I wasn't going to write about it. "It" being Bill 115 (subtitled "Putting Students First"), passed by the recently-prorogued Ontario legislature, a bill that imposes an austerity contract on a majority of the province's 115, 000 teachers, cutting their sick days in half and removing (for the duration of the contract) their right to strike. I wasn't going to write about it, not only because it's an incendiary topic for parents and teachers alike, one that is best approached with the kind of care and nuance I wasn't sure I could muster, but also because, as my reader(s) may have noticed, I've taken a break from blogging to work on other projects.
But, then, the other day a tweet came through my stream that read something like this: "10-yr-old DD has started a petition to protest against lack of extra-curriculars. I'm so proud of her!"
This tweet (a paraphrase) epitomizes the position that has dominated the discussion of the Bill among parents since union leaders invited teachers to protest against the province's imposition of a contract by declining to supervise extra-curricular activities. Despite the fact that, by the terms of teacher contracts, participation in extra-curriculars is voluntary, parents and kids have been vocal in their denunciation of this action. Many have made the point that kids should not be used as pawns in the conflict between the province and teachers. Columnists and pundits have jumped on the bandwagon, bemoaning the lack of extra-curriculars and, more recently, condemning the suggestion from unions that teachers further express their displeasure with the imposed contract by restricting their comments on the November progress reports to one sentence. What one hears most often in the discussions about the current impasse between the government and the teachers is the sage-sounding admonishment to everyone involved to take a deep breath and remember: it's all about the children.
But -- and this is why I've decided to end my silence, because someone has to say it -- IT'S NOT ALL ABOUT THE CHILDREN. In a democracy, an education system is "about" everyone. It concerns and affects young and old, parents and non-parents, teachers and kids. It seems simple enough, but it bears emphasizing: the stakeholders of a society's education system are all of us. Without an educated population, we not only have no workers to pay taxes and support the young and old but, more importantly, we lack an informed citizenry to protect and expand our democratic institutions and ideals. Without a well-paid, well-respected teaching body, the education system simply does not -- cannot -- exist. So instead of patting our kids on the back when they decide to protest the lack of their favourite extra-curricular (which, we might remind them, is called "extra" for a reason), or stepping in to run the activities ourselves, we should be taking the opportunity to shift the focus from "me to we," and teach kids something about the role of education in a democracy.
One way to approach such a lesson might be to talk about the context in which this labour dispute is occurring. I believe that it's incumbent upon parents -- regardless of where they stand on the political spectrum -- to supply this context, for the simple reason that teachers are unable to broach the topic lest they be accused of partisanship. We could begin by talking about how the current labour situation in Ontario fits into the larger picture of recent educational trends in North America: namely, the "reform movement," with its emphasis on boosting "achievement" through increased standardized testing and "accountability." We could talk about how within such a picture, teachers are often painted as part of the problem -- as scapegoats (a term worth discussing) for the socio-political problems of poverty and the chronic underfunding of education -- rather than as a crucial part of the solution. We could then back up and broaden the focus to help kids situate Bill 115 within the context of labour history. We could talk about how ordinary people, working in disparate sectors of the Canadian economy have fought hard for the freedom to strike and the right to engage in collective bargaining with their employers. We could talk about how the federal government has infringed on these rights in recent years by imposing back-to-work legislation in such sectors as transportation and the civil service (e.g., postal workers). We could then bring the discussion back to the current situation in Ontario, specifically to Bill 115, taking care to point out that, as an Act that imposes a contract upon a majority of teachers in the province, it has removed a right -- the right of unions to negotiate the terms of employment -- that most people, regardless of their political persuasion, regard as a cornerstone of modern democratic economies. In addition, we should stress that since the Act proscribes striking or working-to-rule, minor actions such as declining to supervise sports teams and clubs, are among the few avenues for protest left open to teachers.
One could go into a lot more detail and make the discussion far more interesting by bringing up salient events in Canadian history, such as the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919 or the Windsor Strike of 1945, the latter of which led to greater acceptance of unions and collective bargaining (see Rand Formula). But the exact content of the context-supplying conversation we have with our kids is not as important as is the simple fact of having it. If, afterwards, they decide that they still want to protest against missing extracurriculars or report card comments, then so be it and more power to them. At least they will be acting from a position of knowledge, which is all we can expect of kids -- or citizens of any age -- in a democracy.
Showing posts with label children and politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label children and politics. Show all posts
Monday, October 29, 2012
Saturday, March 3, 2012
Hell Yes, We'll Write Chants: Social Justice in Schools
Recently an article appeared in the National Post giving voice to the complaints of a couple of parents whose kids attend Glenview Senior Public School, a middle school located in an area of North Toronto — Lytton Park — that happens to be home to more than a handful of one percenters.
