TE 250: Reading Response

The article "An Indian Father's Plea" by Robert Lake (Medicine Grizzlybear) is about this man's desparate want and need to have his indian child fit in at school and yet still accept the culture he came from. He writes a letter to his son, Wind-Wolf's teacher explaining how the students have been negative to his son and how he wants Wind Wolf to be able to appreciate his culture instead of being embarrased by it. The father also wants to know why the teacher insists that his child is a slow learner at school.

It is incredibly sad to see that children at the age of six are already influenced by their parents to judge other people. Robert explains that when Wind-Wolf wanted to go play at his friend's house before dinner one day, the parent of the other child did not want their child playing with Wind-Wolf because he was not white. Wind-Wolf also had a hard time continuing to accept his identity because the children in his class laughed at his name and because his hair was long. In his culture it is considered masculine to have long hair and in the new culture at his school it is not. He came home and told his father and mother that he wanted to cut his hair regardless of the fact that it is apart of their culture.

Wind-Wolf has a hard time picking different concepts at school such as the language being spoke by his teacher and students and counting correctly. Robert tells the teacher how his son learned to count. He would listen to his aunts and grandmothers count as they sorted different materials for their native baskets. Wind-Wolf was also taught that there are thirteen full moons in a year and Robert wants the teacher to understand why Wind-Wolf may count the number of months wrong.

Based on what I have read in this article, it seems that teachers need to be more open about the diversity in their classes. They need to help their students understand that just because a student is different looking does not mean there is anything wrong with them and they need to be accepting of everyone. The teacher will hopefully see how much this parent wants his child to fit in at school yet still accept and love his original culture because of the effort he is making for his son with this letter.

Media Analysis 1

Media has an affect on many views we have and decisions we make. This varies from what types of people we associate ourselves with to the food or clothing we buy at the store. I found an add in a magazine for a make up product the company is trying to sell. By analyzing this magazine add I was able to find what things made this product stand out to customers and what type of people it was directed to.

My magazine add is a Revlon make up ad for foundation. The initial thing I observed was that a very famous celebrity was sponsoring this product. By having a certain celebrity sponser a product either makes or breaks the product. If you really like this celebrity you may read into the ad more then if you did not like the celebrity which might simply lead you to turning the page.

Also I noticed how flawless her skin is. This flawlessness leads the viewer to believe that the make up will make their skin look flawless as well. Towards the bottom of the ad it states " Naturally Glamorous, Never Overdone." This phrase enhances the fact that the make up will make you look flawless. If you are glamorous and never overdone, you must be flawless.
Although the product's brand name was not in the center of the page, my eyes were still drawn to it. In big letters at the bottom of the page reads "REVLON." Since the brand is in big and bold font, the readers eyes are instantly drawn to it and makes you remember the name because of how much space on the page it took up.

The last thing in this ad I noticed was the audience it was attempting to attract. The celebrity is of caucasion ethnicity and shows a bottle of the make up in her skin tone. There is no other indication of this make up being usable to those of darker skin colors. The only indicator would be that the ad says there are five different shades. This is deceiving to the reader because only one shade of the make up is shown.

As I have said before, media has a major affect on the decisions of what products we decide to buy in our daily lives. The examples I have given show how the Revlon make up ad I found in a magazine makes the product seem like a good buy and could also be directed to a certain group of people.

Reading Response 3

Social class has an affect on many things in our lives. When it comes to schooling many parents and teachers believe the social class of the student's parent has the biggest affect on how they succeed in school and how much help they are receiving at home with their school work. In chapter six of the book, Home Advantage: Social Class and Parental Intervention in Elementary Education, Second Education, the author Annette Lareau goes into great detail regarding this factor of education.

The two schools, Colton and Prescott, were used for comparison of each factor of social class in this chapter. The author first asks the school's principal and teachers why they think certain parents value their child's education more of less than other parents and how much involvement each parent makes in their child's learning. The principal at Colton revealed that many parents do not value their child's education because they never got any education themselves. He believed that the environment the students are living in has the biggest affect on how well they will succeed in their own education. For example, Colton's principal saw that if a parent did not attend parent-teacher conferences this meant they were not concerned with their child's education or how well they are doing at school, if not working at the time of conferences.

On the other hand, the parents at Prescott were more involved and it showed greatly to the staff. Prescott's principal also believes that it comes from the environment of the student but the environment of students at Prescott is much different than at Colton. Prescott's principal believes that if the student's parent thinks education is important then it will rub off on the student and they will think their education is important as well.

After observing what the faculty at each school had to say about parental involvement, the author went right to the main source and talked to the student's parents. It was shown by the parent's feedback that the amount of time they participated in school events or homework with their child did not reflect at all on how they valued education for their child. Parents whose childrent when to Colton strongly valued their child's education and wanted them to at least complete high school. There was no heavy push for college but definitely some interest in it ifor their child.

Again, on the other hand, Prescott parents had higher goals for their children. They wanted to see them attend colleges after high school and maybe even post graduate schooling. Studies are shown that higher social class children are more directed at college while the working class was pushed away from it towards working. Most of this is a result of whether they can afford to pay for their child's college or not.

Most parent's value of education was different from how the principals and teachers believed it would be. Just because the parents view may be higher on education does not mean their child will progress in this manner. From what I viewed of this article, if the parents show some interest in the child's learning this will give motivation to the student to progress higher in their studies. Children need that motivation and eagerness from their parents and peers in order to feel good about where they are headed in their education.

TE 250: Reading Response 2

As I read through the reading "Teaching for Social Justice, Diversity, and Citizenship in a Global World" by James A. Banks, the section "The Stages of Cultural Identity" stuck out to me. Right away I agreed with the first sentence in this section. Banks states "Self-acceptance is a prerequisite to the acceptance and valuing of others" (pg. 295). Banks wants all teachers to realize that you will encounter students dealing with stereotypes and negative feelings toward their own ethnicity regardless if they are minorities or in the dominant ethnicity.

The negative stereotypes/feelings are just a part of the first stage in Banks' Cultural Identity Typology. Each stage describes the pattern of becoming who you are and how you are unable to reach the next stage until you have completed the first. Once the student begins to accept who they are and the culture around them they are able to move up the stages to potentially having "a strong desire to function effectively in two cultures" (Banks pg. 295). This is called Biculturalism. By the final stage the person is able to identify with their own culture, surrounding cultures, the culture of their nation, and the global community.

I believe this is a strong goal to have and to push for because the more we accept ourselves and other nations can help to limit the amount of discrimination in the world.

TE 250: Reading Response 1

As I began to read the article “The Trouble We’re In: Privilege, Power, and Difference” by A.G. Johnson, I was caught off guard by the fact that people judge others based on what they don’t know or understand about other races, genders, or ethnicities compared to what they have learned througout the years growing up. We subconsciously judge because of the fear of difference. If someone is different from us either by race, gender, ethnicity, etc. we find ourselves wondering why that person is the way they are and why they are not like us. This fear also stops us from being able to get along with those of different race, gender, ethnicity, etc. because we do not know how they will act or treat us because that is not what we learned in our society growing up.
Johnson discusses a diversity wheel in his article with different discriptions of people inside it. He tells the reader to look at each group and see where you fit in. Johnson then continues to tell the reader to think what would happen if you woke up the next day in a completely different social group either by race, gender, ethnicity, etc. As I did this, it made me realize that if I was a different gender, race, or sexual orientation I would be privaleged in some areas but less and it would be uncomfortable for me to adjust to such a change because of how I was raised. It is not easy for a privaleged person (even if they are only privaleged in one area) to give that up for a less privaleged social group.