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"I don't want to talk about it" Silencing Students in Today's Classrooms
ORBIT

Carl E. James
Assistant Professor
Faculty of Education, York University

"I don't see difference": How Students are Silenced
Addressing the Silence
Some Classroom Examples of Anti-Racist Teaching
Towards the Future

Darren, a ten-year-old African-Canathan male student, is one of four black students in his Grade 5 class of 30. Approximately six other students in the class are minorities of Asian, South Asian, Lebanese, Iraqian origin. Darren is a keen participant in sports. This makes him very popular with his male peers, thus accounting for the leadership he displays during games on the playground. When asked to name some people he admires, Darren names mainly athletes involved in professional sports.

Born in London, England, to Caribbean parents, Darren immigrated to Canada with his family (mother, father and four siblings), when he was three years old. He is one of three students in his class that are identified as needing withdrawal (i.e., out of classroom) support to bring them to "grade level." In class, Darren is very unlikely to ask for help in understanding assigned tasks, and often, if not monitored, will hand in incomplete class work. Darren is a reluctant participant in class activities. He does not participate in singing, or in aerobic exercises during the "quality daily physical education" activities, or in the oral repetition exercises in French class. His artwork shows little effort or creativity, and for silent reading periods, he often chooses to read comic books he brings from home or picture books which are usually about sports. The reason he gives for not participating in class activities is that "they are boring."

One of Darren's teachers reports that "barren is a very difficult nut to crack. He also appears very set into a pattern of low achievement in his work; if this disturbs him, he doesn't let on. Darren's disengagement from school presents an enormous challenge to anyone charged with the task of designing school curriculum for him." Further, about Darren's psychological state, the same teacher remarked: "What is immediately striking in talking to Darren is his emotional flatness. He will generally answer questions designed to elicit a personal response with such monosyllabic phrases as 'It's okay,' 'I dunno,' or 'Alright' His awareness of the lives of his family members has an oddly vague, detached quality, and his disengagement from school life, with the exception of his life on the playground, seems depressingly absolute."

Every teacher in Darren's school is white, as is the principal, the secretary, the lunchroom supervisors, and even the man who puts on the "Scholastic Book Fair" presentations. When asked about race as a factor in Darren's participation in classes and his success, two of his teachers emphatically stated that "race is not a factor in Darren's performance."

The curricular materials to be found in Darren's classroom are textbooks that have been used since the 1960s and 70s. One of these, a reading comprehension book, presents "Canadian history" as a collision of white Europeans with "primitive native tribes" who do such things as "dance ceremoniously." Nowhere in this book, or in the social studies text, They Went Exploring, is the history of ethnic groups other than white Europeans acknowledged.

Within the first month of the fall semester, Darren's class saw a video as part of the "All About Me" unit. The video is part of the "Inside-Out" series, which is designed to address ethical issues and decisions confronting children. This particular video was about "racial intolerance." It showed a white boy who is confused as he encounters "strange" people of other cultures, and featured a conversation between the boy and his mother, who tells him: "Some people don't want black people living near us. They want to keep them in the slums." The picture cuts here from the mother's face to a grainy, black and white shot of black people in the slums -slumping against walls and doorways looking despondent. There was no discussion following the video, as it was time for recess when it ended, and the teacher did not plan to debrief when they returned. But as the students left the classroom, a friend of Darren's (who is white) was overheard asking him: "What do you think of that movie?" Darren replied in a rather curt manner: "I don't want to talk about it."

Later in the semester, Darren's class began a social studies unit on "Primitive People" which followed a four-week study of "Prehistoric People." The materials for this unit abounded with pictures of black-, brown-, and red-skinned people scantily clad and carrying their traditional technological implements. The social studies curriculum for the following semester showed that the next unit would be on "Medieval Times." Here the lessons presented European societies with kings, queens, nobles, and explorers, all of whom are white.

Why does Darren seem so uninterested in school or in learning? Are race and culture factors that might explain something about Darren's attitude towards learning and his performance in class? Could Darren's reluctance to participate in class activities be a way of coping with the school environment in general, and curricular materials in particular?

"I don't see difference": How Students Are Silenced

In a recent anti-racist education workshop, the facilitator asked whether it is appropriate that teachers recognize the racial composition of their classes. Specifically, he asked if each of us could tell him the racial composition of our classes. One teacher quite confidently responded, "I don't think of my students in that way." Another said, "Colour for me is not important, they are all students; and it is important for me to see them in that way." Both these statements reflect how teachers approach the racial and ethnic diversity within their classrooms. It is also an indication of the limited extent to which teachers are comfortable in dealing with race and, by extension, difference.

