Dear TNLI MetLife Fellows:

Yes, it’s true, February is soon roundin’-the-corner… and with that, we’ll begin (on February 1st) our next national TNLI listserv discussion—to be hosted by our Wyoming affiliate, and moderated by TNLI MetLife Fellow Nichol (Nicki) Elder—a teacher at Laramie High School. As usual, we are sending you the reading information (and digital link)—SEE BELOW—so that you can prepare a bit in advance of this conversation. Special thanks, of course, to Wyoming and Nicki. We look forward to a great February conversation with them at our helm!

Ellen and Peter

FEBRUARY -- Wyoming

Moderator: TNLI MetLife Fellow Nichol (Nicki) Elder
“What Kind of Citizen? The Politics of Educating for Democracy.” by Joel Westheimer and Joseph Kahne. American Educational Research Journal, Summer 2004, Vol. 41, No. 2, pp. 237-269. A direct link to the PDF version of the full article is available on the following URL: www.mills.edu/academics/faculty/educ/jkahne/what_kind_of_citizen.pdf.

Hello, I'm Nichol Elder (Nicki). I'm just wanted to introduce myself to all of you since we will be working together with Westheimer and Kahne's article. I think it is a nice segue from Alfie Kohn's article concerning unconditional teaching to move into a discussion of teaching as an act to assist students in finding their role as "citizen." I'm looking forward to all of your thoughts and how the practices outlined in the two schools in their article compares to the practices in your communities.

I look forward to your input, ideas, and questions.

Nicki Elder
Wyoming
2/1/06

Hello to Mary and to all TNLI fellows.

I'm really curious: Do your schools practice the "character counts" model that is discussed in the article or other methods of promoting citizenship? How do these compare with the two schools focused on in the text?

Another thought that I'm muddling over is how the previous text about unconditional teaching ties into the idea of teachers having a role in more than just teaching specific subject matter (as we all know we do) but also the role of encouraging a certain type of citizenry for the future generations. Less than 50% of our citizenry voted in the last presidential election and the generation of ages 18 - 34 were the ones that voted the least. Are models like the schools discussed in the article going to help younger adults become more a part of the democratic process? Are there other models you've seen that would be more effective? Do you feel frustrated by the many hats and roles you play as "teacher" or is it invigorating to know you can possibly be a factor in this process? These are the kinds of "essential" questions I felt might move our discussion.

I look forward to hearing from many of you.

Nicki Elder
Wyoming
2/6/06

Hello, everyone. What was your opinion of the article? Below, at the bottom of this email, I sought some feedback from all of you. I'll copy them here. Looking forward to hearing from you!
Nicki Elder
Questions to ponder:
1. Do your schools practice the "character counts" model that is discussed in the article or other methods of promoting citizenship?
2. How do these compare with the two schools focused on in the text?
3. Another thought that I'm muddling over is how the previous text about unconditional teaching ties into the idea of teachers having a role in more than just teaching specific subject matter (as we all know we do) but also the role of encouraging a certain type of citizenry for the future generations. Less than 50% of our citizenry voted in the last presidential election and the generation of ages 18 - 34 were the ones that voted the least. Are models like the schools discussed in the article going to help younger adults become more a part of the democratic process?
4. Are there other models you've seen that would be more effective?
5. Do you feel frustrated by the many hats and roles you play as "teacher" or is it invigorating to know you can possibly be a factor in this process?
These are the kinds of "essential" questions I felt might move our discussion.

Nicki Elder
Wyoming
2/9/06

When I first read Westheimer and Kahn's "What Kind Of Citizen" I was reminded of a recent issue at my school. During class visits and demo lessons, I noticed the negative manner in which many students behave in one particular class. Beyond profanity, our students (who are friends) fight, steal and blatantly disrespect many authority figures in the school. After talking with their teacher, I decided that some work on character building might lead them to become more reflective about their actions, better decision makers. Our goal was to improve the community. I did some research, found Character Counts and we looked at some character education exercises.

It seemed like a good idea at first, but then I thought about the thinking behind this curriculum. It seemed as if it would help our kids to come to school, make nice and be these happy, positive kids who worked together and smiled at their teachers (even the photographs on the website depict pleasant, cheerful teenagers). But then I spent more time with the kids and talked to them. I questioned the effectiveness of these arbitrary exercises that still didn't improve the realities our kids were dealing with. I realized that, for our kids, this would be a band-aid to mask the real problems they kids were facing including hunger, lack of winter clothing, violence at home and depression.

