Blog #8

Thinking back to my K-12 schooling, I believe that the “personally responsible citizen” is the type of citizenship that was most relevant and integrated into my schooling. As the required reading states that “The personally responsible citizen acts responsibly in his/her community by, for example, picking up litter, giving blood, recycling, obeying laws, and staying out of debt. The personally responsible citizen contributes to food or clothing drives when asked and volunteers to help those less fortunate whether in a soup kitchen or a senior center” (3). I can remember both my elementary school and high school doing many food drives where every student was encouraged to bring canned goods to school. I remember participating in Earth Day activities where our entire elementary school was required to walk the school perimeter and pick up garbage and litter, and my high school would pick a global initiative each year such as helping to provide clean drinking water or health care to a community in need, and would plan fundraisers to meet this goal. After thinking critically about my education, I do not remember being introduced to the idea of striving to be a social justice-oriented citizen. We did not spend much time questioning why there were people in need who would benefit from our fundraising efforts, we just knew that they would. I think learning about the different types of citizenships that make up our community is important for preservice teachers as this knowledge helps us work towards integrating all types of citizenship styles into our planning and teaching.

Work Cited

Kahne, Joseph & Westheimer, Joel American Educational Research Journal. Volume 41 No. 2, pg 1-22. Summer 2004