We Are All
Related: Understanding Friendship and Meaning
Don Teeuwsen
Vancouver, British Columbia
We
promise to provide a safe and respectful environment for
life long learning which celebrates diversity, embraces
the physical, spiritual, emotional and intellectual integrity
of each individual, recognizes and acknowledges differences
and prevents discrimination in all of its forms.
—B.C. Charter for Public
Education 2003
Opening Thoughts
An essential
component of teaching for social justice is recognizing
the individual and understanding the relationship of that
individual to other individuals in whatever community they
live. For teachers and students, that community is the classroom.
Marilyn Cochran-Smith, writing in “Learning to Teach
for Social Justice” (1999: 114-144), outlines six
principles of practice. This project addressed Cochran-Smith’s
first five principles: provide significant work that is
meaningful and interesting to students; build on what students
bring to school in terms of their knowledge and interests;
teach skills and help students understand ideas that they
are working with; and pay attention to what sense they are
making of what is being taught and work with (not against)
individuals, families and communities. These principles
neatly summarize what excellent teaching practice might
look like and they directed my initial reading and thinking.
This
article is based on a research project that was an analysis
of what Grade 3 and 4 students said they liked and learned
after they had created the artwork you see here. It contains
drawings, photographs and text. The images and writing worked
together to create an identity piece that contained ethical
statements and symbols of culture that had significance
for each student. There are twenty-one students of which
seventeen have a language other than English as their first
language. Two other students have First Nations ancestry.
While most students were born in Canada, at least six immigrated
to Vancouver from a variety of other countries. They were
a bright, engaging and wonderful group of students.
I
ended up with a completely different set of findings than
I would have imagined based on my initial assumptions and
biases. I was interested in researching what students said
was interesting and valuable, and I felt obliged to pay
attention to what my students were telling me. I ended up
learning more than I ever expected to about relationships,
meaning, and the process that makes up what happens in the
classroom. Engaging in curriculum such as this artwork/memory
piece energized the classroom and strengthened our classroom
community. Each student actively participated in the project,
and eagerly informed each other about their own meaning-making
and learning.
The
research process turned into one of the richest and most
meaningful things I have done as a teacher. Becoming a researcher
took a little getting used to. Any change in the parameters
of the project, however slight, made me worry about the
quality of the intended product. Qualitative research has
a great deal to offer any teacher who wants to improve their
practice. In the process of becoming more detached and focused,
I became a much better listener. I was aware of seeing and
hearing so much more than I would have otherwise. I felt
a heightened sense of purpose and a significantly enhanced
clarity about my intentions in my teaching practice. This
learning has been carried over into subsequent teaching
practice.
The
Project Itself
Our
class chose to work on a unit called “Community.”
I used an old school textbook I had found buried in the
bookroom called, Creating a community (1983). While the pictures are dated
and textbooks are generally considered unfashionable teaching
tools for primary students, I like this book because the
language is easy to read and this particular textbook is
filled with questions students can discuss together. The
premise of the book is that a group of people leaves planet
Earth to build a new community on a different planet. One
of the assignments on the first day was for students to
make a list of things they would take with them if they
were going on this expedition. This project was set up as
a kind of passport to be used as we set off to our new community.
Two
books were used as a springboard into the assignment. The
first book was We are all related: A celebration of our
cultural heritage (1996), created by students at G.T.
Cunningham Elementary School. After looking at the George
Littlechild collage that served as the model for the artwork
contained in the book, we looked at four student pieces
and their attached explanations. Then we looked at the book,
Our Elders speak: A tribute to Native Elders (1990). This book, assembled by Karie Garnier,
was published to honour First Nations teaching and was originally
an exhibition for Expo 86. This book was significant because
it contained ethical statements that First Nations Elders
believed were important for all people. Students were able
to identify how parts of the We are all related book followed naturally from Our
Elders speak.
I said that the artwork they were going to do would look
a bit like both of these texts.