The controversy (though one wonders if the complaints of two anonymous parents a controversy make) stems from an assignment in which students were asked to come up with a slogan for the Occupy Toronto movement. According to the article, a father was irritated when his daughter told him about the project, and particularly when she reassured him: "[T]his is about the 1% — this isn’t about you — it is about the billionaires and the millionaires that don’t pay any taxes." Oops. Odds are high that, unbeknownst to the poor "indoctrinated" seventh-grader, it was about her dad. The father called the school to complain. The Post article quotes one other disgruntled father:
But details of this particular assignment aside, the question of the place of social justice in the curricula of public schools is an important one; in fact it's a question which goes to the very heart of the nature and purpose of education in a democracy. If education is meant to serve as a means to replicate the status quo — through the production of obedient workers in what used to be called the "military industrial complex," now more commonly referred to as the "global economy"— then issues of social justice should either not be raised at all or should be raised in a manner which does not seriously affect the class-based belief system children absorb from their parents. The classic way to raise political issues in this harmless way — the method preferred by public schools in previous eras and by many private schools today — is through the formal debate. In a debate, students use their "critical thinking skills" to argue whatever position they are handed, regardless of their opinion about the topic or the merits of the position in question. The mock debate is an example of what might be called a pedagogy of disengagement: it allows schools to teach about current issues, both political and ethical, without invoking either ethics or political feeling.
There is something to be said for such an approach (see Selley's article), insofar as it eschews any kind of overt indoctrination of children. But there are both practical and theoretical problems with it. In the first place, it assumes that the issues being debated are inherently neutral — i.e., that there is no consensus regarding the morality of particular political positions or attitudes towards past events. Yet clearly no such neutrality exists. For instance, no school would have students debate the existence of the Holocaust or the benefits of slavery. There are of course events and issues on which current opinion is still divided — and the banking crisis may well be one of them — but even in such cases, the disengaged approach can be problematic. For example, asking a child whose family has lost its home due to the sub-prime mortgage fiasco to assume the banker's position in a debate may not be ethically defensible. Pedagogically, it could prove counter-productive as well, if the child is encouraged to weigh the evidence and use his or her "critical thinking skills" to decide on a position, but is then told he or she must argue the opposite.
A deeper problem with the debate method — and the "transmission model" of education that it exemplifies — is that while it overtly eschews indoctrination, it brings it in through the back door. Its very structure teaches kids that a disengaged intellectual approach to issues of social justice is both possible and preferable. It is, in other words, an approach to teaching that, like all pedagogies, embodies a political position, however unwittingly.
In that respect, it is not so different from the critical pedagogy being practiced in many public schools throughout Canada, and of which the slogan assignment at Glenview middle school is an example. Critical pedagogy is informed by the Frankfurt School of Critical theory, as well as by educational thinkers and activists such Paulo Freire and Henry Giroux. It is essentially an activist pedagogy which assumes that the role of education is not to reproduce the status quo, but to produce informed citizens (as opposed to workers or consumers) who can question the society in which they live and possibly change it for the better. What it shares with the transmission model of education is an aversion to overt indoctrination:
Hence, in the slogan assignment, the importance of allowing the children to choose a cause. The assignment assumes engagement and interest on the child's part, but it allows for choice as to where this incipient political energy is directed. Although I believe this to be a more honest way of grappling with the teaching of social justice, the approach is not, in my opinion, without its own problems and contradictions. One practical problem is that there is no official "social justice" school subject and, as a result, topics such as the Occupy movement, or child labour must be raised in time slotted for other subjects. Social studies is the most logical place to raise such issues, but in Ontario (and other provinces) the social studies curriculum has been stripped of most non-Canadian content (history and geography), which limits the topics that can be addressed. As a result, you see social justice projects being injected awkwardly into subjects like English or "digital immersion," and you have backlashes from parents who believe such an emphasis either detracts from the teaching of "the basics," or is being imposed artificially on a structurally neutral curriculum.
This practical problem reveals a deeper theoretical problem with the critical pedagogy espoused by many front line educators: the system within which teachers teach about social justice is not inherently activist or even progressive. Concepts from critical pedagogical theory have trickled down from universities (such as OISE in Ontario) and teachers colleges, but the educational system in which they have landed remains essentially undemocratic. The crucial paradox here is that you have social justice being "taught" to students in schools whose hidden curriculum — the emphasis on rules, compliance, and authority-pleasing "achievement" — is deeply conservative, in the most literal sense of the term.
