Chilean Inspiration and Questions about Structure

                

*Check out this video if you want to get a glimpse of the "voices"  (musical in this case) in the Chilean school described below.

As an undergraduate, I spent a semester in Chile studying comparative education and social change.  For the final month of my time in the country, I participated in a self-created, independent study. I lived with an amazing family in a rural Mapuche village (the Mapuche are the largest group of indigenous people in Chile)  of Chapod working with students 4-8^th grades to consider history, geography, and world cultures using the World Cup 2010 to frame the journey.  Throughout the course of history, and especially during the time of Pinochet’s dictatorship, the Mapuche people have been heinously discriminated against. Their ancestral lands have been stripped from them, they were asked to longer build their traditional homes, and were forbidden to speak their language. As a result, many Mapuche face lives of poverty, continued discrimination in the workplace, and have not passed on their language of Mapungundun to their children. Interestingly, there is a move by the young adults to go back to school and learn their family’s language.  Chapod is situated one hour by bus from the major city. Very few people have cars and there is neither a gas station nor any store to speak of. The village consists of a school, a church, and a cluster of homes full of kind and gracious families.  During my time in the village, I worked with the 4^th-8^th grade student to consider cultures, history, and geography of the world using the upcoming World Cup as our framework. Each week,  I would go to the city by bus and download photo after photo of people, animals, landscapes, and events from around the world. I would bring them on my computer to the school (where there is no internet) and show the kids. Students responded with such enthusiasm! As they encountered the diversity of the world, I hoped they would own their own unique contributions as Mapuche people.  One of the most powerful experiences occurred one afternoon when I had tea with the founder of the school. He talked about what it felt like when he was told he must only speak Castellano (Spanish).  He talked about the heart wrench he experienced as he lost his own voice. . . As I consider the ways in which voice can empower students, I continue to think back to my time in Chile and to all that I learned about identity and voice through the students there.

As I have read and reflected upon readings for Critical Pedagogy and Teachers for Critical Inquiry this week, I have been struck by the frequent references to the power of voice.  In bell hooks, “Confronting Class in the Classroom,” she makes a powerful reference to the words of Jane Ellen Wilson:

“Only by coming to terms with my own past, my own background, and seeing that in the context of the world at large, have I begun to find my true voice and to understand that, since it is my own voice, that no pre-cut niche exists for it; that part of the work to be done is making a place, with others, where my and our voices, can stand clear of the background noise and voice our concerns as part of a larger song” (The Critical Pedagogy Reader, 139).

hooks continues, explaining that a “distinction must be made between a shallow emphasis on coming to voice, which wrongly suggests there can be some democratization of voice wherein everyone’s words will be given equal time and be seen as equally valuable. . . and the more complex recognition of the uniqueness of each voice and a willingness to create spaces in the classroom where all voices can be heard because all students are free to speak, knowing their presence will be recognized and valued. . .just the physical experience of hearing, of listening intently, to each particular voice strengthens our capacity to learn together” (The Critical Pedagogy Reader ,139). 

With this in mind, I continue to consider how this work will unfold. Beginning with public speaking skills as a foundation to promote self-confidence, we will move together toward student-selected projects that build conceptual understanding of what it means to share what we care about and who we are in ways that impact and transform ourselves, our communities, and our world.  As a people, we are asked to explain where we come from, who we are, and what matters to us in multiple contexts, be it interviews to gain acceptance into charter and private middle and high schools, to secure jobs and opportunities, or to open doors for our children by articulating why they deserve scholarships to summer programs or colleges.  Expression is foundational to life—musicians compose and perform, dancers choreograph, sculptures breathe life into clay, photographers capture life in a manner that is sharable, athletes hone their trademark moves, poets slam, chefs marinate and present with parsley.  If childhood and schooling doesn’t allow for the movement of imagination and the articulation of self, where will our artists be? Our athletes? Our leaders? Our freedom fighters?

I need your help. I plan to begin meeting with students next Wednesday, March 5^th.  I am currently between two structures to make this happen. The first involves staying after with students from 3:15 until just after 4 when the bus arrives to take them home.  This would allow us to meet in our classroom and meet for a specific amount of time. I would ask about 10 students (current and former first graders) to participate in this time.  I am currently thinking of students with beautiful stories who are 1. Local kids with powerful advocates as parents who are painfully shy and 2. Refugee students who will likely have to advocate for themselves in major ways in their lifetimes and will need strong voices to do so.  The second structure is quite different in that it would be limited to three children and I would be able to commit to taking these three children home after the session. This would allow us to meet at school or somewhere else and not have a restrained amount of time nor environment.  I could add a couple students if their parents would be willing to pick them up.  This would allow me to really focus on building the voices of the very small group I work alongside.  Does anyone have any suggestions between these two structures? Or have ideas for what I should do to build student confidence and introduce the project/get input from kids during our first meeting next week?