But it is only when difference is acknowledged that teachers will be able to create a positive learning environment for students like Darren. Such an environment is one that presents positive images of learners and validates their experiences. It is one that recognizes the particular diversity of the student population in terms of, for example, gender, social class, race, and ethnicity, and provide the space for the inclusion of their experiences in the classroom discourses. Students must be seen as individuals who occupy a number of social worlds and are therefore members of multiple groups. With regard to ethnicity and racial group, it is understood that each group has its own history, its own achieved or imposed position within Canadian society. These are part of the basis for the students' orientation to education and their perceptions of their possibilities.

There are times when, in referring to difference, teachers have said, "They're all unique individuals, and I treat them that way." Individualism is acknowledged in terms of personal difference, while group membership is acknowledged insofar as it refers to a group of students. This is a contradiction, for if it is accepted that individuals' experiences are shaped by the fact that they are students, is it not also true that their experiences will similarly be shaped by their status as, for example, members of a racial minority? And as students differ from each other, but share the "student experience," so too racial minority students differ but have the minority experience.

If students do not have their individual and group experiences acknowledged. and validated in terms of, among other things, their racial identities, then they will feel invisible and insignificant and that their differences are irrelevant. There will be no space for their voices in the classroom discourse. This is likely to silence these students, and as a result, they might disengage from the educational process.

Returning to Darren, we have noticed that on the playground, he is a leader and an active participant in recreational activities, in class he is "emotionally flat." While there are many factors that might help to explain this inconsistency, it is important to examine the classroom dynamics and his teacher's practices in particular. The teacher's role is crucial, for she or he has power over the students and this is reflected in choice and use of films, videos, posters, guest speakers, textbooks, and other classroom materials. While the video about racial tolerance might have been an attempt to acknowledge "diversity" and to have a lesson which would promote positive race relations, it failed to do so; it seemed to reinforce, like the social studies unit, stereotypes of Africans and other racial minorities. If such information and images are presented, then they must be accompanied by discussions that deal with issues such as stereotypes. In addition, there must be a balance between negative and positive information and images.

In not recognizing Darren's difference ("race is not a factor"), his teachers negate his life experiences, the history of his racial group in Canada, and the social and cultural world which he occupies. As a result, Darren's experience, needs, and interests are not reflected in the class materials. If the images of blacks that Darren constantly encounters in classes are ones that present them as low achievers, "primitive," and "slum dwellers," and there are no discussions about these images, then this will operate to silence Darren. His experience is not acknowledged or validated; he is invisible; and moreover, he is powerless in challenging the teacher. No wonder then that Darren, like many other black students (James, 1990), finds his classes "boring" and refuses to ask questions which would help him with classroom tasks.

Confronted with these negative images of themselves, racial minority students like Darren are likely to develop low self-esteem (Phinney, 1989), which in turn is used to further justify the notion that race and culture are not factors to be considered. For once the concept of self-esteem is engaged, the issue is seen as a deficit within a particular individual rather than a problem of how her or his racial group has been represented or portrayed. In response, many of these students "choose not to learn" because they do not feel that their voices are accepted and valued. They choose to not learn "that which denies them their sense of who they are" (Delpit, 1993, p. 291).

Addressing the Silence

To address the situation of students like Darren requires teachers to be constantly and critically self-reflective. We must reflect on our socialization, our biography, our worldview, and on how these impact on our practices, the classroom materials we use, our pedagogical approach to teaching, our vision of what we wish for all of our students and how we might best meet their needs. We must reflect on how we decide on what to teach, what materials to use, and what the appropriate roles of students and parents are in helping to design curricula that would respond to their needs and interests. Also, as teachers we must acknowledge our own interests and needs. We need to think about what we are learning from our students; what we think the students are learning; and how we know this. In essence, this reflection helps us to become conscious of what we bring to the classroom, both as socialized individuals and as professionals.

As part of their professional socialization, some teachers declare that they "do not see colour," that it is unimportant in the teacher-student relationship. This colour-blindness is a denial of the psychological and cultural power of racial constructions upon the lives of every member of society. The sad part of this position is that these teachers believe that they are being neutral and that this neutrality absolves them of stereotyping and of being racist. But race and cultural difference must be acknowledged if we are to provide a safe and nurturing learning environment, in which all students feel validated and included. Only when teachers acknowledge race and racism will we be able to avoid inflicting hurt on students like Darren who only see images that undermine their self-esteem and have lessons that present little or no positive images of their ethnic and racial groups. In order for Darren and his peers to develop a healthy respect, appreciation, and acceptance of each other's differences, their curricular materials must help them to critically evaluate and interrogate the negative images that they encounter in their education and general socialization process.