I have written about the hidden curriculum elsewhere, so will not discuss it in depth here. It suffices to point out that it is in no danger of being overturned or destroyed by a few lessons about Occupy movements. In fact the 21st-century hidden curriculum, which serves to inculcate in students behaviours and thought processes befitting their future role as workers in the global economy, is supported quite overtly by broader educational trends and practices, such as the recent focus on standardized testing, character education, time management, and mastery of technology.
So Lytton Park parents can relax. Their offspring may be writing slogans for the 99% but, in the end, schools like Glenview will help these kids end up where many of them started: comfortably ensconced in the 1%.
* From Critical Pedagogy Primer, by Joe L. Kincheloe
The controversy (though one wonders if the complaints of two anonymous parents a controversy make) stems from an assignment in which students were asked to come up with a slogan for the Occupy Toronto movement. According to the article, a father was irritated when his daughter told him about the project, and particularly when she reassured him: "[T]his is about the 1% — this isn’t about you — it is about the billionaires and the millionaires that don’t pay any taxes." Oops. Odds are high that, unbeknownst to the poor "indoctrinated" seventh-grader, it was about her dad. The father called the school to complain. The Post article quotes one other disgruntled father:
People will say, well, it is important to stay current so that the kids understand what is on the news. But I say that is my job, sitting at home, as a father — to talk to my kids.Chris Selley has written a well-argued response to this familiar complaint (which is often raised about another parental bugaboo, sex ed), so I won't address it here. As the parent of two kids in Grade 7 who've been given comparable assignments, I have a different point to make. But first I feel should set the record straight: I have it on good authority that the "media literacy" assignment in question was not as simple or clear cut as the Post article makes out. According to my "sources," kids were divided into groups and allowed to choose a "cause" for which to come up with a slogan. One group chose animal welfare; another chose the rather generic cause of human rights.
But details of this particular assignment aside, the question of the place of social justice in the curricula of public schools is an important one; in fact it's a question which goes to the very heart of the nature and purpose of education in a democracy. If education is meant to serve as a means to replicate the status quo — through the production of obedient workers in what used to be called the "military industrial complex," now more commonly referred to as the "global economy"— then issues of social justice should either not be raised at all or should be raised in a manner which does not seriously affect the class-based belief system children absorb from their parents. The classic way to raise political issues in this harmless way — the method preferred by public schools in previous eras and by many private schools today — is through the formal debate. In a debate, students use their "critical thinking skills" to argue whatever position they are handed, regardless of their opinion about the topic or the merits of the position in question. The mock debate is an example of what might be called a pedagogy of disengagement: it allows schools to teach about current issues, both political and ethical, without invoking either ethics or political feeling.
There is something to be said for such an approach (see Selley's article), insofar as it eschews any kind of overt indoctrination of children. But there are both practical and theoretical problems with it. In the first place, it assumes that the issues being debated are inherently neutral — i.e., that there is no consensus regarding the morality of particular political positions or attitudes towards past events. Yet clearly no such neutrality exists. For instance, no school would have students debate the existence of the Holocaust or the benefits of slavery. There are of course events and issues on which current opinion is still divided — and the banking crisis may well be one of them — but even in such cases, the disengaged approach can be problematic. For example, asking a child whose family has lost its home due to the sub-prime mortgage fiasco to assume the banker's position in a debate may not be ethically defensible. Pedagogically, it could prove counter-productive as well, if the child is encouraged to weigh the evidence and use his or her "critical thinking skills" to decide on a position, but is then told he or she must argue the opposite.
A deeper problem with the debate method — and the "transmission model" of education that it exemplifies — is that while it overtly eschews indoctrination, it brings it in through the back door. Its very structure teaches kids that a disengaged intellectual approach to issues of social justice is both possible and preferable. It is, in other words, an approach to teaching that, like all pedagogies, embodies a political position, however unwittingly.
In that respect, it is not so different from the critical pedagogy being practiced in many public schools throughout Canada, and of which the slogan assignment at Glenview middle school is an example. Critical pedagogy is informed by the Frankfurt School of Critical theory, as well as by educational thinkers and activists such Paulo Freire and Henry Giroux. It is essentially an activist pedagogy which assumes that the role of education is not to reproduce the status quo, but to produce informed citizens (as opposed to workers or consumers) who can question the society in which they live and possibly change it for the better. What it shares with the transmission model of education is an aversion to overt indoctrination:
Advocates of critical pedagogy make their own commitments clear as they construct forms of teaching consistent with the democratic notion that students learn to make their own choices of beliefs based on the diverse perspectives they confront in school and society. Education simply can't be neutral . . . . Recognition of these educational politics suggests that teachers take a position and make it understandable to their students. They do not, however, have the right to impose these positions on their students. This is a central tenet of critical pedagogy. *
Hence, in the slogan assignment, the importance of allowing the children to choose a cause. The assignment assumes engagement and interest on the child's part, but it allows for choice as to where this incipient political energy is directed. Although I believe this to be a more honest way of grappling with the teaching of social justice, the approach is not, in my opinion, without its own problems and contradictions. One practical problem is that there is no official "social justice" school subject and, as a result, topics such as the Occupy movement, or child labour must be raised in time slotted for other subjects. Social studies is the most logical place to raise such issues, but in Ontario (and other provinces) the social studies curriculum has been stripped of most non-Canadian content (history and geography), which limits the topics that can be addressed. As a result, you see social justice projects being injected awkwardly into subjects like English or "digital immersion," and you have backlashes from parents who believe such an emphasis either detracts from the teaching of "the basics," or is being imposed artificially on a structurally neutral curriculum.