I
wanted to engage parents in my research; I was interested
in doing something in this project that involved parents
in a meaningful way. I had read a journal article written
by Maria del Rosario Barilllas, called “Literacy at
home: Honoring parent voices though writing” (2000:
302–307). Barrilas argues that it is critical that
we invite parents to share their experiences and knowledge
with their children. In addition to creating collaborative
assignments, there is the added benefit of having parents
use the family’s first language so that they may have
a voice in their children’s academic development.
One
of the assignments was to ask parents and children to create
a piece of writing for one another about a belief that they
believed would be beneficial in their lives. Barillas advocates
that students and parents need venues in which to express
thoughts and feelings. Along lines of communication, the
two groups would share needs, wants and expectations. Each
artwork contained two ethical statements, something students
said they had learned from their parents, and an ethical
statement written by their parents that contained a teaching
they would give to the classroom community. Significantly,
there was an interesting overlap of beliefs that parents
and students shared—but not necessarily within the
same family. To avoid illiteracy issues, children were encouraged
to scribe for their parents.
It was
in the process of creating the artwork that I could see
that making friends and understanding what friendship meant
constituted the most valuable learning for the class. Throughout
the project, the students had conversations and visited
and helped each other, and these interchanges made the project
meaningful, interesting and valuable. Students came to their
own understanding that the project was about finding out
about each other.
They helped
each other out. Sometimes as many as five students would
be working on one person’s artwork. Students used
each other’s input to check the criteria for the artwork
itself. They were told to make their drawings recognizable
and the colours bright. They were told that many people
would be looking at their work and that those people would
be thinking about what they were seeing. Comments students
made, as they worked throughout the construction of their
artwork, indicated that they felt they were creating something
important.
The students
constructed envelopes out of paper in which to put their
ethical statements. I allow a considerable amount of conversation
in the classroom because I think students use conversation
to make sense of my teaching and their learning. The conversations
also help them to negotiate getting along and to create
a safe place in which to share stories and make sense of
the world. They shared crayons, and in some cases, helped
each other out, filling in the colours of the symbols and
backgrounds. While the researcher in me agonized about wanting
this work be their own, the contradiction inherent in encouraging
them to help each other out and then insisting that they
do separate work was so glaringly obvious that I held back.
For the duration of the project, students took breaks from
their own work to look at and comment on each other’s
pieces.
bell
hooks in Race and representation (1992: 115) writes about being able to gaze. African American
slaves were punished if they were caught looking. Students
loved to look at each other’s projects even when they
were in the early stages. They were not just looking, they
were gazing into each other’s pictures and seeing
the stories embedded within. hooks says that the white supremacist
culture controls who is represented and how they are represented.
Indeed, despite the number of minority students in the class,
how many images do they see of themselves? What kinds of
messages are we sending to those students who seldom, if
ever, see themselves in books or pictures on the walls?
During
the project, my time was taken up with a myriad of questions
and calls for help; the stuff teachers do every day. Things
like helping with spelling, holding a folded paper down
so that it could be glued, reassuring someone who wanted
to rip their project up because they had made a mistake
in the colour they had chosen for one of the pattern backgrounds,
and the inevitable repairing of construction paper that
tears if you are not careful and press too hard with a pencil.
My class is never an ocean of calm, yet it seemed to me
that they were busy and happy with the assignment. They
delighted in explaining the symbols they incorporated into
their work. I would be consulted on colour choices, not
because they didn’t have their own ideas, but rather
it seemed to me, more as a way of checking in and as a gesture
of inclusion.
After
three weeks, when the project had been completed, the celebration
of what we had accomplished provided me with one of the
most emotionally important moments in my teaching experience.
The presentations were electrifying. I will never forget
that morning’s exhibition with its ritual and respectful
coming together. We met at the carpet, sitting on chairs
with our artwork on the floor in front of us. It was the
first time that as a group we had a sense of what we had
accomplished.
The
excitement was barely containable. Everyone had a chance
to hold their work up and say something about their piece.
After each presentation, we all applauded. Some students
self-consciously held their work up and said nothing or
offered a comment about what they were doing when one of
the pictures was taken. Some summarized their artist’s
statements. In total, this took more than forty minutes
and no one asked for a break or engaged in disruptive attention
seeking. For students to sit and share so attentively made
me aware of how proud they were of their work.
