Cleaning Up Our Mess

I was quite intrigued by our discussion in class on Wednesday. I was
especially interested in the varying opinions people had about the
feelings that Native Americans have towards receiving help from the
"outside world" or the "White Man." This is is an interesting topic
when applied to schools. I found it ironic that some students who
have never set foot on a reservation or interacted with Native
Americans felt like they could make judgements like "Native Americans
are too prideful to accept any help from other people." I was
actually upset by this comment in a way because some of my most
meaningful and memorable experiences in my life have come on service
trips to Indian Reservations. From these experiences, I know that it
is more than possible for the "White Man" to work with Native
Americans in a manner that builds a bond as well as improves the
quality of life on reservations at least for a while. I understand
the idea that some (NOT ALL) Native Americans, often the older more
traditional tribal members, may seem to reject any sort of
relationship with or aid from outside of the reservation; I have
experienced this first hand to some degree on these trips but I do not
feel, as I think Professor Langholz also mentioned, that this
rejection from some gives us an excuse to avoid cleaning up the mess
that the "White Man" caused for the "Red Man." In fact, I feel that
using this excuse continues to perpetuate the negative stereotypes
that these NATIVE Americans have been given by good ol' "Amurcans."
I have some really conservative friends who are good ol' "Amuricans"
that live in rural and small communities near reservations and they
hold some pretty negative views about Native Americans and for some
reason feel that it is acceptable to talk about them as if they are
farm animals or worthless. I do not think these friends- I am
embarassed to give them credit as my "friends"- would talk about other
minority groups in the same sense. Why is this? I think it is because
we have, as a society, deemed it acceptable to cast ALL Native
Americans as lazy, uneducated, and unmotivated drunks with no values.
The truth is that there are countless white, black, brown, and yellow
men who are just as, if not more guilty of one or more of these traits
than any "Red Man." This is angering to me and I wish that more
people thought about this issue in this light.

I think that the "White Man" or more accurately society as a whole
needs to do a better job at "cleaning up" this mess. We need to
realize that we are guests on the Native Americans soil (not the other
way around) and that the "wonderful" scheme of putting all Native
Americans on reservations, in the inner city, and in the mandatory
boarding schools they used to have to attend (like the ones we have
discussed and read about in class) are perhaps the reason that they
are dealing with problems as an ethnic group. Perhaps, if Native
Americans would have been left to fully govern, educate, and take care
of themselves, they would not all be " lazy, uneducated, and
unmotivated drunks with no values" as many people believe (at least
subconsciously). Maybe the reservation and boarding schools is the
reason they "have no values" or are unable to contribute to society in
the manner that some people feel is appropriate and expected. I
believe there is hope for these people and I believe that it will only
come by a joint effort between the U.S. government and American
citizens (including "Amurcans") as well as Native Americans and their
leaders. I feel that the education system may be a great place for
this effort and transformation to start.

What would happen to me if I were born in a different setting

I am very priviledged. I was born in suburban Minneapolis and attended a nice elementary school in an upper-middle class neighborhood. I attended a small parochial school for middle school and one of the most prestigious private schools in the Twin Cities for high school. My family has always extremely supportive and helpful with my education. There is no way that I would have been as successful in school as I was if it were not for the influence of my parents and the more well-off schools that I attended. Now I attend Luther College and the support here is even more impressive. I struggle with ADHD and some other learning differences. Lately, I have spent a lot of time working with Luther's Student Academic Support Center (SASC). We have worked on numerous skills including time management and reading as well as discussed using audio books and tutors to ensure that my performance meets my potential. The support I have received from SASC has been very beneficial already and I look forward to it ensuring more success for me in the future. I also hope that I will learn some valuable skills that I can recommend to my future students who may have similar needs to me. In class on Wednesday, we watched a video that highlighted America's current problems with unequal schools. Schools in impoverished communities receive substantially less money per student and therefore are not able to provide even close to the same opportunities as the more wealthy schools. The differences illustrated in this video were outlandish. I am very fortunate to be in the same situation that I am now and was born into because I feel that if I were born to a different family in a poor community, I would not be at Luther today. The support I have received by my parents and past teachers has been crucial to my success thus far. For all of these I am grateful but also deeply bothered because ideally all students would be given these same opportunities in America. Something needs to change and it may start with funding.

Believe in Education!

I just watched an extremely inspirational and powerful speech that Professor Langholz emailed us.  It was given by an extremely articulate young boy to a stadium full of people at a Dallas Independent School District conference.  Click on the following link to watch it http://www.dallasisd.org/keynote.htm .  This boy delivers a tremendously optimistic and moving speech about education.  Regardless of whether or not this student actually wrote this speech or just delivered it, the message is the same.  Teachers need to believe in their students.  Teachers need to believe in their fellow teachers and other school staff, faculty, and administration.  Students need to believe in their teachers.  All of these go hand in hand and I agree with this boy that every child is worth believing in and trying to help.  For many children, their only source of guidance and compassion is their teachers.  This is very sad and makes our job as teachers that much more powerful, important, and meaningful.

