What Could Have Been.... Chapter 7 Blog #4 - Elizabeth Francescotti

This chapter is an overview of all the missed opportunities for learning, the avoidance of speaking to culturally different families more because it was 'uncomfortable' and the lack of coordination between the ESL and General Education teachers.

Fortunitly, our group was very adept at noticing missed learning opportunities and made many of the same recommendations about pushing harder and going further to best serve Peley and Raji in their education.

We also got a look at how assessments can be culturally biased and opportunities missed by the student because of cultural differences. Peley was able to score so high on her literacy tests that she should have been recommended for the program but instead only was placed in advanced reading. Raji who was also very literate was placed in an average group. The parents made sure their children could read and write English. It is the value they placed on it and impressed upon their children.

However, the lack of social skills which are needed to maintain literacy were a hold back for these students.
They were not able to make that social connection at school, which many of the theorists' in Mooney's text stress as highly important for development. The reason? The conflict between home and school cultures. Peley and Raji had to live going back and forth between two cultures when they went from home and school. They did not get to share in the benefit of the cultures being the same like the other children did.

Which of this chapter's suggestions for change do you think would be the best and simplest to implement to quickly start turning this situation around?

Have any of us been color blind, and thinking this is the best approach?

Discussion Director-Quote - blog#4 Chapter7 Elizabeth Francescotti

As discussion director I think there are two lines that really send the message of this chapter and this text home to us  as future educators.

"Educators may even believe that color blindness is the way to teach tolerance. However, it is recommended that acknowledging and celebrating differences helps to eliminate stereotyping in classrooms."

Being color blind...can be a lot like being silent as we talked about in class last week. It is a way of ignoring the differences which are very clear and visible to the students.

Had Peley and Raji been given time to talk about their cultures AND felt secure to do so, that their shared information would be accepted and not ridiculed, they could have shared another part of the world with the class. We are increasingly a global society as technology makes our world smaller each day. Sharing worldly interests and differences/similarities was a really sadly missed learning opportunity in Mrs. Starr's classroom.

Sad end (Chapter 7)

I found many of the suggested ideas at the end of chapter seven to be very interesting and many things I would have never thought of at first. But first, I am saddened by the fact that Patricia Schmidt has not kept in touch with Peley and Raji's family (p. 121). It would have been nice to know about the development of the two children over the years. Another fascinating thing to have know would have been how well Peley's family learned to handle America, especially with only what is "equivalent to an elementary education in Cambodia and Vietnam" (p.114).
Let down aside, I feel the best suggestion made in chapter seven was to bring a teacher of ESL or special education for a push in program at times. It really makes sense to give the children who are in the program not always feel singled out and allowing the other students to embrace the teacher as a member of the general education program. Also, by bringing in the teacher, it would allow the general education teacher and the special program teacher to align their lesson plans. The fact that Peley and Raji were missing valuable reading lessons and not having an in synced ESL program was a real draw back. Does anyone else think, by having a hybrid or full push in program, the two students would have done much better both socially and educationally?

Susan Schuler: chapter 6

"We have custom. They have custom different. Afraid different custom."

This is what Peley's mother said. It caught my attention because it's true. People tend to be afraid of different cultures, while a lot of people will at least try to get to know other cultures, they ultimately decide their culture is best. There's evidence of this everywhere, if you listen to people talk about other countries and their laws and expectations, most of the time they're talking about them in a negative light. Or when someone from a different country is new to the U.S. people tend to be wary of them and when they engage in a custom of theirs, Americans tend to think they're 'weird'.
There are many different reasons why this is, what do you think they may be?