Years in Education: 4-6 White Cisgender Woman Queer Middle School Social Studies & Social Justice Teacher Q: What do you have in common with your students? A: There are layers to what my students and I have in common. Many of my kids are white. About half are girls. Most are cisgender. A handful are queer. And those, the first spokes on the intersectionality wheel, matter. The world hits us in similar ways, and we can immediately and visibly relate to each other’s experiences. But I’m not sure those are even the most important ways in which we are similar. I, apparently, have the sense of humor of an average middle schooler. Recently, a kid asserted that vegans had to be “tall… to get to the leaves at the top of the trees,” and I still haven’t really stopped laughing. We share a genuine and sincere appreciation of the importance of birthdays. We agree that sometimes it’s better to run outside in the snow and try to catch it than it is to just watch it fall. Honestly, I think what we share the most is a genuine interest in each other. They want to know the people they spend hours with every week, and I want to know and understand them. Together, we want to understand the world, the people in it, and the choices we all make. We don’t always agree, but we are certainly bound together by our mutual curiosity. In my social justice class (an elective that I started last year), this is especially true—and in that case, we’re also bound by a true passion for the subject. I just did a survey yesterday, asking my social justice students about their willingness to participate in a high-risk, quite vulnerable activity. I explained the activity in detail, and I gave them an anonymous survey. If even one person did not want for the activity to occur, we wouldn’t do it. If anyone wanted changes made to the activity (for example, changing or removing some of the questions asked), I’d make those changes. They have all opted to participate in the activity, and we’ll take that courageous leap on Monday. It may be hard, but I know that we’re all taking care of each other. With the kids with whom I have the deepest connection, what we share is a willingness to be vulnerable. We’re learning together, exploring the world and its intricacies as we go. Ms Frizzle (the greatest role model of my life) advises her students to “take chances, make mistakes, get messy!” and I think following this life approach together is an important point of connection. Q: Does it matter that students and teachers have things in common? A: I’ve struggled with this question, because I feel equally and passionately that there are two truths that seem to directly conflict: 1. Of course it matters. Students should be able to see people like themselves represented throughout their lives, and that’s especially important when those people are in “role model” positions. 2. No, it doesn’t matter; what matters more is a genuinely caring relationship. I don’t have to have your experiences to care about them, and to believe you when you tell me about them. I think the reality is that Truth 1 helps facilitate a movement toward Truth 2. If kids can tell immediately that you share something in common with them, or if they learn about it, they’re more willing to trust the teacher. But if a teacher can communicate true regard for their students, in a way that students truly feel, then that can overcome a lot. A couple of years ago, I had a wonderful, quiet student in my class. She was reliable, kind, bright, and just a genuine pleasure. She isn’t one who would stay after class and talk, but we had a positive relationship. A year later, I had her younger brother as a student. When the sister saw my name on his schedule, she assured him, “Oh, you’ll like her. She’s really LGBTQ-friendly.” The brother is trans, and his best friend—another student of mine that year—is non-binary. Before they even arrived in my classroom, they already knew that I would… see them. I’m cisgender, and very feminine, but they knew that I could be their ally and advocate. The messenger matters, certainly—but I think the message matters even more. Litza is the founder of her school's popular Social Justice elective. Photo (c) 2017 Kristin Leong
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Years in Education: 11--15 Male Gay Filipino American Upper Secondary English Teacher Q: What do you have in common with your students? A: This is my eleventh year teaching, and in these eleven years I've taught in Mountain View, CA; Rome, Italy; Bonn, Germany; Buenos Aires, Argentina; and now Sofia, Bulgaria. I share this because the cultural contexts of the places I have lived and the make up of the student body of each of the schools have been incredibly diverse. In California, the public high school had over 2,000 students from grades 9-12. Students were predominantly White and Asian with a smaller Latino population and even smaller Black population. There was a large achievement gap that was largely divided by race. All the international schools I've worked at have had an average of 800 students from pre-K to grade 12. On average, 20% tended to be American, another 20% host country nationals, and the other 60% of students were a mix from over 40 nationalities. Over 60% of our students are non-native English speakers. Accents and linguistic mistakes are never made fun of. However, apart from a small percentage of scholarship students, most students and their families were wealthy enough to afford a ~$20,000/year education. For embassy children, their country's taxes usually paid for that. Many companies also paid for students' tuition as part of the relocation package. Depending on the context, I've had different similarities with my students. In California, the strongest commonalities