Stereotyping

After reading the articles for this week, I feel as though there are far too many people who need to step back and evaluate the stereotypes that we carry around with us. In many cases, they are overly generalized and when  we use them as teachers, we are causing untold amounts of damage to our students.

When reading through the politics of caring article, I found it horrible that the teacher Mr. Johnson actively said that many of his students are going to be dropouts, that they were immature, and generally knocking them down in every way possible. It is probably the worst kind of attack that a teacher can do to their students. Teachers are speaking from a position of power, and it is being abused when you talk down to students like that, who have no direct recourse to challenge what you are saying. Not only that, but doing so creates an incredibly negative atmosphere that is just not conducive to learning.

In the hardcore article, I was equally disgusted by the details of a police officer that was completely disrespectful to a kid due to his held stereotypes. Even when the kid attempted to apologize (when he had done nothing wrong) the officer continued to be disrespectful of him.

I hope that I can recognize instances where I fall into some of these patterns (we all do from time to time) so that I can correct them before they are as damaging to individuals as these two examples are.

Caring

While reading through the caring article, I found myself wondering why the article was focused specifically on the Latino population. It seems that the whole idea behind the article could be applied to all students, not specifically the Latino population.

While it is true that the minorities may run into more issues with genuinely caring teachers due to a cultural disconnect, I feel as though true care of the students is something that this article should be pushing for ALL students. It has positive effects for all students to feel as though they are cared about, and the sentiment that teachers only care about teaching is likely not only seen in the Latino population.

So while I agree with what the article is trying to get across, I just felt that it could have focused more on care overall, with some added attention to the minority populations and the challenges they face, instead of being entirely focused on them, and ignoring the majority populations in the equation. Are they feeling the same things? It's hard to tell in this article.

Masculinity

During the discussions on blackboard during week 5, there was a good deal of discussion that brought up name calling in schools. The Kimmel article, Masculinity as Homophobia explains the situation pretty well from a male perspective. Unlike women, men are held up against a perception of what is masculine. Anything that is perceived as feminine, either emotionally or physically, leads to harsh reactions from peers. As Eric pointed out, students even go as far as to cover their tracks when they do anything that may be perceived as a homosexual or feminine, as seen by the phrase "no homo."

I begin to wonder if there is anything that can really be done about this in a classroom setting. While it is possible to tell students that the language is inappropriate, it will just lead to them censoring themselves in the classroom and starting it up again once they leave. As this is more of a universal issue, I feel as though the best course of action is to avoid adding to the pressure ourselves. Students have enough to deal with from their peers and self perceptions that we should be trying to alleviate, not add to.