This practical problem reveals a deeper theoretical problem with the critical pedagogy espoused by many front line educators: the system within which teachers teach about social justice is not inherently activist or even progressive. Concepts from critical pedagogical theory have trickled down from universities (such as OISE in Ontario) and teachers colleges, but the educational system in which they have landed remains essentially undemocratic. The crucial paradox here is that you have social justice being "taught" to students in schools whose hidden curriculum — the emphasis on rules, compliance, and authority-pleasing "achievement" — is deeply conservative, in the most literal sense of the term.
I have written about the hidden curriculum elsewhere, so will not discuss it in depth here. It suffices to point out that it is in no danger of being overturned or destroyed by a few lessons about Occupy movements. In fact the 21st-century hidden curriculum, which serves to inculcate in students behaviours and thought processes befitting their future role as workers in the global economy, is supported quite overtly by broader educational trends and practices, such as the recent focus on standardized testing, character education, time management, and mastery of technology.
So Lytton Park parents can relax. Their offspring may be writing slogans for the 99% but, in the end, schools like Glenview will help these kids end up where many of them started: comfortably ensconced in the 1%.
* From Critical Pedagogy Primer, by Joe L. Kincheloe
Monday, May 16, 2011
The New F Word and Kids
Recently, I watched an episode of TVO's The Agenda with Steve Paikin on my computer. The episode was called "The New 'F' Word," and I had missed it when it first aired in January 2011, despite the fact that a good friend of mine, Charlie Keil, a professor of Cinema Studies at the University of Toronto, was one of Paikin's guests on that occasion. The hour-long show consisted of a discussion of the recent decision by the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council to ban the Dire Straits song "Money For Nothing" from Canadian airwaves because of its repeated use of the anti-gay slur "faggot."
I was twenty minutes into the show when my 11-year-old daughter, J, walked into the room. Although she did not stay long, I am pleased that she walked in when she did, and saw the show's title displayed across the screen. The ensuing discussion—which occurred while I paused the show, and which I have transcribed below—served as a unplanned continuation of a conversation that began when she was quite young. (See here.) I'm not a big fan of the phrase "teachable moment," but I do believe this was one.
I was twenty minutes into the show when my 11-year-old daughter, J, walked into the room. Although she did not stay long, I am pleased that she walked in when she did, and saw the show's title displayed across the screen. The ensuing discussion—which occurred while I paused the show, and which I have transcribed below—served as a unplanned continuation of a conversation that began when she was quite young. (See here.) I'm not a big fan of the phrase "teachable moment," but I do believe this was one.
J: Hey, what's Charlie doing on there?
Me: He's a guest on the show.
J: "The New 'F' Word"? What's that? Charlie won't even say the old F word. [She's right! This is revealed near the end of the show, starting at 46:25.]
Me: The new F word is "faggot." It's a pejorative term for "gay." Have you heard it?
J: No. Why are they talking about it?
Me: Because a song containing the word has been banned from being played on the radio.
J: Good.
Me: But it's complicated. In the song, the word is used satirically. Do you want to listen to the song?
J: Okay. [I find the the original version of "Money for Nothing" on YouTube and play it for her.]
Me: So you see, the person saying the word in the song is a character. He doesn't represent the singer's views.
J: I still think he shouldn't say it. But I guess it's like in a story when there's a character you're not suppose to like, who says nasty things.
Me: Yes.
J: Or like in Billy Elliot, when the miners say the old F word because that's the way they would talk in real life. [J and her twin sister have said they do not want to see the stage version of Billy Eliot because of the swearing.]
Me: Sort of. But it's a bit different because the old F word isn't directed at a specific group. The new F word is worse because it targets gays.
J: Yes, but I still don't want to hear either the old or the new F word.
Me: But do you understand why some people might object to the new F word being banned?
J: Sort of. But if it upsets people to hear it, maybe it should be banned.
Me: But, J, in art—in songs or stories or plays—you have to be able to critique ideas or words, and to do that you have to be able to say them. When they're used in that context they're not necessarily hurtful.