were with other students who were immigrants or first generation making sense of a bicultural world - for me it was Filipino values and traditions inside my home and white America outside of it. I connected with the students that were assimilating to become white American, inadvertently assuming that American was better and even growing shame for my ancestral roots. Internationally, the term "third culture kid" is used quite often: the first culture being the culture the students' parents are from, the second is the current country they live in, and the third is the amalgamation of the two. This phenomenon is what we have in common - guests in a new world never fully connected with our home country or the one we live in. However, regardless of these varying cultural contexts I've lived in, one thing I have in common with some of my students wherever I am is my sexuality. As a gay man, I connect with my students that are either in the closet or are out and proud. We share a common thirst for safe spaces, constantly having our feelers out to ensure we have be ourselves otherwise passing for straight when we cannot. Living as an expat compounds the complexity of this as each culture has different laws and norms for the gay community. Q: Does it matter that students and teachers have things in common? A: Yes and no. Commonality has this powerful ability to build relationships. When I find out a student speaks Spanish or German or Italian, for example, I speak to them in that language to make that linguistic connection and share our cultural experiences. Ironically, commonality also as the power to create xenophobia. Too often, students from the same country will only hang out with each other because of the comfort in their similarities but also then to build negative stereotypes of other groups. Teachers are guilty, too, of having an affinity for students that we have things in common with sometimes letting those that we don't connect with slip through the cracks. Josefino is a TED-Ed Innovative Educator. Follow him on Twitter @josefinor and read about his expat adventures as a teacher abroad on Medium @josefinor. Photo (c) 2017 Kristin Leong Years in Education: 20+ Jewish White Female First in Family to Graduate From College High School Honors Algebra, Pre-Calculus, Honors Problem-Solving Seminar Teacher Q: What do you have in common with your students? A: I have a love of puzzles, and most of my students do, too. If we have a few minutes left in class, sometimes I will pose a riddle and the whole class lights up. I have a play table in the back of my classroom with various puzzles and games from childhood, such as Connect Four or the Cracker Barrel Wooden Peg puzzle, and students often come to my classroom early to play. I love watching the light in their eyes when they work on puzzles either together or individually and solve them - it's such a good feeling of accomplishment when you get something on your own, or even with a little help from someone else. Growing up, I was surrounded by a lot of love, but there was also a lot of turbulence in my family. My mother was married and divorced by the age of 19, with me, her nine-month old baby, in tow. I grew up living with my extended family--my grandparents, aunts, and an uncle. My father was not really present for me. My mother was more like a sister. We fought constantly, and I always went elsewhere for solace. For me, math put me in the present moment; I could do math problems or puzzles, and all the issues I had with my parents would go away. I like to give students problems that take their minds off of the baggage they bring into the classroom - we all have it. And for a few minutes each day, students can smile at the delight of solving the riddle or of the trickery involved in it. Even if they don't have the commonality of liking math, I try to make it fun for them so that we all can share those moments of joy when they think, "Aha!" or "I get it!" Q: Does it matter that students and teachers have things in common? A: Yes, because when you instinctively see the problem that you had when you were growing up, you can help. For me, it was coming in with baggage or being a perfectionist. I work in a private school where most students strive for high grades. Personally knowing that sometimes you don't get the grade you think you deserve, I try to let them know that it will all be okay if they don't get that A on the first test. I even made a huge poster that says, "Everything will be OK," which I sometimes need to draw their attention to. But I have found that with math, it's not always about ability. I think the most important thing is letting them know that you believe in them. I had several adults in my life that thankfully believed in me, and I know that if a teacher thinks you matter or are important, your confidence soars in that class. Even if you don't have things in common, for example, race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, every person deserves to feel important. As a Jew, I have been discriminated against, and I never, ever want my students to feel that way. My biggest priority in class, aside from getting the material across, is having a warm, inviting classroom for ALL students, whether we have commonalities or not. It's a privilege to be teaching my students, and I often learn more from them than they do from me. My job is to make them all shine, even if only for the moment that they are in my classroom. Lisa is a TED-Ed Innovative Educator. She is the creative genius behind many brain-bending TED-Ed lessons such as Can you solve the locker riddle? and Can you solve the virus riddle? Follow her on Twitter @Lisaqt314 . Photo (c) 2017 Kristin Leong |
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