After
lunch, we met so that I could ask them what it was they
liked about the project and what kinds of things they learned
from doing the work. Their conversations taught me to understand
what they valued and learned. I think that all voices were
heard. Everyone’s presence was recognized and valued
not just at the presentation and evaluations but in a sustained
way throughout the whole process. hooks talks of this in
her book Teaching to transgress (1994: 179–180) and says that
if there is prolonged silence in a classroom, it is because
of an absence of safety. My students felt safe as well as
noticed and respected.
The
Analysis
I
expected that students would talk about notions of respect
and respecting difference while acknowledging the inherent
commonalities of all persons. I thought they might talk
about enjoying working together with a shared sense of common
purpose. I hoped for comments about how their own notions
of identity confronted them; perhaps, a comment or two about
how they felt they knew themselves better after such a thought-provoking
assignment.
Their
comments reflected the huge issues they consider on a daily
basis. Students reported in their own words that the project
was valuable for them because:
“This
project was about people.”
“We
did it so people can know about you and you find out about
them.”
“Once
you understand them you can make friends.”
“You
start being friends because you know them.”
What
followed was a conversation about how the whole school should
do this and then we would maybe see each person for who
they are.
The
second thing that they really liked was the process of creating
the collage. They loved doing the artwork. They were falling
all over themselves in a rush to talk about the designs
and patterns, how cool the colours were, how they learned
to make interesting envelopes, and how detailed everyone’s
drawings were. The words “pretty,” “beautiful,”
and “nice” were repeated over and over.
They
also learned about the shifting meaning of symbols. The
only comments they made about difference were comments on
different ways they created symbols, patterns and envelops.
Their comments about symbols were repeated over and over
too.
“People
have all kinds of symbols that they use.”
“If
you asked the other person they would tell you what the
symbol means.”
“Symbols
mean different things to other people.”
“Symbols
mean words.”
“Even
if you don’t know what a symbol means, it means something
to them [the person who drew it].”
The
next time we met, I took time to ask some questions about
the comments they had made about symbols. I asked, “Everyone
seems quite excited by the symbols. The symbols look like
pictures, but they act like words when we look at them.
Is this what you think?” There were hands up all over
the place now. That was it! They said it was like learning
a language. The meaning of the symbols shifted sometimes
just a little, but sometimes a lot. For example, Jan (all
names of students have been changed) had used grass as a
symbol for the music that she loves to listen to. When she
was asked why, she just shrugged and said, “Because.”
They talked for some time about how hard it was to understand
what someone was saying, especially if you don’t know
them. I asked if I was hard to understand. There was agreement
all around. “When we didn’t know you, we didn’t
know what you were saying, but you are getting easier to
understand.”
Students
love making art. Students doodle and draw in their journals.
They doodle on the edges of worksheets. They are as respectful
of a picture as they are of the written word. John Ralston
Saul, (2000: 126) puts it this way:
We are not all great or even good artists. But we are all
intrinsically part of the imaginations inclusive nature.
Those who believe in the dominance of understanding and
methodology seem to miss the obvious. The tools they consider
marginal—those of the arts—are in fact the tools
of storytelling and reimagining ourselves which all humans
use. And why do we use them? In order to convince ourselves
that we exist as humans and as individuals in a society.
He
goes on to say only art can reveal to us what we already
know. It is as if we restate or retell stories about ourselves
with greater clarity through artistic representation.
Students
have to have the opportunity to represent themselves and
share those representations with each other. Paulo Freire
says in The politics of education (1985:
78-79) that as societies work towards transformation, artistic
representation moves from prefabricated images to art that
is concrete or real. My students spoke about how great everyone’s
art was. It had a special quality because they were not
copying someone else’s idea. A basketball in a border
pattern had personal meaning. The artist had a serious reason
for including it. Other students could find out just what
the images did mean by asking.
Henry
Giroux, writing in the introduction of Freire’s book,
The politics of education,
(1985, p. xx), notes that the dominant culture controls
the production of culture for everyone. One of the reasons
students were so engaged in this project is because they
understood that they were in control of the images and of
the representation. They were telling their own stories.