J: Maybe you just think they're not hurtful when they're used that way because you're not gay.
Me: Maybe.
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Elections and Kids: Desperate Times
The first election I remember clearly was the federal election of 1972, in which Robert Stanfield ran as leader of the Progressive Conservatives against Pierre Trudeau. The reason I remember that political race in particular, has to do with my best friend Ann. I adored Ann and her family. Her father was an executive at Coca-Cola Canada, her mother a kindhearted former kindergarten teacher, and their airy suburban side-split (a literal mirror image of ours) overflowed with beautiful, happy children. Ann's parents seemed to be more particular about certain things than mine. For instance, they cared about brands. They drank Coke, never Pepsi (although after Ann's father transferred to Pepsi, this allegiance abruptly switched, something that puzzled me somewhat); they ate Kraft peanut butter, and Kraft macaroni and cheese. Store labels were not acceptable substitutes. Store brands were acceptable to my parents, and I complained about this state of affairs to my mother. She tried to explain that the products themselves were mostly the same, so it didn't really matter, but this explanation struck me as feeble. My parents clearly didn't understand the world the way Ann's family did.
Another brand Ann's family liked was the Progressive Conservative brand. Pierre Trudeau was anathema to her family, as he was to many of of our neighbours. The sign on Ann's front lawn was oversized—and blue. I spent a lot of time with Ann's family during that election; I spent a lot of time with them in general. I fantasized about being part of their perfect family, although I was fond of my own less perfect version as well. So that June, I practically lived with Ann, which meant I spent a considerable amount of time riding around in her parents' station wagon, as her mother and father carried out their chores. I remember one day in particular when Ann, her younger sister and I were being driven around our neighbourhood by Ann's father. I don't recall how it started, but the three of us, sitting happily seatbelt-less in the back of the car, windows wide open and a warm wind whipping our hair, began to cheer every time we passed a Conservative sign, and boo when we passed a Liberal sign. (In our suburb, NDP signs were conspicuous by their absence.) Ann's father chuckled and smiled at us as we did this, and I remember the whole outing being a lot of fun.
That evening at the dinner table I told my parents what we had done. My father laughed; he said nothing. It wasn't until years later that I discovered my parents had never voted Conservative in their lives. My mother supported the NDP and my father was a Liberal, who occasionally voted NDP. Yet at the time, they felt no need to tell me this. They seemed unperturbed by my unbridled enthusiasm for Robert Stanfield and the Progressive Conservatives.
Fast forward almost 40 years. My 11-yr-old twin daughters are in the car with my husband and me. We're driving around our neighbourhood during a spring election, and my daughters are noting the preponderance of Conservative signs. We pass a Liberal sign and the girls begin to cheer. From that point on, they cheer every time we pass a Liberal sign. (In our suburb-in-the-city, NDP signs are conspicuous by their absence.) Sitting in the front seat listening to them, I realize that we have become Ann's family—a family in which children are initiated at a young age into the world of partisan politics. I begin to think about how this situation came about, especially in light of what I thought were my beliefs about children, politics and indoctrination. (See here, for instance.) For the truth is, in retrospect, I admire my parents' restraint. I respect them for refusing to tell us what to think politically, for allowing us to mature, and figure out for ourselves where we stood on serious issues.
In the family that my husband and I have created, things are different. At the dinner table one evening not long ago, one of my daughters asked what the Conservative Party of Canada stood for. My husband answered flippantly, "They stand for the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer." My daughter seemed a bit shocked so I added, "That's not how they would describe what they stand for," and I proceeded to try to explain the CPC in a manner more in keeping with how a supporter might explain it. I talked about how some people believe the role of government is to tax citizens who can afford to be taxed so as to provide services and programs to all people, but especially to those who would not be able to afford such services otherwise. I went on to explain that other politicians believe government should be as small as possible, and that taxes should be low, so people can decide for themselves what to to with their money. That was as much fair-mindedness as I could muster, and I couldn't help but add that the problem with the latter approach is that it disproportionally favours the rich.
So why have I chosen not to exercise the same degree of restraint during this election that my parents exercised effortlessly throughout every election that occurred during my childhood?
