Entry # 21: Do we really believe kids
are born without the desire to know?
Yesterday, after a "Walk Through" of her school, a principal asked
our rather large group of visiting administrators what she could do about
the ever present 20 percent of her students that she can't seem to reach.
Everyone acknowledged the problem. Everyone had tasted their piece of this
pie, no one likes it, but we've all learned to live with it.
There was plenty of blame to go around at this session. High school folks
wanted to know why the middle schools hadn't "fixed" these kids,
and the folks in the middle turned to ask the same question of the elementary
teachers. We used a protocol and the conversation was handled politely,
but there was no mistaking the purpose -- the blame game had begun.
Since we were all respectful of each other and how hard we all work, I knew
it wouldn't take long for the locus of blame to be turned away from us and
on to the kids and their families. A few minutes went by and sure enough,
one of the principals began to talk about the lack of motivation, the "baggage"
that some kids bring. I could already predict the next sentence, the one
about the parents, the ones who packed those bags.
By the time this principal got around to talking about work ethic as something
you either have or don't have, I was feeling pretty upset. However, she
was upset too, and she was just giving voice to a very popular view about
why some kids fail.
What's behind the disengagement?
Instead of the defeated acceptance of this view of kids, a view fraught
with biases based on race and class, maybe we need to look at the why's
behind the disengagement. Do we really believe that whole groups of children
don't care about themselves? Do we really think that some kids are born
without the desire to know, the willingness to participate?
Could it be more about us and less about them? Have we presented skills
and experiences galore in the primary grades fully expecting our kids to
make sense of it by grades four or five?
Do we know how we understand the ways we make meaning? Is our ability to
connect with text something we were taught or was it something we received
as a birthright?
I don't think I was taught to understand. I was taught to cooperate in school,
but at home I was encouraged to question, to talk, to think. Do we encourage
our children to think in school? Do we demystify thinking by teaching about
it?
I'm reading Mosaic of Thought,
by Ellin Oliver Keene and Susan Zimmerman, and their focus on the ways we
make meaning, and our ability to share these processes, has knocked me off
my feet. As you can tell from all my questions, I'm on a thinking binge.
Is this the way in, the missing connection to the elusive 20 percent of
our children? Can we help them cross the bridge from decoding techniques
to real connection with texts? Are we prepared to probe and share our own
process of understanding?
Are we willing to take a long look at the texts we use, texts that might
make it harder for our children to forge connections because the names,
faces and situations bear no resemblance to their lives? Can we take ownership
of the ways we silence our children, with a look or a comment? How can we
cross the bridge together?
Motivation vs. understanding
I brought up a few of my questions in yesterday's session. I asked if people
felt kids knew how to understand and and whether we felt we knew how to
explicitly teach these strategies.
I mentioned that I was reading Mosaic of Thought and that it was really
pushing my thinking about these issues of motivation vs. understanding.
I also talked about adolescence as a time of emotional upheaval, a time
when it was easier to play it cool and come without supplies, than it was
to honestly admit you didn't know how to know. I'm anxious to explore these
questions and apparently so were a lot of other folks in the session.
We agreed to buy the book for everyone involved in this cross-Cluster initiative.
We also agreed to read the book before our next meeting in March. I know
there's no one answer to helping all kids construct meaning, but I have
that weird feeling you get when you are on the brink of really learning
something, the feeling that this could be big. On that note, I better get
back to the book and our online discussion of it.
[Editor's note: Deb is co-moderator of the
new MiddleWeb listserve.]
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