One of the other striking things about these images is the
layered quality some of them have. Images are embedded under
later changes. There is a sense of uncovering form and meaning
that makes looking at the artwork a profound experience.
Indeed,
early on in the project, one boy asked, “Don, if these
pictures we are doing help us to know each other, why didn’t
we do this at the beginning of the year?” It was a
good question. I expect next year it will be one of the
first projects we do. I also wonder if it might be interesting
to work on those pictures over the year, to add to the images
as we get to know ourselves better and as our understandings
of ourselves change.
Another
student, Lian, expressed considerable frustration about
not knowing what the pictures meant just by looking at them.
Lian’s statement echoes the intriguing idea contained
in structuralism that meaning is constructed and not the
product of shared systems of signification. Meaning is not
intuitively shared. Other students loved this notion of
not knowing. When you are in an ocean of language, ideas,
and curriculum you are expected to understand or be engaged
with, the delight of being able to make your own symbols
and attach your own meaning to them was, in the words of
another student, “Fun.” So, added to the power
of being able to tell their own stories, the students had
the opportunity to control the meaning they brought to the
project.
Many
theorists believe that words are instruments of power and
that those who control the power control the meaning of
the discourse. But meaning is constantly shifting as people
engage in discourse. The excitement and energy generated
by discussing these ideas with my students leads me to believe
that students rarely get to control the meanings of things,
and that they empower themselves when they do. It might
seem unsettling for some teachers to invite students to
make their own meaning. E. D. Hirsh, writing in Cultural
literacy, (1987: 48-55), reviews the notion that our
understanding of the outside world reflects our understanding
of schemata or memory pictures we group together to facilitate
our knowing. Hirsh wants all students to operate from the
same set of schemata to facilitate literacy. Here is a man
who is comfortable with the notion that hierarchies exist
and he believes that the trick is to invite the powerless
to understand the meanings and understandings of words and
text so that they can succeed or at least work for those
in charge.
Of
course, it would be silly to suggest that everyone get together
and start talking as if they are unconcerned with sharing
meaning or understanding. The point is, I think, that sharing
meanings requires a common language but, more importantly,
requires the development of a set of relationships that
allow dialogue and discourse to occur. Sharing is not something
that someone imposes. Sharing implies notions of equality
and relationship. Sharing implies conversation and time
for each person to understand and think. The single largest
learning I gained through this project was the beginning
awareness that normal everyday tensions for my students
are magnified by the uncertainty of understanding the language.
Then too, there is the assumption that the words out of
my mouth have greater power, meaning, and validity than
the words that come out of their mouths.
Sharing
meanings in conversation is not something that only teachers
have to think about. Nor is it something specific to classroom
teaching or curriculum. At the 2002 Lafontaine–Baldwin
lecture, George Erasmus, the great First Nations statesman,
said that researchers who examined more than two hundred
commissions and task force documents found that even when
the same words were used, Aboriginal people and government
representatives were talking about different things. What
Erasmus was advocating was that we find ways to develop
relationships with each other so that we can talk together.
He suggested that it was time that we examine the inequities
of power contained in the discourses in which we are currently
engaged.
In my literature review, I happened upon a draft document
that was looking at ways to establish performance standards
for human and social development. While the document identified
valuing diversity, cultural awareness and participation
as important aspects of social responsibility, the paper
avoided any discussion of how such concepts might be evaluated.
It seems that we are soon going to be called upon to teach
and evaluate student understandings of cultural diversity,
as well as their understandings of cultural heritage. What
kinds of curriculum will teachers use to teach these concepts?
The kind of project reported on here is a good place to
start teaching and learning in this curricular area. It
has the added benefit of creating at the same time an opportunity
to foster friendship and understanding.
I think, as teachers, we need to be ever aware of the relationships
we have with our students. Some of us are more comfortable
than others with the notion that we have enormous amounts
of power compared to the students in our classes. Some of
us take it as a given that the curriculum is a reflection
of those who hold political and economic power. We don’t
let students get in touch with each other. We limit the
time spent in talking and fill the day with planned curriculum
that is meaningless and devoid of real content and relevance.
It is to our detriment that we do this daily….unthinkingly…reflexively.