I look forward to your voices. . . .

-Maggie

Hello All,
 If kids were free to express themselves, what would they say? What could I find out about kids? Just last week, I had an experience with a student in my school that will forever challenge my understanding of the oppressed and of oppressors as well as what dialogue and perspective really mean. I attended a “wax museum” exhibit put on by the third graders at my school. Each student was dressed as an individual they deemed to be a “freedom fighter” and had a paper “button” at their feet labeled with their assumed identity. Students were dressed as Jackie Robinson, Harriet Tubman, and Martin Luther King, Jr. Visitors to the exhibit were to step on the button to hear each child’s speech and step on the button when the child completed their spiel.

One student, the older brother of my former first grade student, was representing his father. I had met his father and spoken with him over the phone, so I thought it might be interesting to learn about him. The child was enthusiastic to share with me and I was enthusiastic to hear from him. This is an energetic and friendly child who is spending his second year in third grade. He is from Burma. He began to speak about his father. He explained that his father was the president of his university, the great-grandson of the President of Burma, and a Karen warrior who fought for freedom and justice for his people. The child shared rapidly and then stopped, returning to his frozen position. How often do words follow this “wax museum” model? It was not in the “model” for me to question or share my reactions. The words are shared but the dialogue about how these words affect others (I was moved in incredible ways and my perspective greatly challenged. How much I have to learn about the stories of the families of my students! And of my students themselves!) or how they challenge and perplex the speaker is not always voiced. Mutual trust between dialougers is something that must be intentionally sought after and engaged in by both parties, yet I believe that with humility and in love, it is possible. I believe that the interaction between young children is a fertile ground for mutual trust to flourish and this is an interaction that I want to witness and be inspired and challenged by. I taught this child's little sister for a year and I never knew any of what her older brother shared with me in twenty seconds. What he CHOSE to share. How often I sat with both children as the little first grade encouraged her brother to read basic words when she could fly across the page and fill her head with stories. . . How many phone calls did I exchange with her father about things such as her reading progress or if I could drive her home from an after school event? How little I listened to who he was!

 This semester I want to listen to my students. I want to hear their voices. I plan to carve out time after school once a week to just delight in the stories of my kids. Who are they? What are their perspectives? What stories do they want to share? How do they want to share them? I would like to have just a small group of former and current students to run alongside in this project. I think that if as a teacher I learned to listen to my students stories, I would be a much better educator and partner of students and their families. I think it is important for me to start this outside the classroom context so that I don't feel like I am trying to get across a specific standard or have kids stand in line quietly in the hallway. I want kids to be freed up and be themselves. I feel like I know a lot about my kids. . . but maybe I only know what I ask them. Maybe I only know what I want to hear or what they think I want to hear.

 As I was reading for our Critical Pedagogy class, I was struck by the chapter in Pedagogy of the Oppressed about dialogue and the role of mutual trust in dialogue. When a child experiences what it is to be known and honored rather than deposited into and directed, I believe there is an opportunity for unparalleled growth. My students’ stories have the potential to “transform the world” if only they are shared, heard, and honored (87). What might it look like for “mutual dialogue” to exist between my students? How can students learn to seek the “constructive elements” of words (87)? In reality, who am I to teach six and seven year olds anything about the power of dialogue. Children are often those who most genuinely “love the world,” “love life,” and “love people” (90). They are therefore well equipped to enter into dialogue. Without this dialogue, “there is not communication, and without communication there can be no true education” (92). If I call myself an educator, is it not my first and foremost goal to promote communication?

 I don't know yet exactly what this work might look like. I am hopeful I can create a vision for it alongside my kids. I look forward to hearing if anyone has any recommendations of further readings around this theme. Today I had an exciting turn of events in that one of my 2 team members at school voiced that she would be interested in working alongside me in this work. She was a Kindergarten teacher last year and taught many of my students. She also has her masters in Multicultural Education and a real passion for Critical Pedagogy. I look forward to what this could look like. . .