The answer is complicated. My mother and father were quite possibly more mature in their parental role than my husband and I. Or perhaps they were simply less willing to talk openly to their children about politics and other sensitive issues. But I believe there's more to it than that. The political landscape in Canada has changed drastically in the last four decades, but most noticeably in the last decade. In 1972, there was a consensus among the major political parties about what Canada could or should be. It was not a well-defined consensus, but I believe it stemmed from and incorporated Trudeau's notion of a Just Society, which I interpret to mean a society interested (at least in theory) in providing a decent quality of life for all its members. Am I indulging in pure nostalgia here? Possibly. But the fact is, "red Tories" like Stanfield—and at the provincial level, Bill Davis—would be considered liberals by today's standards. So my parents had no real reason to fear a Progressive Conservative government. But in the wake of the merger between the Canadian Alliance (successor to the far right Reform Party) and the Progressive Conservatives in 2003—which brought into being the Conservative Party of Canada—conservatism has taken on an entirely different cast. I do fear another Conservative government—with reason, I believe. Though he has never managed to achieve a majority in Parliament, Stephen Harper has attempted to remake Canada in the image of the worst elements of American Republicanism. He has used loopholes in parliamentary law to perpetrate innumerable abuses of power and to subvert the democratic process. He has prorogued Parliament on two occasions: once in 2008, while facing a confidence vote in the House of Commons (and the perfectly legal prospect of an opposition coalition forming the government), and again in 2010, to avoid handing over disturbing information regarding the Afghan detainee file to the House of Commons. In March of this year, his government, having refused to furnish adequate budget information regarding its plan to build new prisons, was found in contempt of Parliament, a first for Canada, and indeed for any Commonwealth country. (For a full list of Harper's abuses of power, see here.) Currently, Harper is running for re-election on an strikingly Bushian platform of sustained tax breaks for corporations and their wealthy shareholders, increased military spending, and a promise to build shiny new prisons, even though the crime rate in Canada is down.
So perhaps we can be forgiven for being a little more forthright with our children about the current political scene in Canada. The truth is, as a parent, I'm afraid: afraid that should Harper achieve his majority, the Canada I knew as a child—a Canada which my parents and Ann's took for granted, one which poured money into schools, health care, and social programs, and taxed its citizens progressively in order to do so—will cease to exist as my children grow into adults. Perhaps, in other words, desperate times call for desperate parenting.
Another brand Ann's family liked was the Progressive Conservative brand. Pierre Trudeau was anathema to her family, as he was to many of of our neighbours. The sign on Ann's front lawn was oversized—and blue. I spent a lot of time with Ann's family during that election; I spent a lot of time with them in general. I fantasized about being part of their perfect family, although I was fond of my own less perfect version as well. So that June, I practically lived with Ann, which meant I spent a considerable amount of time riding around in her parents' station wagon, as her mother and father carried out their chores. I remember one day in particular when Ann, her younger sister and I were being driven around our neighbourhood by Ann's father. I don't recall how it started, but the three of us, sitting happily seatbelt-less in the back of the car, windows wide open and a warm wind whipping our hair, began to cheer every time we passed a Conservative sign, and boo when we passed a Liberal sign. (In our suburb, NDP signs were conspicuous by their absence.) Ann's father chuckled and smiled at us as we did this, and I remember the whole outing being a lot of fun.
That evening at the dinner table I told my parents what we had done. My father laughed; he said nothing. It wasn't until years later that I discovered my parents had never voted Conservative in their lives. My mother supported the NDP and my father was a Liberal, who occasionally voted NDP. Yet at the time, they felt no need to tell me this. They seemed unperturbed by my unbridled enthusiasm for Robert Stanfield and the Progressive Conservatives.
Fast forward almost 40 years. My 11-yr-old twin daughters are in the car with my husband and me. We're driving around our neighbourhood during a spring election, and my daughters are noting the preponderance of Conservative signs. We pass a Liberal sign and the girls begin to cheer. From that point on, they cheer every time we pass a Liberal sign. (In our suburb-in-the-city, NDP signs are conspicuous by their absence.) Sitting in the front seat listening to them, I realize that we have become Ann's family—a family in which children are initiated at a young age into the world of partisan politics. I begin to think about how this situation came about, especially in light of what I thought were my beliefs about children, politics and indoctrination. (See here, for instance.) For the truth is, in retrospect, I admire my parents' restraint. I respect them for refusing to tell us what to think politically, for allowing us to mature, and figure out for ourselves where we stood on serious issues.
In the family that my husband and I have created, things are different. At the dinner table one evening not long ago, one of my daughters asked what the Conservative Party of Canada stood for. My husband answered flippantly, "They stand for the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer." My daughter seemed a bit shocked so I added, "That's not how they would describe what they stand for," and I proceeded to try to explain the CPC in a manner more in keeping with how a supporter might explain it. I talked about how some people believe the role of government is to tax citizens who can afford to be taxed so as to provide services and programs to all people, but especially to those who would not be able to afford such services otherwise. I went on to explain that other politicians believe government should be as small as possible, and that taxes should be low, so people can decide for themselves what to to with their money. That was as much fair-mindedness as I could muster, and I couldn't help but add that the problem with the latter approach is that it disproportionally favours the rich.
