“Like the rings that ripple around a rock thrown in a pond, rings of successful dialog that begin in the classroom can ripple outward in ever-larger circles into homes and out into the community”
-(Cowhey, 2006, p.98).
I am so grateful for the message in these latest chapters of Black Ants and Buddhists by Mary Cowhey, because I feel like she really addresses the main concerns holding me back from diving headlong into a critical, social justice centered teaching approach. Concerns like, can kids this age really get something out of these lofty ideas and discussions, as important as they are? What will happen when they find out their efforts for peace are unsuccessful? What if parents and administrators don't like what I'm doing and think I am rocking the boat? Cowhey takes the time in Chapter 5 to help me see how valuable these discussions are to developing a classroom of social activists and critical thinkers, simply because of the important conversations it can spark. While not all conversation leads to successful action, it does have the power to get kids, and the wider community, thinking about critical issues. As Cowhey points out, “Critical thinking and dialog go hand in hand” (Cowhey, 2006, p.90). It really resonates with me when Cowhey expands on her definition of dialog, saying “It is one thing to have your most privileged, articulate, and entitled children speak up in a dialog… For me, the real test is to have the least-empowered children, the least articulate, take a leading role in that dialog while the more articulate children thoughtfully listen and consider things from their classmates’ perspectives before they comment or question” (Cowhey, 2006, p.91). I am burning with envy of this idyllic description, and am eager to transform my own practice to help achieve it.
As with previous chapters, the almost too-perfect-to-believe, even saccharine anecdotes that Cowhey shares about what her children supposedly really said and did, had me cringe and raise my eyebrow here and there. But I appreciate the sentiment behind these personal stories, like the one where the students think about how to make their voices heard in protest of the war. Cowhey really cut to the quick of my concerns about the effectiveness and value of exposing this age of kids to social issues when she shares that “Our Children’s March for Peace did not stop the war, but it was important that the children marched anyway. It was important that they wondered if children could go on strike to stop a war, and they tried as hard as they could, marching bravely in the cold until dark” (Cowhey, 2006, p.97). What a lovely way to put the whole objective into perspective, that makes me feel a lot more confident about trying on this style of thinking and teaching myself. I'm reminded that the objective of this teaching style isn't necessarily to create huge waves of change throughout the social issues we explore, but to give kids an authentic and empowering experience of how change is really set into motion: and that it's not often easy or fast. This might be challenging for me, as I know I can get discouraged with results are sluggish or non-existent. I have to remind myself that it's the process, not the product, that really holds the power.
Cowhey makes sure to drive home the point that “Teaching peace takes more than preaching it” (Cowhey, 2006, p.90), and it has pushed me to reexamine my own qualms with these challenges. It is so easy to read some picture books about civil rights leaders and moments in history, but until kids begin applying this learning to a critical look at their own lives, it is merely preaching. I love the way Cowhey seamlessly interweaves the academic learning standards with the authentic goals that have the kids fired up and matter to them, like the contention over the platform on the playground. Cowhey responded to her students' complaints in a thoughtful and impactful way, telling them “I didn’t particularly have jurisdiction over the platform, but that Ms. Agna, our principal, might. I said they would all have an opportunity to write a persuasive letter to Ms. Agna, clearly laying out their arguments in support of their proposed solution” (Cowhey, 2006, p.117). I think I am getting better at this, but being able to instinctively connect these seemingly small moments in student's lives to learning objectives is a huge part of what I want to develop in my practice. This book gives me lots of stepping stones to begin my exploration, particularly the book recommendations, which I have already racked up around $60 in my Amazon cart in my eagerness to add them to my collection. I've also jotted down many of the inspirational quotes she shares, like “If we are to reach real peace in this world, we shall have to begin with the children” (Gandhi via Cowhey, 2006, p.88) and “Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed unless it is faced” (James Baldwin via Cowhey, 2006, p.114). I like the way she uses them to propel not just her students, but also her own thinking, and I could see them being put to a similar use in my own classroom context. Sometimes I need these grounding words as much as if not more than my students. And considering the ripple effect I would love for my foray into pedagogical social justice to have, it never hurts to have these words around where other community members might encounter them and reflect on them. I will certainly be trying out the Pocket Poems mentioned on page 87 as another way to let kids explore these big ideas. Cowhey explains that “Pocket poems” are “short poems, which the children cut out, word by word, mixed up, and reassembled, referring to a printed copy of the poem on an envelope as needed” (Cowhey, 2006, p.87). She uses Langston Hughs, but I could envision using all sorts of content related to relevant social studies topics.
It made me feel like the classroom really could be a safe space to experiment with these new ideas when Cowhey shares her own honest less-than-ideal moments, and the way she used them to become teachable moments for the kids or for herself. When she wished she hadn't brought a topic up, like the landmines, she really used it as a think-aloud and modeled her reasoning with the kids and provided them with an important experience for activists. As Cowhey reflects, it was "an important point for activists of all ages. A critically thinking activist doesn’t jump on every bandwagon that rolls into town” (Cowhey, 2006, p.118). I also loved the idea of explicitly teaching "bias-detectin" and the way she used this topic to exercise it. What could have been an awkward teacher misstep to be brushed under the rug became a valuable lesson all in its own. The kids still got a lot out of the engagement as “They learned to use their bias-detection skills to help them think about who is missing, who is talking and who is not, who is providing information and who is not, what information is given and what information is not” (Cowhey, 2006, p.120).
I think Black Ants and Buddhists is an important read for all teachers and school communities seeking to foster social responsibility and empower students. In a beautiful extension of her rippling pond metaphor, Cowhey relates the experience of teachers attempting to try something new to a watery image, saying, “If you teach critically, and if teaching critically is
different from the dominant culture in your school, you may feel like you are
going against the grain, swimming against the tide” (Cowhey, 2006, p.210). All of us have experienced this in some way or another, either professionally or otherwise. For enthusiastic teachers who may begin to feel burned out from all the unfixable problems our world faces, Cowhey helps put it into perspective by sharing her own attitude towards this conundrum. She writes, “I can’t fight every battle and still have the energy,
sanity, and focus to keep teaching positively, keep loving my family, keep
having a life. Even with allies among colleagues, families, and administrators,
I can’t win every battle. Sometimes, however sadly, I have to let go” (Cowhey,
2006, p.215). Nobody likes to let go of battles they find important, but knowing a superhero teacher like Cowhey finds herself in this emotional predicament too, is encouraging.
Moving forward, I am filled with inspiration and ideas, and the courage to cast my stone into these waters knowing my job as a teacher is to create ripples with my power, not a tsunami. By cultivating a classroom environment that welcomes and honors students' voices, and celebrates the power of their thinking, I can help set positive change in motion. It's not about fixing the world's problems in a school year, it's about setting tomorrow's leaders on the right path to do so in the future. After all, “The most important skill that can and must be developed through activism is critical thinking” (Cowhey, 2006, p.103).
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