I agree with Westheimer and Kahn's summation of the limits of character education. The emphasis on personal responsibility detracts from the physical and social ills of many poor, urban kids. It’s a kind of "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" approach that neglects to address the sources of our kids’ anger, sadness and frustration that manifests in chronic misbehavior and "poor" citizenship. If character education is really about citizenship then how can we neglect to address our community's real struggles?

So my colleague and I decided to work with our school-based support team to provide much needed intervention and service for some of the students in this class. At the same time, rather than drill exercises on honesty, trust, respect etc., we model compassion, understanding and fairness. The challenge is holding students accountable for their behavior and getting them to treat one another better. Writing workshop has made a positive impact on this effort because during a nonfiction unit, the students created how-to manuals in which they taught one another about friendship, helping their families and even taking care of the neighborhood.

Perhaps when some of their basic physical and mental health needs are being met, we can take a more explicit and reflective look at citizenship and democracy.

Amber Moss
NYC
2/10/06

Hear, hear! I couldn't agree more. Our district "mandated" Character Counts, but, as you said, we are talking the talk, a lot of rhetoric that doesn't match the reality kids in my area are facing. Where does the jargon fit in when your parents are smoking pot (or more) every night, all the uncles are in gang related activities, and mom is trying to get the cousins across the border even though the coyote didn't show up. The "street" provides excellent cash for the relatives here and aboard, whereas the state mandated curriculum lacks any connection to one's own "real" world. Exactly why should I learn algebra when I can make more than the teachers do if I "deal" on the street? But we think if we pass out books with nice words in them we will make a difference? While meanwhile we cut funds for any vocational guidance, even in probation schools?

Oranne Lee
Santa Barbara County, CA
2/11/06

Hello,

My name is Holly Link, and I'm one of the leadership fellows in San Francisco this year. Two weekends ago our group met and had time to discuss the Westheimer/Kahne article. Previous to our discussion we'd watched Ann Lieberman's video on "What is Policy?" It was interesting how parts of Lieberman's talk seemed to be directly related to "The Politics of Educating for Democracy."

As we began to discuss the Westheimer/Kahne article, we agreed that most of our own experiences as students were instruction/training on becoming a personally responsible citizen, and that many of the schools in which we teach also use curriculum or programs that promote "good citizenship" in this same way.

We bemoaned the fact that many of us are teaching in schools being monitored by the state or district which makes it nearly impossible to integrate any sort of focus on "social justice" into the prescribed curricula. For example, we discussed scripted reading programs in which a set of instructional steps take the place of teachers’ voices. While, in some ways new teachers benefit from programs that direct us so concretely, veteran teachers often can, on their own, address standards/content in ways that integrate and focus on real-life issues.

As we talked about this, we began to think about federal policy and the agendas of states and governments, or at least the agenda that presents itself when one begins to think about how teachers across the states are expected to teach- with what materials and how. It seems we are being prevented from ever getting to the root issues like defining social inequities and working towards systemic change.

I view Lieberman's ideas about policy and the action research we are doing as work with an orientation towards social justice. Lieberman points out that the mediating factor between policy and teachers has to be a professional community of teachers that comes together as a supportive and active body working on issues of research and policy. We are doing this through the Leadership Institute, but we recognized that we make up a tiny percentage of teachers in the school district who even have access to these ideas and professional development surrounding issues of policy, social justice and their connections to each other.

For me, these thoughts being up some hard questions:

1) How do we, as teacher-leaders, use our action research and work related to social justice to support our own school sites? Does anyone have the opportunity to do this in their schools? Do principals support what we're doing?

2) How can we work towards fostering discussion about social justice vs. 'becoming a responsible citizen' through the content or programs we have to deliver?

(This second questions relates to Amber Moss and O. Lee's comments on the reality of their students' lives versus character building programs that start with the assumption that students' basic needs are already being met.)

Holly Link
Buena Vista School
San Francisco
2/13/06

Hello fellow TNLI's,

With this month’s article, I was able to reflect on my own education and how different it is from today's students. The largest problem I see for todays’ students is NCLB. This legislation is about standardized testing. My own principal, against her values as an educator, has told our pre-k and Headstart classrooms along with 1st and 2nd grades, they must start teaching their students how to answer using extended responses. Extended response is a portion of our state standardized test.

