Literacy with an Attitude

By Patrick J. Finn

            I disagree with Patrick J. Finn’s statement, “There had been numerous literacy campaigns earlier in Brazil, motivated by the desire to make the poor better workers, better citizens, and better Christians - classic reasons for literacy campaigns among the poor since the invention of the printing press” (page 2). I disagree because there are people who are poor and they are the best worker there is and are good citizens who says their prayer every single day. What we need is education and better government organization to help support the people and by doing so the people become a good economy. 

            On the other hand, I agree with Finn when he stated, “I didn't say to an errant student, “What are you doing?’ I said, ‘Stop that and get to work.’ No discussion. No opening for an argument” (page 4). If I was the teacher, I would have done the opposite and ask the students why they are doing what they do? I like the advice that Finn has mentioned here and it helps me how to deal with students who misbehave instead of opening up the problem and continuing it to the next round. I disagree with the quote being said, “Obedient students were not kept in from recess, but most days there were one or two disobedient students kept in from recess” (page7). The reason I disagree was because tutoring at an elementary school, I noticed that if two or three students were disobedient, the whole class was held inside from recess. I know it’s not fair for those obedient students but it’s the teacher’s choice to not take her students outside. This relates to “Privilege, Power, and Difference” by the presence of power that the teacher represents and the students themselves who are, Hispanic, black, Asian and white are powerless, symbolically and intellectually. 

            On page 17, first paragraph relates to our class discussion how everything we learn in the class are being put in news Finn’s quote similarly stated, “The teacher's questions were designed to help them make connections between events in the news and what they were learning in school.” For us, we have talked about S.C.W.A.M.P. and LGBT along with Privilege, Power, and Difference or racism and we all learned from videos and news that relates to our topics. For example the video, “Between Barack and a Hard Place: Challenging Racism, Privilege and Denial” and “Gloria Ladson-Billings, Michael Lomax, Gary Orfield on ‘The Other 3 R's.”

            A statement that bothers my moral consciousness is one of Finn statement about other teacher’s decision, which goes, “...I heard among the working-class school's teachers was that they planned early retirement” (page 25). This statement bothers me because teachers should not teach just because it’s their job but they should teach to help as many students as they can. Page 158 stated, “Freire referred to the culture of Brazil's illiterate poor as a 'culture of silence” (158). This relates to “The Silence Dialogue” article and how the poor are being silenced along with their culture in comparison to the higher working-class or known as the rich peoples. The rich or higher-class have the power and they’re in control in comparison to the poor people who takes whatever is left for them to use and make something of it. 

            “Education, technology, and power are closely related” (page 168), this statement relates to our topic “Unlearning the Myths that Bind us” by Christensen. Both articles relates to the media and how technology support the media if not related to education it relates to people’s entertainment that sometimes becomes a bad stereotype. The quote on page 175 relates to the video we had watched in our last class about making the students want to learn. The quotes states, “First he created a positive atmosphere in the classroom through activities that stressed self-affirmation, mutual respect, communication, group decision, making and cooperation because he knew that these values and skills are associated with the gentry.” This kind of teaching skill is amazing and it can be time consuming.

            I can relate to the quote, “I think that not only is it the teacher, but more importantly, it's the system. They purposely teach you using the 'boring method” (page 182). This quote reminds me of my Junior and Senior year in high school. Since there was a school program for that involves the NECAP, education became less interesting and more computerized. We weren’t able to learn in a fun way but instead we learn for the test that we would likely not pass and fail. I feel like my high school year of education was a waste because almost everything was taught for state tests and not for our own need with interest. It also relates to this quote, “However, until standardized tests can be devised that are free of class bias, it's unfair to use working-class students' performance on them as a measure of the success of the school reform - whether it be social justice classrooms or any other reform” (page 186). I agree with this second quote because students who come from lower-working class are not on the same level as students from high-working class so why give them a test that they are not trained to take? It’s practically close to a child with a disability and making them take a standardized test that students who are not disable might take. 

 Here is some websites about Standardized Testing:

http://standardizedtests.procon.org/

http://www.ride.ri.gov/InstructionAssessment/Mathematics/NECAPMathematics.aspx