Michelina's blog

 Maya and Matthew's children's book They, She, He: Easy as ABC is a wonderful resource since it presents gender diversity to young readers in an approachable and developmentally appropriate manner. The book fosters an inclusive knowledge of identity from a young age by guiding youngsters through many names, pronouns, and ways that people might identify themselves using the alphabet format. The book normalizes a range of gender expressions and teaches kids that using pronouns is a sign of respect for everyone by showcasing varied identities alongside amiable illustrations. As children come into contact with people who have varied identities and experiences, the book also helps them understand that pronouns aren't just the conventional "he" and "she" categories.     As an educator, I think it is so important to discuss and have open arms gender and sexuality discussion. When I was in middle school, we learned about sexuality and gender, and how everyone is...

       Toward Ending Ableism in Education by Patrick Hehir promotes a change in the way educational systems see and assist students with impairments. According to Hehir, ableism, "The prejudice or discrimination against people with disabilities.", is pervasive in educational institutions and frequently restricts students' potential and possibilities. He stresses how crucial it is to value the variety of learning styles and make educational settings more inclusive. According to Hehir, teachers can establish fair learning opportunities that emphasize individuals' strengths rather than their weaknesses by identifying and eliminating ableist behaviors. This will allow every student to succeed academically and socially.     I can strongly relate my High School experience with Hehir's passage, as the students with disabilities in my high school were placed in classrooms with regular learning plans, catered to students without disability. These classes moved at a...

  Aria- Richard Rodriguez      Rodriguez talks about his transition from using Spanish at home to learning and using English in the classroom. He talks on how adopting English, the "public" language, and separating himself from Spanish, the "private" language, causes him to feel less intimate with his family. He says, "I became... the confident student, academically successful. But, diminished, in my family's eyes." This highlights a typical experience for bilingual students, who frequently struggle to balance maintaining their cultural and linguistic heritage with thriving in an academic setting where English is the primary language.      Students from non-English speaking backgrounds could experience difficulties comparable to those Richard Rodriguez describes in Aria, where the transition to an English-dominant environment affects their cultural self-perception and familial relationships. These students frequently feel torn between upholding their c...

Compare and contrast Finn v.s Shalaby Shalaby's Troublemakers and Patrick Finn's Literacy with an Attitude examine how societal attitudes of students from underprivileged backgrounds contribute to educational inequalities, though from distinct perspectives. In Shalaby's Troublemakers, the author looks at how young children, especially African American students, are branded as "problems" in the classroom, which results in harsh disciplinary measures that worsen exclusion rather than promote growth and understanding. Shalaby emphasizes the human cost of these designations by highlighting how adult views of deviance eclipse children's innate potential and need for nurture. She argues for compassionate teaching methods that accept kids for who they are, understanding that actions classified as "trouble" are frequently the result of systemic neglect and a lack of support rather than personal failings on the part of the kids.   In contrast, Finn's Lit...

    In my opinion, I believe that every student learns differently, and has their own strength and weaknesses in the classroom.       Kohn includes in his " Stuff " category he states that there should be a "sense of clutter" in the classroom including supplies, posters, and other educational items. I agree with this to an extent. Personally, If i notice something is messy or cluttered, it is all I focus on until it is organized to my liking. In middle school I had this one teacher who had his entire room covered in newspaper articles, photos with his student, educational posters, decorations from every holiday, flags from colleges, stacks of papers and homework all over his desk and cabinets, and basically anything he found around the school. There was so much going on that for the first few weeks of class I would get easily distracted due to something that caught my eye in the classroom. This would cause me to fall behind as I struggled to grasp a full at...