For
me, the issue is that each teacher should be aware of the
political implications that are inherent in each of our
teaching practices. Marilyn Cochran-Smith’s principles
of education became so real to me as this project took hold
of the students and myself. Teachers have control and often
limit individual student autonomy and identity. More to
the point, we limit ourselves to teaching the curriculum,
worried about the politics of what we are doing. Many teachers
are afraid to teach what is real and settle for what is
concrete. I believe that what truly matters is seldom, if
ever, on the page but something that comes out as process.
We teach who we are. We teach the relationships we believe
are important.
For students,
learning how to make friends and live together is fundamental.
It was in engaging in the artwork that the understandings
of friendship came up. Throughout the project, conversation
visiting, and helping each other made the project meaningful,
interesting, and valuable, and provided the students with
an understanding of the importance of finding out about
each other. Along the way, their own relationships were
strengthened and new relationships were forged. We learned
a lot together.
One
Year Later
One year later, I am reminded that friendship
and finding out about each other represented the core learning
and understanding in this project. Right now, as I write,
the United States and a number of its allies are at war
with Iraq. I feel the world
right now is at a crossroads. In the past two months, while
thinking and reading for this paper, two articles in The
Globe and Mail resonated personally and for me, connected
to this project. On February 8, 2003 (F6-7), there was an
article about the plague of suicide bombings that routinely
occur in Israel. Arin Ahmed, a would-be Palestinian suicide
bomber related that:
“I got out of the car. The place wasn’t exactly like I’d
seen on the map. I saw a lot of people, mothers with children,
teenage boys and girls. I remembered an Israeli girl my
age whom I used to be in touch with. I suddenly understood
what I was about to do and I said to myself: How could I
do such a thing?”
All Arin
Ahmed, the “failed” suicide bomber, did was
remember a real human being who she had known. How do we
get in touch with anyone else? We talk to them. We listen.
We pay attention. Is it such a stretch to imagine the reason
that we, as teachers, engage in the projects that we do
is to have the classroom community find out about one another?
To create community, to build friendships, we have to talk
and listen to one another.
Exactly
one month later (2003, F6-7), another article appeared in
The Globe and Mail entitled “Making peace one person at a time.”
The article describes how Michelle Divon, the Israeli ambassador’s
daughter, made friends with the daughters of the Jordanian
and Iranian ambassadors. They met at school and found themselves
working on a thirty minute presentation that addressed each
other’s different cultures, religions, and upbringings
as well as celebrating their similarities.
Divon says
that meeting in Canada created an opportunity for them to
learn from each other and to enjoy a friendship. I knew
their experience because that is what had happened in our
class working on this project. Echoing the promise contained
in the quote that opens this paper, Divon says,
“Our similarities are far greater than our differences and I
would like to provide people with the opportunity to discover
this on their own. Just like we cannot shake hands with
a clenched fist we cannot make peace without looking each
other in the eye.”
Resources
Barrillas,
Maria del Rosario. (2000). Literacy at home: Honoring parent
voices through writing. In The Reading Teacher.
Vol. 54 (3).
Freire,
Paulo. (1985). The Politics of education.
Massachusetts: Bergin and Garve.
Erasmus,
George. (2002). Why can’t we talk? In The Globe
and Mail. Toronto: The Globe and Mail, Saturday March 9, 2002.
Hirsh,
E.D., Jr. (1987). Cultural literacy: What every American
needs to know. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
hooks,
bell. (1992). Black looks: Race and representation
. Toronto: Between the Lines.
hooks,
bell. (1994) Teaching to transgress: Education as the
practice of freedom. New York: Routledge.
Saul, John
Ralston. (2001). On equilibrium.
Toronto: Viking.
Texts
Used
Cochran-Smith,
Marilyn. (1999). Learning to teach for social justice. In
Griffin, Gary A. (Ed.). The education of
teachers: Ninety-eighth yearbook of the National Society
for the Study of Education (Vol. Part I, 114-144). Chicago, IL: NSSE, distributed by
the University of Chicago Press.
About
the Author
Don
Teeuwsen is a Grade 1 teacher at Lord Robert’s
Annex in Vancouver.