The Last Lecture by Dr. Randy Pausch

One guideline for this blog assignment was to attend 2 lectures and blog about them.  I may be slightly bending this rule by simply watching a lecture by Dr. Randy Pausch who a professor of computer science and known for his book  "The Last Lecture" on youtube.  This lecture and his book were written when he was diagnosed with cancer and was asked to give one last lecture to the students and faculty at Carnegie Melon.  Pausch is very optimistic and delivers quite the inspirational and uplifting lecture for someone who is going to die in not too long.  He discusses the importance of pursuing childhood dreams, having fun, and working hard.  One of the most ideas that he discusses is the idea that just because someone is tough on you or criticizes your shortcomings, this does not mean that they do not care about you.  In fact, it probably implies the opposite; that is, they do care about you and want you to improve and know that you are capable of more.  It is more problematic when someone gives up on you and does not get on your case to perform at your highest.  This idea is extremely pertinent to a career as a teacher.  I want to relay this message to my students so that they realize that my critiques and those of others, of their behavior, school work, and progress are a result of us caring rather than us getting mad or not liking our students.  This is an important distinction for people to understand.  You can see the lecture on youtube by searching "last lecture" or by clicking on the link here The Last Lecture.

Mission trips and Service Learning

Some of my best experiences in life have been the mission trips I have gone on with my church.  I have to been to inner city Philadelphia, rural Arkansas, and Indian reservations in Montana, Arizona, and North Dakota.  I have had so much fun and been so moved by the relationships I built and strengthened on these trips and the work we did to help others.  I am going on another mission trip this spring break to Mississippi and Louisiana through Luther and Habitat for Humanity.  I am quite excited for this trip.  In class on Friday, when Professor Langholz was eloquently delivering his "Dews and Doughnuts of Teaching" (his version of Do's and Don'ts that came with Mt Dew and doughnuts), I began to think about how I could implement these experiences into my work as a teacher.  He said that as teachers, we should be eager to pick up new hobbies, travel,  go on adventures, and take risks because teachers need to be interesting people.  My experiences on these mission trips give me a different insight into the way the world works and make me unique.  As a teacher, I would love to be able to use these experiences as a source of learning or inspiration for my students and encourage my students to also become involved in some sort of service.  I believe that this may be just as beneficial for those helping as for those who are being helped.  As a science teacher we could even do class activities that would include service type projects like cleaning up parks or picking up garbage around a lake or in a forest.  The students would be participating in stewardship, getting exercise, working as a group, and learning about the negative impact that humans can have on the environment.  All of these are beneficial consequences of this type of service learning. 

Snow Days

Many school children in the Upper Midwest had their days made today due to school closings and the resulting snow days.  As a child, like many other kids, I lived for snow days and I still would be more than happy to have classes cancelled due to a heavy snow storm.  Some kids may be more excited just to simply miss school and may not even be happy for all the wondrous activities that the snow provides.  For me, missing school was never really a negative, but I think the best part about snow days was the fact that there was a large amount of fresh snow and this meant that skiing, sledding, snowball fighting, and snow fort building was sure to occur.  The recent snow days got me thinking about snow days and how they can relate to education.  For one, snow days present some logistical problems for teachers and schools. Perhaps more important and more interesting to think about as a future teacher is the fact that more students are excited about snow days (or missing school in general) than school itself.  Is this is a problem of current schools or is it just a natural thing that kids would rather not have to go to school and just play all day.  The latter is probably the more agreed upon explanation.  I would say it is not necessarily a problem of the schools but the better schools or schools that have more enthusiastic teachers and stimulating curriculums will have more engaged students that may be more likely to enjoy school.  Thus, the students at these schools may not be as excited to miss school for a snow day as students in other schools. As a teacher, a cool goal to have, may be to have your students more excited to go to school than to miss school on a school day.  I would love it if my students were more excited to come to school and learn than to have a day off to lounge around.  This is probably an unrealistic goal but it would be awesome and I am sure it would make teaching quite fun and less frustrating than it could be under other circumstances.  On the other hand, these snow days may be a good way to allow for kids to relax, get some exercise, and just be kids.  There are many positive things that could result from this extra time off.  As a science teacher, it would be fun to have the kids come into school and do a snow or winter related science experiment or just take a hike in a nearby nature park or woods.  

Luther's Big Brother Big Sister Program

At the the beginning of the school year, the various clubs at Luther all gathered in the library lawn and had sign up tables.  I signed up for a few fun clubs including the outdoor club (BWP) and the PALS program which is like Luther's version of Big Brother Big Sister or other similar one on one mentoring programs.  Both groups have been fun but especially PALS.  I got paired up with an awesome 7 year old boy from a nearby town.  There has been only one organized PALS even so far this year and this was also where I first met my pal.  Right away we connected which was really cool.  We are both quite high energy and enjoy being active so we were to have a fun time and get to know each other fairly easily.  I had so much fun that I told my pal's parents that i would be willing to hang out with him more often than just the times that had been set up by the Luther students who organized PALS.  This past Sunday I went out to eat with my pal and his parents which was a fun way to get to know his family and a little more about him.  After this, my pal went for a little bike ride from campus to Dunning Springs and hiked around for a while.  He was quite intrigued by the size of the waterfall and the other natural features that make this environment so interesting.  We spotted birds and looked at big trees and dreamed about how cool it would to just put a couch in the stream and relax there on a hot summer day.  After this, we biked back to my dorm room and he showed me an awesome website where we were able to create our own super hero.  I thought this was pretty cool even though I am almost 20 years old (which is really weird to think about because in many ways I still feel like a kid or at least a teenager).  My pal is a perfect example of what there is to learn from and admire about children.  They have an intense joy for life, a natural curiosity, excess energy, and pure enthusiasm.  I feel like all of these are extremely positive attributes that all of us should strive for and hope that by hanging out with my pal more some of this will rub off on me and increase my already energetic, jovial, and curious personality.  I am supposed to be a role model for my pal but he may be a better role model for me.  I encourage everyone to seek opportunities like this PALS program and get involved because they can be extremely rewarding for all who are involved.