Teachers, Knowledge, Building Relationships: Invitation and Hospitality
What resonated with me from Dr. Fatima’s speech, was her talk about colonization. I think that her insight was defined through lived experience. Lived experience is the most valid way of defining oppression. If you have only read about it and try to speak to it, it is difficult to understand the small details of how oppression impacts every facet of an individual’s life. Considering her assertion that our schools are a melting pot was impactful to the way that I view the entire public education system. I think a way to have a more inclusive classroom environment would be through having conversations with my students, so that I can find out how their lived experiences has defined them. Colonization promotes individuality and this is seen throughout the entire school system. By approaching the classroom more holistically, and letting the students lead me to what their strengths are. My hope will be to get away from this individualism system that is currently present. We are all play an equal part in society, from the homeless addict to the successful CEO. In my classroom I want to treat it like a more caring and just society, if there is a poor student or a wealthy student, that they both contribute equally to how the classroom works. Since our kids always have the power to decide not to learn, if we can engage them on their level and where they are at then the desire to learn will hopefully come.
Students & Learning Environment: Focus on places, spaces, and boundaries
The idea of the colonizers bringing the concept of ownership or possession has ignited some interesting thoughts for me. I remember the teacher always referring to the classroom as their classroom as if they were the sole owners of the space. I however, had one teacher who said that it was our classroom, each morning she would welcome the class to our classroom. Although I could not articulate it at them time, I felt like she was more on my level with that one simple statement. I feel like as far as classroom layout the post-modernist approach is what resonates with me. I like the idea of no seating plan, the teacher not having a big desk at front or rear. We should be trying to open the space up as much as possible, less boundaries for the body with the hope of less boundaries on the mind. I would have many different areas and ways of working, like on the floor, in a seat, in a hammock, an area for solitary work and an area for group-oriented work. For a long time, my partner and I have talked about the outdated model of factory schools. They are setting kids up for a society that is rapidly changing. The idea of treating children’s minds as a mass-produced product, is sad. Children have a natural curiosity and desire to learn, so a classroom should be set up to encourage whatever that mind is ready to consume!
Indigenization Core Question
When I went through kindergarten to grade twelve, my basic understanding was that aboriginal people lost a war. That they were just as responsible for the atrocities associated with the war as the white men. After losing the war, I thought that we the colonizers helped the indigenous people by providing them land and a good education. I have since learned about a lot more of the insidious ways in which the colonizers corrupted the indigenous people’s ways of life. There was never any war, only a genocide. A cultural genocide was to follow, with the residential schools as the single biggest catalyst for the cultural genocide of the Indigenous people. One of the points that resonated with me was call to action number ten. It states and reconfiguration of the education system with the input from indigenous elders. Our whole public school system is very Eurocentric. As the saying goes “history favors the one who writes it”. We need to admit that what happened was wrong, and furthermore that there is a lot to learn from the indigenous people, such as, how-to live-in harmony with the land so there is something left for future generations to enjoy. The gift that Joseph gave me and has made me feel confident in my life choices was when he said, “that the earth just wants us to love and dance,” I have from as young as I can remember always loved to dance. I remember reaching a certain age where my dad told me that it was not appropriate for a boy to dance. He said that I would be made fun of by my peers, I felt shame for the joy I felt. Even though it felt wrong, I convinced myself that it was wrong to enjoy dancing. As I grew older into my twenties I got further away from my dad and when I was a night club, I remembered my love for dancing. Sometimes guys would make fun of me, but I did not care because it felt good. As I got older, I met my wife when I was dancing, she loved that I loved to dance. I would go on to take her to many electronic music festivals where we would dance all night. There was this special feeling of connectiveness when you are in a crowd of a few thousand people and you are all dancing as one to the music. It really felt like that is what the earth needed more of us getting together and connecting over one thing. What I would like to learn more about, is how to incorporate more of the indigenous values and ways of teaching into my classroom. I like the less formal way of storytelling to teach lessons as opposed to rigidly reading from a textbook. This approach will make the material a lot more accessible to my students. Indigenous people lived off the land in Saskatchewan for thousands of years, I would love to impart some of this knowledge on to my students as well. So that no matter what kind of situation they end up in that they can not only survive but thrive.