Sunday, February 23, 2014

Safe Spaces-Hyperlink

After reading safe Spaces I was really intrested to learn more. Although it is not a very pleasing topic to read about when you are reading about childrens' thoughts of suicide because of how bullied they are being, it intrests me to know the problems that these students face and why. I decided to do some research, and read stories about children and see what besides the bullying triggered them, and what didn't somebody do to help these children. I found this website http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/20/jamey-rodemeyer-suicide-gay-bullying_n_972023.html which I thought was really intresting to read. After reading one story I was fascinated to read more. Safe Spaces relates to this because it goes to show that you really do need to focus and look at the people that are being bullied for most of them take the easy way out which is not the right way at all. After reading safe spaces I had a completely different outlook and realized a lot more. It all starts in the classroom and if the teacher can address the problem and help to prevent the bullying to continue than mabe that could save a life. It is extremely importnat to talk to anyone if you are being bullied because any student or child that is being bullied and keeps it inside is pnly digginng themsleves and it hurts. I think that because most bullying happens in schools they should have clubs that these people can join to feel better and feel accepted. I know in my High School we had a club called gay straight alliance and it really helped students who were shy about their sexuality come out and be themselves.

Saturday, February 15, 2014

Aria: Rodriguez



After reading both of these stories I had a little trouble figuring out which article I wanted to talk about and which prompt I wanted to use. I took the time to read some posts of other class mates and then I came across Madison’s. In Madison post she tells us of her reading, "Aria" by Rodriguez. She begins to talk about the troubles of Richard Rodriguez and how his family is from a Spanish speaking family but in school he has to speak English. It is evident that it would be hard to have to speak English in school and Spanish at home, at times this could be very confusing and frustrating.
As life goes on you realize that there are a lot more colored people and different racial background people living in the United States than their ever was before. By all means I am not racist but I grew up surrounded by all white people living in a middle-class neighborhood where their may have been one or two colored families. Now it’s like a white and black country everywhere which is great but I feel like now there are a lot more changes to accommodate colored people. For instance, I never thought I would see the day that we would have a black president and look we do! The whole point of that is, just like in the article White Privilege, it has always been white people that have had the privilege over colored people but as the years are progressing and centuries are approaching, there no longer will be a white privilege. For example, any time you need customer service over the phone there is an option for Spanish. Not only that, but when you walk into most buildings, important notices are placed with an English and Spanish sign. 

                                

Madison also elaborates on the fact that Rodriguez has to accommodate with real world not being able to speak his language which ruins his family’s relationship. That saddens me but you can't change the country that speaks English into a Spanish speaking country to save you families relationship.

I've had many thoughts trembling through my mind about this topic and when I saw Madison’s post I had to comment. I think she also did a great job describing and talking about the troubles of Rodriguez and how it connected to an article that she found. I would definitely agree with the fact that being bilingual is a plus because nowadays you walk into a restaurant, and as a waitress I have waited on many Spanish speaking families and at times it is very hard to understand what they are saying or one of the younger children in the families relays what they are trying to interpret.

I also found a link which corresponds to what Madison had to say and talks about the benefits of billingual education which I thought was really intresting! http://articles.latimes.com/keyword/bilingual-education

Sunday, February 9, 2014

Silenced Dialogue: Lisa Deplit- Connection

After reading the "Silenced Dialogue" by Lisa Deplit it connected me to a movie called Freedom Writers in a different kind of way. In this article that Deplit writes, she claims in the beginning of her article how a black woman who was trying to teach her class, always seemed to be pushed to the side and was thought of as "not good enough" or "not doing her job right" towards other white woman teachers. There was always a problem when students were taught by the colored teacher and then the following year was taught by the white teacher or vise versa. It was hard for both teachers to teach their students considering that they had very different ways of teaching their students.

In the article it also talks about authority. One little passage that I found really intresting was on page 35 and claimed, "Black children expect an authoriy figure to act with authority. When the teacher instead acts as a "chum", the message sent is that this adult has no authority, and the children act accordingly." This short passage is what really brought me back to Freedom writers. If you've never seen Freedom Writers, it is about a middle-aged white woman who goes in a classroom with students that are mostly black and ahve a lot of problems at home. She tries to teach them, and these students see her as joke because she doesn't show them authority but also because many of their previous teachers always gave up on them. To make a long movie short, after several weeks of continuously trying with these students she finally made a diffrerence.

 


Also, another part of this article made me think of something a teacher back in High School once told me. In this article on page 37, it began to talk about how a student was proud of the teacher's meanness. Now why would he be proud of how mean she was? This made me think of the time that my teacher once told me, if you've never said you've hated your parents at least once in your life time, then they aren't doing their job right. Just like in this article, the boy claims that his teacher was mean but he was also glad she was mean because he learned a lot from her. I thought that part of the article was really cool and it really made me conect back to what my High School teacher once said.
Below is a link of an article that I found about teacher authority in a classroom community which I found really intresting.
http://www.ncte.org/library/NCTEFiles/Resources/Journals/CCC/0612-dec09/CCC0612Close.pdf

Sunday, February 2, 2014

Amazing Grace: Jonathan Kozol- Quotes

In the article Amazing Grace, Kozol talks about how "When you enter the train, you are in the seventh richest congressional disrtict in the nation. When you leave, you are in the poorest."(Kozol 3) After reading this I was completey amazed and intrigued which lead me to read more. How is this even possible? This just goes to show how soceity is really screwed up. I don't understand how these wealthy human beings can live so close to a neighborhood that is so poor but yet are completey okay with it, and never thought to help these poor people out. While reading this article I came across a quote which was said by a father of four children. He claimed, "You just cover up...and hope you wake up the next morning." (Kozol 4) After reading this statement I sat back and realized how lucky some of us really have it. This father of four children live on the streets and is lucky enoug to get another day to live. These people are living in fear and will probably never have a normal life. This is very relevant to what the author is talking about because of how segrated some areas in America are, espeically in New York where some of the poorest people come from. Also another thought that I found very interesting was Kozol stated, "I think they hate you because you are not in their condition. I am in hell and you are not and so I hate you and I have to try to bring you down to where I am."(24) I couldnt agree anymore on what was just said. This jus goes to show that many people who are at lowest of the low, bring people down who are wealthier or even have something that is worth more value to them. These people feel like there lives may never be as good as the people who are rich or even have a little more than them and because of this they act out on it, which causes shootings and deaths and stabbings. Not all black people are poor and not all white people are rich. Sometimes its not all about the racial segreation which was talked about in the beginning of this article but the values that people have.
South Bronx, New York 2013
 
South Bronx, New York 1990

Washington Heights, New York 2013

Washington Heights, New York 2012

Saturday, February 1, 2014

A Little Something About Me....

As you all may know my Name is Courtney but what you didn't know is that I'm a twin! I'm a faternal twin which means we don't look alike. I have a younger sister who is 15 and an older sister who is 28.



My younger sister is in the middle and my twin is on the right :)
 
  I'm 18 years old and attended Pilgrim High School. Ever since I was little I knew that I wanted to be an Elementary school teacher. I'm taking this class to become an Elementary school teacher and I can already tell from the vibe the of the classroom that we're all going to have a great semester. I'm very eager and excited to take this course, it seems like it is going to be a lot fun! My favorite things to do is run and go shopping when I'm not with my friends or family. I work at Newport Creamery in Garden City and Dunkin Donuts. I love to work and make money! I can't wait to see what this class has in store over the course of the semester.