime TV show addiction.

Ruth Johnson