So why have I chosen not to exercise the same degree of restraint during this election that my parents exercised effortlessly throughout every election that occurred during my childhood?
The answer is complicated. My mother and father were quite possibly more mature in their parental role than my husband and I. Or perhaps they were simply less willing to talk openly to their children about politics and other sensitive issues. But I believe there's more to it than that. The political landscape in Canada has changed drastically in the last four decades, but most noticeably in the last decade. In 1972, there was a consensus among the major political parties about what Canada could or should be. It was not a well-defined consensus, but I believe it stemmed from and incorporated Trudeau's notion of a Just Society, which I interpret to mean a society interested (at least in theory) in providing a decent quality of life for all its members. Am I indulging in pure nostalgia here? Possibly. But the fact is, "red Tories" like Stanfield—and at the provincial level, Bill Davis—would be considered liberals by today's standards. So my parents had no real reason to fear a Progressive Conservative government. But in the wake of the merger between the Canadian Alliance (successor to the far right Reform Party) and the Progressive Conservatives in 2003—which brought into being the Conservative Party of Canada—conservatism has taken on an entirely different cast. I do fear another Conservative government—with reason, I believe. Though he has never managed to achieve a majority in Parliament, Stephen Harper has attempted to remake Canada in the image of the worst elements of American Republicanism. He has used loopholes in parliamentary law to perpetrate innumerable abuses of power and to subvert the democratic process. He has prorogued Parliament on two occasions: once in 2008, while facing a confidence vote in the House of Commons (and the perfectly legal prospect of an opposition coalition forming the government), and again in 2010, to avoid handing over disturbing information regarding the Afghan detainee file to the House of Commons. In March of this year, his government, having refused to furnish adequate budget information regarding its plan to build new prisons, was found in contempt of Parliament, a first for Canada, and indeed for any Commonwealth country. (For a full list of Harper's abuses of power, see here.) Currently, Harper is running for re-election on an strikingly Bushian platform of sustained tax breaks for corporations and their wealthy shareholders, increased military spending, and a promise to build shiny new prisons, even though the crime rate in Canada is down.
So perhaps we can be forgiven for being a little more forthright with our children about the current political scene in Canada. The truth is, as a parent, I'm afraid: afraid that should Harper achieve his majority, the Canada I knew as a child—a Canada which my parents and Ann's took for granted, one which poured money into schools, health care, and social programs, and taxed its citizens progressively in order to do so—will cease to exist as my children grow into adults. Perhaps, in other words, desperate times call for desperate parenting.
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Reflections on Remembrance Day and Kids
Over on PhD in Parenting there is a post entitled "More than 2 minutes of silence" about innovative ways to commemorate Remembrance Day with children. Below is the comment I submitted in response to this post:
I’m very conflicted about how to celebrate Remembrance Day with my kids. They have great-great uncles who fought in WWI; one of them was blinded in the trenches and came back to Canada to help found the CNIB. However, I feel that Remembrance Day has become politicized in ways that rub me the wrong way. For instance, instead of being about remembering the war dead, it’s often talked about in terms of men and women who gave their lives in the name of “freedom.” But many wars have nothing to do with freedom (WWI is arguably one of them, Afghanistan another), and everything to do with a political system that still believes it is OK to send men and women off to kill and be killed. We tell our children to use their words, yet our politicians continue to countenance the use of guns to resolve conflicts.
I guess I'm trying to say that, for me, what is lacking in Remembrance Day ceremonies is an emphasis on peace. So this November 11 I took the opportunity to tell my children about the interesting history of the white poppy, and how there are people who are trying to prevent it from being made available as an alternative—or a complement—to the red poppy. And how, ironically, these are the same people who talk about the value of fighting for “freedom.”
I’m very conflicted about how to celebrate Remembrance Day with my kids. They have great-great uncles who fought in WWI; one of them was blinded in the trenches and came back to Canada to help found the CNIB. However, I feel that Remembrance Day has become politicized in ways that rub me the wrong way. For instance, instead of being about remembering the war dead, it’s often talked about in terms of men and women who gave their lives in the name of “freedom.” But many wars have nothing to do with freedom (WWI is arguably one of them, Afghanistan another), and everything to do with a political system that still believes it is OK to send men and women off to kill and be killed. We tell our children to use their words, yet our politicians continue to countenance the use of guns to resolve conflicts.
I guess I'm trying to say that, for me, what is lacking in Remembrance Day ceremonies is an emphasis on peace. So this November 11 I took the opportunity to tell my children about the interesting history of the white poppy, and how there are people who are trying to prevent it from being made available as an alternative—or a complement—to the red poppy. And how, ironically, these are the same people who talk about the value of fighting for “freedom.”