It is important for teachers to help students learn about how individual and structural racism operate to affect everyone and about how they are experienced by both white and racial minority people. This is necessary so that students can develop strategies to confront these forms of racism in order to bring about social change. Teachers generally, and - according to Christine Sleeter (1994) - whites in particular, must guard against the tendency "to discuss cultural differences" as a way of deflecting "attention away from racism" or talk about it "in ways that simplify and devalue others while rendering whiteness itself as invisible, or `normal"' (p. 6). As teachers, whether in a multiracial or racially homogeneous class, we must help students to critique white supremacy; and, as Sleeter suggests, white teachers must begin to engage in such critiques themselves.

Some Classroom Examples of an Anti-Racist Approach to Teaching

In an attempt to address the consequences of racism and stereotyping that resulted from the reading materials in his classroom, Andrew Allen, an elementary school teacher in the North York Board of Education, developed a different approach to his teaching. Mr. Allen had found that his Grade 2 students, particularly blacks, were uninterested in reading even the popular "multicultural" picture books with black characters. His students claimed that the images "did not look like them. They were ugly and African." The images presented in the books were, in fact, stereotypical illustrations of African peoples. As a result, Mr. Allen decided to use the books to teach critically. He taught his students to recognize the bias in the literature; sometimes, before asking his students to react to the stories or the pictures, he would describe what he disliked about the books. The students would then proceed to either write their own stories or develop their own illustrations.

This idea of students' writing their own stories has also been successfully employed by Bob Davis in his OAC black history course at Stephen Leacock Collegiate in the Scarborough Board of Education. The results of the students' work are presented in their book, Our Roots 2, a significant symbol of their capacity to write and to produce historical accounts from their perspective. This is a recognition that the students are experts in their own lives - a perspective Lisa Delpit (1988) contends must be kept. No doubt students are inspired by this learning process because their voices are heard and are validated.

Another example of a teacher who responded to the needs and interests of her students is Mrs. Goodie Tshabalala-Mogadime with the York Region Board of Education. In her language arts class her students read Underground To Canada, and "A Woman Called Moses," a story about Harriet Tubman. Mrs. Tshabalala-Mogadime reports that these stories, along with viewing the movie "Malcolm X," helped one of her 13-yearold black students who was considered to have a learning problem "to critically analyse systemic racism and discrimination, as something that is not just school related." She said that the student's self-concept and his belief in his abilities increased after he was exposed to information that was relevant to his experience and was presented examples of the capacity of his group members to succeed. Mrs. Tshabalala-Mogadime also involved the parents and members of the community in her classes by inviting them in as guest speakers.

Teachers are not neutral, neither is the pedagogical approach we employ. We must acknowledge the biases that are inherent in our approaches to our subject matter. This realization came through in an experience I had in a workshop where the facilitator, wishing to present an "anti-racist approach" to teachers, presented a role play of one that is appropriate. After everyone was given their respective roles, it was evident that the racial minorities in the group were not participating. When they explicitly raised their difficulties with the role play, the facilitator, rather than using this as an opportunity to discuss the difficulties and pursue other ways in which the lesson could be presented, became defensive and reported that on all the other occasions in which he has used this role play, "students have quite liked it, even the black students." This facilitator, who is also a teacher, is operating on the premise that "what applies to one, applies to all." He did not pay attention to the diversity to be found within all groups. To him, the problem was not himself, or his method; it was the "attitude" of the racial minority participants. Instead of working with the participants to develop an approach that would serve the whole group, he stuck to his original plan. Needless to say, very little was accomplished that day.

Towards the Future: Provide Space, Validate Voices

As teachers, we must see ourselves and the students as learners and teachers together, all engaged in a dialogical educational process. We must take into consideration the power dynamics of the classroom and society in general, noting how everyone is affected by the cultural, social, economic, and political structures of the larger society. We must recognize the impact of systemic racism and sexism on the lives of the students and must provide them with the tools to analyze their situation and construct strategies which will enable them to realize their educational and occupational goals.

To have an approach to teaching that is inclusive, teachers must constantly engage in a critical examination of their curricula and practices. In order to be responsive to the changing needs and interests of the students, we must be flexible, responsive, and willing to engage students as well as fellow teachers in building a non-racist curriculum. Social change must be seen as the hallmark of an educational process where students gain critical awareness and insights into themselves and the social forces that influence their lives. The teacher is a facilitator of this process, someone who affirms and validates the cultural experiences and identities of all students so that their voices come alive, are heard and not silenced.

REFERENCES

Delpit. L. D. (1993). The politics of teaching literate discourse. In T. Perry & 1. Fraser (Eds.), Freedoms' plough: Teaching in the multicultural classroom (pp. 285-295). New York: Routledge, .

James, C. E. (1990). Making it: Black youth, racism and career aspirations in a big city. Oakville: Mosaic Press.

Phinney, 1. (1989). Stages of ethnic identity in minority group adolescents. Journal of Early Adolescents, 9, 34-49.

Sleeter, C. E. (1994, Spring). White racism. Multicultural Education.