NCLB has caused education to be about the test, which leaves teachers out of creating more meaningful lessons, unless it has to do with the test.

This is so disappointing because school isn't school any longer, it is standardized testing. If we want to effect policy change, I think we should all address NCLB.

Chad D. Kirkpatrick
Chicago
2/13/06

Hello. Your friendly "neighborhood" facilitator here.

I've wanted to wait to state my own opinion concerning the article, giving others a chance to voice their own opinions.

I agree completely with what you've said here. I find one of the biggest frustrations in educational policy presently to be the stifling of our power to empower our students as funding gets cut nationwide for the arts and vocation and community/real world opportunities to do service learning projects and projects that make more sense to the learning process get pushed aside so that we can fall back into a teach-to-a-test model that seems to not promote the kind of critical thinking and actual schema-growth learning that goes beyond a mere test.

It can be disheartening, but as I meet more and more dedicated teachers, via the policy institute here in Wyoming and nationwide via this listserv, as well as from other projects I'm doing with Amnesty International and Peacejam (in which I am a sponsor) and AP conferences and writing project work, I am nothing but inspired by the wonderful hard work teachers put in to making learning meaningful for their students of all ages, locations, and socio-economic backgrounds. It is inspirational, really.

I do wonder, how do we balance service learning opportunities with the political climate of NCLB and testing and AYP in schools?

I also wonder what can we do to help the citizenry of the future generations be best prepared for the world they will inherit. The violence that is shaking the world daily impacts us all globally. Outsourcing work is a common commentary in the news. We gain knowledge in months that took decades in previous centuries. Today, I spoke to people from Laramie (my home), Denver, Colorado; New Hampshire; a little community outside Brazil; and all of you via cell phone and/or email.

This is a reality for many of our students as well.
How do we prepare them academically, but even just as (if not more) importantly, socially and ethically to deal with this world?
I believe that is the essence of the reading this month.
What is a democratic citizen in this world?
What is our role in the development of this citizenry?
What is the most effective way to succeed in this role against what obstacles?

Thanks for letting me rant and rave and question. Hope all of you are having a good month.

Nicki Elder
Wyoming
2/24/06

Thanks for your positive notes, Nichol. I agree that I meet many inspiring teachers who are able to "keep that balance," even when the pendulum swings from theory to theory. I actually do believe in accountability, even national testing. As a military child I moved from state to state, and was keenly aware of many differences. If college entry and other "global" opportunities hinge on the education we provide, we have to have some degree of consistency. I just feel that NCLB contains many unrealistic expectations for many students with special needs, language issues, poverty, etc. that need to be adjusted. Some publishers' responses have been to sell drills that kill creativity and zest for learning, but are being sold widely to administrations. Some we must do, but I'm glad to hear there are a lot of you out there being more creative.

Are we supposed to stick to theory or share practical ideas?

Like you, I value practical, real life applications. I love your ideas about community service, etc. I agree with the article that we need always to keep as one of our primary goals the development of citizens. As part of the Impact II program I designed several units for elementary school age called "Why pay taxes?" to teach government and citizenship using simulations, even for 3rd graders. Actually "acting out" situations, debatating current controversies seems to be what excites students most. Visiting government offices, court houses. They love feeling "grown up." For local government, my 3rd graders held a Board of Supervisors meeting to decide whether or not to approve new growth (a new hotel). They loved it! Similar projects for 5th grade. Also mini income tax lessons ( this is the perfect time). We generate lists (using phone book sections as resources) of services government does for us (from parks to lost animal shelters, schools, etc.) and role play a few. After this we "vote" on how much they think we should pay in taxes. Year after year they vote for at least 20 - 25%. I really wish we could visit Washington, DC.

I know of a charter school in the SF area that is training their 6th graders to be "senators" who help make school policies and even work with discipline issues -- they receive communicating/counseling skills. Students who received "behavior slips" appear before the Senate to discuss how and why to improve the behaviors! So far offenders seem to be taking their sessions before the senators even more serious than the usual trip to the principal's office. Government by peers.

Scholastic News featured an article about Palestine where students from feuding regions are joining together to play basketball. Basketball teams amid the violence. What an inspiration.

So many positive things happen every day in our schools. If only they were in the media. What if we could get CNN to have segments? We need an Educational Correspondent!

It is this type of in depth teaching I hope we TNLIers can stress and keep alive even amid the flurry to test. I valued getting your mail.

Oranne Lee
Santa Barbara County, CA
2/28/06