Response to Prompt 2 (Kozol, Delpit)

The children in the second grade class that I am tutoring in this year are of Hispanic and African American descent. According to Infoworks, sixty three percent of the students live in high poverty areas. As Ms. Roberts informed me, about twenty five percent of the twenty student class live in homes with one parent. Most of these single parent homes are African American. These statistics give indisputable evidence of the issues of segregation as described by Jonathan Kozol that still exist in the education system. These statistics are solid evidence of the obstacles that children and families who live in high-poverty areas have to overcome in their struggle to attain an education equal to that of the middle and upper class.


These students come households that speak Spanish or a form of English that is highly disputed among society as a legitimate language called African American Vernacular. Regardless of the legitimacy of AAV, these children have to learn Standard English in school. The fact that Standard English is not practiced or even spoken in these children's homes does not make it any easier for them to adapt what they learned in school to their home lives. During one of the classes I was tutoring, one of the students was dismissed. He left the class room to meet his mother at the office. In order to get to the parking lot, the student and his mother had to walk back past the class I was in. I heard them walk by the open window and realized that they were speaking Spanish. This situation is an example of how these students have to use one language at school, Standard English, but are not able to practice it at home because the parents do not speak English.


Although these problems such as low income, difficulties in learning Standard English and segregation are problems in the cultures of Hispanic and African American children in my school and in the U.S. in general, these students also bring strong cultural capital to the classroom. These children come from cultures with a rich history with roots in art, music, literature and politics. As in the writings of Lisa Delpit, these children need have their rich cultures preserved and prove to these children that their heritage is extremely important. They need to be taught about the culture of power that exists in the education system. We have to teach them about the politics involved in achieving an education, and the issues involved specifically with the sad fact that it is even more difficult for these low income students to receive an equal education compared to that of higher income families.


If we can accomplish teaching these students about the barriers that they will have to cross and the systems of privilege that are working against them, we will empower them with the knowledge to act against the cultures of power that exist in the world. By teaching these children how a democracy is supposed work, we can ensure that these students will be able to "shake up" the system and attempt to change the status quo. We have to teach these children that their language and the way they use it can effectively be the most powerful weapon in the slow changing environment that is education.