Social Justice Event: Promising practice Reflection

To be very honest when I was told that I HAD to come to campus for a conference on a Saturday for our FNED class I was upset and disinterested to hear what was to be discussed.  After attending the conference I came away with new knowledge about teaching. We had to attend two workshops then everyone came together to listen to the keynote speaker Dr. Chris Edmin.

             The first workshop I went to was “Idea to implantation challenges and opportunities of building an outdoor classroom to broaden participation in STEM”. In this workshop they discussed the RIC bee education center. The RIC bee education center is an outside classroom that some high school students created.  In building the structure the students came across a few problems when designing and building their structure. The designer of the structure which was one of the students is now attending RISD.

The classroom was placed next to the two bee hives that are on campus. The honey that was served with breakfast at the conference was from the bees on campus. The students built the classroom with honey comb stools that had facts about bees on them. Elementary, middle and high schools have used the classroom to educate students about bees.  Also they discussed about the idea of making more outdoor classrooms like this one.  I intend to take the summer program I run there for a summer filed trip.

            The second workshop was “teaching while brown; bearing under the influence”. They started the workshop by asking everyone to think of a teacher that has had a great impact on them and why. We all had 30 seconds to come up with a teacher. They asked a few people to share. I could not share for I am unable to think of a teacher that has had an impact on me.  They next things they discussed were about immigration; migration is a universal biological phenomenon which means all living entities will migrate. They pointed out that in the United Nations Article 26 it states that education is a human right.

            The two speakers were Colombian and stated that they considered themselves to be rather great teachers. They said that they are always trying to come up with new ideas to help them engage their students in their lessons. One of the speakers said that he taught in Miami for several years in a sub-standard test score school where most of the students were minorities. He was able to get all of his students to improve their test scores to the point that they were being compared to the test scores of the schools in suburban areas. He was told that the only reason that he had such success with those students was because he LOOKS LIKE THEM.

            The other speaker had taught in RI and has gone through some of the same things the other speaker did. One of his former fellow white teachers told him that to improve test scores that they needed “more white kids”.  He replied by telling that teacher that his problem is that he is a horrible teacher and that’s why he cannot help his students. After the white teacher said he was just joking.   The speaker was told by another teacher that the problem is that “you can’t turn donkeys into race horses”.   

The speakers discussed that the felt that you do not have to “look like “your students to get them to succeed. But you do have to come up with ways to draw them in. once you have their full attention that is when you will be able to give them the education they deserve.   For instance talk about the history of Algebra, where zero came from or the history of the scientific method which was or at least a resembling the modern method was developed by Muslim scholars, during the Golden age of Islam, and refined by the enlightenment scientist-philosophers.                          

After the workshops everyone returned to the first meeting place for lunch and the keynote speaker who was Dr. Chris Edmin. Dr. Chris Edmin spoke about using different teaching techniques and how for the most part schools are set up the same way that they were set up over 100 years ago. He explained how the system is just renaming the practices which in turn are not changing anything. Throughout his speech his main point was about the pedagogy problems facing the US.

            Dr. Chris Edmin told us how he met RZA who is a rapper and a member of the Wu Tang Clan (rap group). He said that RZA had told him that when he was in school he liked science but did not understand it along with the other subjects. RZA’s teachers were not supportive and some even encouraged him to drop out of school.

At the end of his story Dr. Chris Edmin said that RZA now has frequent communications with scientist and now has an understanding and love for science.

Dr. Chris Edmin expressed that he felt that the struggles of our education system is the civil rights movement of our life time. The issues facing the youth of this country are becoming as daunting as the issues that have and do face minorities and women in this country. Dr. Edmin stated that there needs to be an understanding of the culture of young people and teach the teachers how to understand so they can adapt their teaching strategies to engage the students. This would not only help the students that are in urban areas but help all students gain interest, a feeling that teachers care and understand them.

One of the final points that Dr. Edmin brought to everyone’s attention was that black and brown people are made of or by rhythm, it is in their blood.  Dr. Edmin asked everyone if they knew what a cypher was. Only 10 people or so included me raised their hands. Most of the rest of the people that were there had a “what in the world” look on their face. Dr. Edmin asked for some people how knew what it was to come up and help him start a cypher. Only 7 people including myself and 2 kids went up. So even some of the people that said they knew what the cypher was did not know it enough to feel confident to go up and start a cypher.

Everyone who went up for the cypher went up there and stood in a circle. Dr. Edmin explained to everyone how he did not give instructions for us to stand a certain way but we instinctively stood in a circle. He elucidated to everyone on how the cypher works. How everyone stands in a circle and one person starts a beat and then another person starts to rap. When the other people that are in the cypher like what someone is rapping about then the all make an Ohhhhhhh, Whoa! sounds. Also that when someone else wants to start rapping or jump in they then tap or nod at the one rapping then start going off. This Dr. Edmin explained was one example that would help to engage students in their education. 

here are some videos of the Ohhhh, Whoa, teachers rapping in class and an cypher just in case you do not know what it is.