I admit that I was a bit intimidated using a critical literacy approach to learning, but now my literacy program would be incomplete without it. Very often, people assume that young children are incapable of identifying social injustices, discrimination and stereotyping in the world around them, and not having the power to make a change. This could not be further from the truth! I will give an example of how a recent comment made by a student in my in my classroom set us all on a journey of self discovery.
A male student was looking for a background image to illustrate the “All About Me” information we had just composed about him on the Smartboard. When he came to a pink background with hearts on it, another boy stated, “You can’t choose that one, it is only for girls!” That started a discussion about what is a girl color and what is a boy color. The obvious answer was: pink is for girls and blue is for boys. We talked about whether or not girls could like blue and if boys could like pink. It was interesting to note that some boys took great exception when a lone boy said he liked pink, but nothing was said when several girls stated the liked blue. From this discussion, I knew that I some work to do in the area of gender discrimination.
In our library I found a book called “William’s Doll”, by Charlotte Zolotto. The story is of a boy, William, who wants a doll, but his father refuses to buy him one and his brother along with another friend calls him a “sissy”. The father instead buys him a basketball and a train set. Although William likes those things he still wants a doll. When his grandmother comes to visit, he shows her the basketball and train set, but he told her what he really wanted was a doll. They both went and picked out a doll and when they came home with it, the father was quite upset. The grandmother went on to say to the father that with a doll William could cuddle it, nurture it, take care of it, ect- all the things that would make him a great dad when he grows up.
Before I read the story to the children, we discussed what kinds of toys they liked to play with. Out of that discussion, I asked them if it was ok for boys to play with dolls and if girls could play with Pokemon (as these seemed to be the dominant toys that the boys and girls played with in my class). Some of the girls were quick to say they liked playing with Pokemon, but the boys were reluctant to admit that they liked playing with dolls. The same boy in the earlier discussion who made the comment, “Pink is for girls”, was adamant that boys should not play with dolls, although he didn’t mind girls playing with Pokemon.
As I read the book, I asked the children to pretend they had a camera and I asked them to take a picture of a part in the story that they connected to in their own life. After the story, they drew their pictures on sticky notes and we discussed each of them. Many children drew pictures of a time when they really wanted something, but others made fun of them for it. We revisited the book several times after that and through discussions I could actually observe many children changing their mind about whether toys are “boy toys or girl toys”.
From that activity we decided to look at flyers, Toys R Us flyers in particular, to see what kinds of toys boys and girls were playing with in the pictures. The children discovered many things including: boys were the only ones playing with vehicle toys, boys were driving vehicles and the girls were in the passenger seats, pictures of boys playing were on blue pages, and the girls were on pink pages, only girls were shown playing with dolls and both girls and boys were playing at the art easel.
After the deconstruction of the flyer, the students recreated the flyer so it was unbiased toward the type of toys that girls and boys played with.
To promote social action, the students then wrote a letter to Toys R Us and explained their argument for representing girls and boys in an unbiased way in the flyers.
This is only one example of how I incorporate critical literacy into my grade one classroom. There are so many other examples that I could add. My point is that it can be done, and we have to ensure that we afford our students the opportunity to engage in meaningful learning and to know that even at the young age of 6 and 7 years old, they are important and they have the power to make a difference. If they start believing this and experiencing it first hand now, imagine the possibilities when they are older…
Friday, May 14, 2010
Penguin WebQuest
Young children are naturally curious; they question everything around them and try to make sense of their surroundings- and then they come to school. Very often when children enter the school system, they are taught not to question, nor to explore or make connections to their out of school experiences.
With these points in mind, I began to reflect on my approach to teaching a thematic unit on penguins. Although I support a constructivist approach to learning, I felt that most of my teaching was using a “top down” approach, especially when it came to the teaching and learning of the individual penguin characteristics. During whole group discussion, I did make use of the KWL chart (What I Already Know, What I Want to Know and What I Have Learned) but something was missing- I knew I was doing too much “teaching”, I was not providing my students with enough authentic learning situations, nor was letting them be in control of their own learning. I decided to change my approach from “teaching” the students about penguins to providing them with opportunities to explore, question, inquire, debate, make sense of, and convey meaning to others- in essence, to become active participants in their own learning. Instead of reading the students books about penguins and then as a group filling in information on a matrix to represent penguin facts, I decided I would create a penguin webquest. Although the design of the webquest was in my hands, the path of learning that each child chose was intended to be individual- I would play the role of a facilitator or guide. Throughout the webquest, there would be opportunities for students to construct their own knowledge and convey meaning to others; they were to become active participants in their own learning.
Prior to beginning the webquest the following activities and discussions would be completed:
o Read and discuss various Tacky the Penguin books, by Helen Lester.
o In an effort to bridge the gap between what students already know about penguins and what they might learn, students work together in small groups to make a list of things they “know” about penguins and write penguin “wonderings”- questions they may have about penguins.
o During whole group discussion each group presents their list of things they “know” about penguins as well as their penguin “wonderings”.
o As a facilitator the teacher raises the questions:
How could we find answers to these “wonderings”?
How can we find out if what you “know” is true or false?”
o Students discuss the sources they could use to learn about penguins: i.e, internet websites such as National Geographic for Kids, reference materials, videos, magazines, non-fiction books.
This discussion would lead us into our penguin webquest, entitled:
Tacky Finds His Home
http://teacherweb.com/WQ/ElementarySchool/Penguins101/index.html
With these points in mind, I began to reflect on my approach to teaching a thematic unit on penguins. Although I support a constructivist approach to learning, I felt that most of my teaching was using a “top down” approach, especially when it came to the teaching and learning of the individual penguin characteristics. During whole group discussion, I did make use of the KWL chart (What I Already Know, What I Want to Know and What I Have Learned) but something was missing- I knew I was doing too much “teaching”, I was not providing my students with enough authentic learning situations, nor was letting them be in control of their own learning. I decided to change my approach from “teaching” the students about penguins to providing them with opportunities to explore, question, inquire, debate, make sense of, and convey meaning to others- in essence, to become active participants in their own learning. Instead of reading the students books about penguins and then as a group filling in information on a matrix to represent penguin facts, I decided I would create a penguin webquest. Although the design of the webquest was in my hands, the path of learning that each child chose was intended to be individual- I would play the role of a facilitator or guide. Throughout the webquest, there would be opportunities for students to construct their own knowledge and convey meaning to others; they were to become active participants in their own learning.
Prior to beginning the webquest the following activities and discussions would be completed:
o Read and discuss various Tacky the Penguin books, by Helen Lester.
o In an effort to bridge the gap between what students already know about penguins and what they might learn, students work together in small groups to make a list of things they “know” about penguins and write penguin “wonderings”- questions they may have about penguins.
o During whole group discussion each group presents their list of things they “know” about penguins as well as their penguin “wonderings”.
o As a facilitator the teacher raises the questions:
How could we find answers to these “wonderings”?
How can we find out if what you “know” is true or false?”
o Students discuss the sources they could use to learn about penguins: i.e, internet websites such as National Geographic for Kids, reference materials, videos, magazines, non-fiction books.
This discussion would lead us into our penguin webquest, entitled:
Tacky Finds His Home
http://teacherweb.com/WQ/ElementarySchool/Penguins101/index.html
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)