In my elementary school and high school the student body, teachers and staff were primarily white. We also read books that were mostly centered on white characters and their experiences. I think that this lack in diversity in the school and the books that we read gave me a view on the world that wasn’t varied or diverse. I was taught that the way I experienced the world was normal and that it was normal to only read about white characters. In fact, I didn’t even realize that we were missing out on other cultures and other world experiences.
It wasn’t until my final years of high school when we started reading books from other perspectives that I realized what I had been missing. Previously to these books I had biases about other perspectives and I didn’t really understand that they were as important as people had been saying. After reading stories from people with different experiences and from different backgrounds I realized that it is actually extremely important to read and learn about other perspectives and other cultures.
I think that the bias that I had in high school, and probably still have to some extent, is important to recognize as a teacher. As a future English teacher I think it is my job to make sure I am choosing novels, stories and poems that reflect diversity and share unique experiences. It is also important to make sure that I choose authors from different backgrounds. It is important to me that my students are exposed to perspectives from other cultures and that they learn to appreciate these differences and the diversity that exists in Canada.
I think that learning about your biases and working to unlearn them is an important part of growing as a person. It is important to recognize what you were taught and how these teachings, intentional or not, affect your decisions and your mindset.
A single story that was present in my schooling is similar to one that was talked about in the video. I had a perception that Africa was mostly poor people who were starving. Obviously this is not the case in all places but I believed that all of Africa was like that. I didn’t learn much about Africa in school, other than the fundraisers we had for African communities, Operation Christmas Child, commercials on TV and the photos of sponsored African children I would see on fridges. This was my perception towards Africa and it was a single story that I was unintentionally taught.
Truth did not seem to matter and it was never specified, at least not to my knowledge, of where our donations were going in Africa or what countries were in need of help. I just assumed it was all of Africa that was poor instead of acknowledging the vast differences between the countries in Africa.