week 3monday

teaching

seeing the kids

• as layers of mystification and obfuscation are peeled away, as the student becomes more fully present… experiences and ways of thinking and knowing that were initially obscure become the ground on which an authentic and vital teaching practice can be constructed. (To Teach, p. 25)

the great (American) cultural (teacher) myth

• others may prejudge kids or be influenced by what others say or believe about them or about kids in general, but I see kids for who they really are

mediation• all our transactions with the world—people,

things, relationships—are mediated by – other people, – cultural beliefs, values, expectations, – experience, knowledge, and so on.

• we do not act directly on the world—no person, thing etc. is directly accessible

• actions, interactions, transactions always mediated

how to learn to see kids

1. begin to understand how kids are viewed in this culture—explore the beliefs and values we hold about kids

2. pay close attention to kids from as many perspectives as possible

3. strive to glimpse the possibilities, knowing that the more we see, the more we create

4. be humble—understand that no matter how closely you look you will only be scratching surfaces

some initial premises

• kids have many selves, many identities, many dimensions, depending on contexts

• the more selves, dimensions etc. one sees in a kid the more possibilities for connections

• the more selves, dimensions etc. one sees in a kid the more possibilities one creates for the kid

cultureculture

accents and dialects

• who has an accent or speaks with a dialect?– everyone has an accent– everyone speaks a dialect– the prestige of a dialect has less to do with

qualities of the dialect than with dominance of those who speak it. • some accents carry more “cultural capital”

than others.

some examples:• I ain’t got no money• I don’t have any money

• I know what it is.• I know what it’s.

• going to• want to• Worchester• psychology• herbs• often

history of ECE

major influences on ece (across history)

• romanticism• biological maturationism• psychodynamic theory• protestantism• behaviorism• economics• fear of and concern about poverty• mental measurement• cultural deprivation/differences (at-risk)• Piaget/structuralism/stage theory• developmental psych in general• belief in environment• legalism• special education

housekeeping

most common 320/321 writing problems• non-working, extra, useless words• beginning sentences with there is or it is etc• using that or which to refer to people• pronouns with no noun referent• no comma in compound sentence connected

with conjunction• separating compound verb with comma• separating verb from subject with comma• not differentiating restrictive and non-

restrictive relative clauses• commas and periods outside quotation marks

week 3wednesday

teaching

all labels (good and bad) limit kids

• labels one-dimensional– kids have many dimensions.

• a label (even assuming it is accurate) emphasizes one dimension at the expense of many many others

• labels emphasize differences between kids– emphasizing differences limits kids– valuing similarities frees kids

• the goal of good teaching is a community of children, each with many identities and indefinite possibilities

• the first goal is to see the individual, as unique and rare, – but not as someone completed, – rather as someone with many and

unknowable potentials.• the second goal is to see the individual as

unique and rare – without defining him in terms of his

differences from other individuals. – to define someone in terms of what she is

not limits her.

cultureculture

the basic premise1. in some ways each person is like no other

person2. in some ways each person is like some other

people3. in some ways each person is like all other

people – our culture and the culture of teaching

emphasizes 1. – to see kids in only one way limits them

and how you see them

• kids spend much time sharing who they are with other kids.

• they spend much energy being like each other, talking like each other, dressing like each other, and so on.

• so why do we as educators spend so much time emphasizing the differences between kids.

• what would it be like if we spent as much time and energy looking at what kids share, at what they have in common?

history of ECE

• the history of schooling is like a stream which has many currents. – at any given time some currents are

stronger, closer to the surface etc. than others.

– some currents become weak and seem to disappear, only to reappear later.

– often different currents join to form a seemingly new one.

– but the currents of today can be traced to the currents of yesterday.

• you are entering a stream that has been flowing for centuries

history projects• don’t plagiarize—cite sources for quotations

and paraphrases—always credit• full references for books, articles, etc.• quotations—citation and page #• present well—organized, attractive• first person plural

housekeeping

places I’ve lived:• Helena MT 45-49• Urbana IL 49-53• Tallahassee FL 53-56• Laramie WY 56-60• San Diego CA 60-66• Chicago IL 66-69• San Diego CA 69• San Francisco CA 70-71• Chicago IL 71-81• Madison WI 81-84• Milwaukee WI 84-85• Charlottesville VA 85-89• Urbana IL 90-?

jobs

• teacher, Chicago Catholic Schools, 1967-69• teacher, San Diego Head Start Program, 1970• child-care teacher, San Francisco Schools, 1970-

1971• teacher, Chicago Public Schools, preschool,

kindergarten 1972-1979: • free-lance writer, Chicago, 1979-1981• research assistant, teaching assistant 1981-

1983, U of Wisconsin• research associate 1984-85, U of Wisconsin• assistant professor, U of Virginia, 1985-89• assistant/associate professor, U of Illinois at

Urbana-Champaign, 1990- ?• research fellow, Center for School Education

Research, Hyogo University of Teacher Education, Hyogo, Japan, 1998-99