  “Our schools are designed to prepare children to take their assumed place in the social order rather than to question and challenge that order. Because we train youth in the image of capitalism instead of a vision of freedom-for lives as individual workers rather than solidary human beings-young people are taught academic content that can be drilled and tested rather than understanding literacies and numeracies as forms of power, tools for organizing, fodder for the development of their own original ideas.” Trouble Makers- Preface This quote questions the essential goal of education in the modern world. It implies that obedience is frequently given priority in schools over critical thinking, with the goal of preparing students to fit into existing societal institutions rather than inspiring them to confront or question such structures. This viewpoint brings to light a serious worry: rather than fostering true understanding and empowerment, education could work to support capitali...

For this blog I wanted to connect  A Short History of Public Schooling - Excerpt from the film Class Dismissed  and the movie we watched in class  Teach Us All The video  A Short History of Public Schooling - Excerpt from the film Class Dismissed  stood out to me than other videos we have watched in class. We learn through this video that Education evolves overtime, and changes based on the technology we have at the time. For example, schools were not even around until the1900s, and they were one room buildings all ages, as time goes on we find better ways to educate by separating ages and curriculums. What stands out to me as this video of the history of education does not go into much detail onto who was allowed into these schools at the beginning of education. In the beginning of education the schools with the best curriculum and educators were only provided to students who were white. The other students had to learn in bad conditions with educators who could...

 The Four I's of Oppression For this blog post I will be focusing on reflection. Ideological, institutional, interpersonal, and internalized oppression—the Four I's of Oppression—offer a structure for comprehending the ways in which systemic oppression functions and appears in society. I would like to focus on the idea of Interpersonal oppression and my personal connections with interpersonal oppression. The Interpersonal oppression happens in environments where people act unfairly toward others because of unconscious stereotypes. This is a place for analysis because it invites us to consider how we might unintentionally contribute to oppression and to critically examine our own behavior. Developing understanding and empathy is crucial to establishing supportive settings in the community, at work, and in educational institutions. I am a waitress in a small town diner-like restaurant. I have had many instances where I was treated poorly, as many do when working with the public....

 Reflection~ Michelina Irons Something I wanted to reflect on from Lisa Delpit's Other People's Children  (p24), was the discussion on the 5 key aspects of power and more specifically power in education. These aspects offer an idea for analyzing how power is enacted, how rules for participating in power are established, and how these rules reflect the student's education. The Delpit's analysis reveals that Schools are not neutral spaces but are areas where power is both exercised and contested. Delpit goes into great depth explaining the dynamics of power within educational settings and how these dynamics shape educational experiences.  Her passages provides a comprehensive examination of the concept of "the culture of power" and its implications for understanding educational injustices and communication issues. The text stresses the significance of recognizing and correcting inequality of power in education. By understanding the laws of the culture of power a...

Privilege, Power, and Difference ~ Alan Johnson   Blog #1 Michelina Irons         In the book  Privilege, Power, and Difference   written by Alan Johnson, he applies that he has written this book for one reason, and it was to represent all of the injustices and unnecessary suffering. Johnson argues that everyone is apart of the problem of injustice as nobody will ever be the same and everyone has their own faiths and beliefs. His book argues that if we uses our differences we will be able to take the injustice we caused and work with it to create a better framework with less injustice for ourselves and our peers. In his Introduction, Johnson states " As a white, male, heterosexual , middle-class professional , I know about such feelings from my own life. But as a sociologist , I also know that it's possible to understand the world and myself in relation to it in ways that get past the defensive feelings and give us all a common ground from wh...

 Hi welcome to my FNED 246 Blog! My name is Michelina Irons, I am currently a sophomore at Rhode Island college. I am a secondary education major with a focus on history. My hobbies include reading, spending time with my friends and family, taking care of animals, and learning about History. I have two dogs at home, and I have about 60 fish in a man made koi pond my dad and I built over the summer. I found a passion for history when I was in middle school and learned about the history of my family involving World War II and Immigrating to America after the war. Becoming a teacher is extremely important to me as it is a job that requires patience, knowledge, and being a caring individual, and in some situations schools struggle to find individuals who hold these qualities, which reflects on the students.