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Back to Jail—Ugh!
Between the ages of eight and eleven I kept a diary. Although I like to think I was a fairly imaginative kid, my diary entries are strikingly unimaginative and repetitive. But they are interesting to me nonetheless for one reason: every weekday entry during the school year started this way: "I went to jail, ugh." Throughout the entire course of the diary I never referred to school by any other term. The reason this interests—or rather confuses me—is that I didn't actually dislike school. I didn't love it, I may have been a little bored, but I had several good school friends, and I was comfortable there. My elementary school, and even my middle school were second homes to me. I do not remember experiencing them as places of stress or undue misery.
As I prepare to send my own daughters back to school, I've been reflecting on what a difference two or three decades makes. My daughters are in the throes of back-to-school dread, and for good reason: to them school does indeed feel like a sort of prison. Despite the "progressive," child-centered rhetoric of the last thirty years—rhetoric that is especially prominent in school boards such ours (Toronto District School Board), which pride themselves on their forward-thinking approach to education—I would argue that schools have become more repressive, more prison-like than when I was a kid. Take lockdown drills, for instance, which every school in the TDSB is required to conduct twice yearly. This is a practice that originated in prisons as a means of containing riots by controlling the movement of the inmates; its adoption by school boards throughout North America is justified by citing hypothetical threats to "security." When my children were subjected to their first mock "lockdown" in grade 2, they were traumatized, their minds filled for days with images of potentially violent intruders skulking around the schoolyard or wandering down hallways. Around the same time, the school implemented new anti-bullying policies and procedures, the literature for which was full of references to "safe" schools. Could the administrators not see a contradiction between the two policies? How is subjecting children as young as four to lockdown drills conducive to creating a psychologically "safe" space? Have school boards ever performed a cost benefit analysis of the practice in terms of psychological harm versus physical security? (When kids get to high school, the "lockdown" effect is in many cases compounded by the presence of armed police officers enforcing "zero tolerance" policies. But that is a subject for another post.)
Today's schools are punitive and authoritarian in a subtler but arguably more harmful manner as well. Without much debate or any overt change in policy, schools have begun in recent years to exert more and more control over children in the most basic, bodily of ways. In the playground there are rules against running, against using the playground equipment in an unapproved manner, against play fighting or roughhousing of any kind. Within the school and classroom, access to the bathroom is even restricted. If a child asks to go to the toilet before or after recess, his or her request is likely to be denied. I witnessed this policy being enacted in a junior kindergarten class a few years ago while I was volunteering in the school library. A junior kindergartner (i.e., a four-year-old child!) had the audacity to ask the teacher if he could go to the bathroom soon after recess. I didn't hear everything the teacher said in response, but I did hear her when she began to yell loudly at the child who was slinking down the aisle toward the nearest bathroom, "No, it's not okay. You know you're supposed to go at recess. You know the rules. It's not okay!" When Michel Foucault wrote about the ways in which the state exerts it power at the micro level, including at the level of the human body, he probably did not have this scenario in mind. But for me, it is a perfect example of the early "disciplining and punishment" of the human soul.
A few more anecdotes to drive home the point, especially the under-acknowledged fact that schools have become more, not less, authoritarian in recent years:
My older brother recently told me that when he was in elementary school—this would have been in the late sixties—a teacher berated him in a manner that he felt was uncalled for and unfair. My brother's response? He simply left the school and walked home at recess. The school called my mother, who actually defended him!
Fast forward forty some-odd years. I picked my daughter up from school one day in fourth grade and upon seeing me, she immediately burst into tears. She'd been feeling physically ill for the final half hour or so of school, and upon arriving home she promptly threw up and took to her bed. I later asked her why she hadn't told the teacher she needed to call home. "It was close to dismissal time," she explained. "The teacher would have said I had to wait."
On another occasion, my daughter had a total breakdown after she accidentally dented her trombone. Even though my daughter considered the band instructor to be one of the "nice" teachers, she claimed he was nonetheless going to "murder" her for denting the instrument. I have rarely seen her so distraught. She cried for one hour straight, repeating over and over again "he's going to kill me." I asked her why she couldn't just tell him the truth: that someone had accidentally bumped into her and the trombone got dented. She looked at me as if I were stupid and said, "I can't just say that, because he's an adult and I'm not, and teachers don't believe kids." I went into the school the next day and talked to the teacher, who nonchalantly told me he'd send the trombone out to be repaired. He even provided another trombone for my daughter to use in the meantime. But I was left wondering whether he would have responded as casually had my daughter actually done the explaining herself. What is it about him, I wondered, or more generally, what is it about school that makes my daughter feel so utterly dis-empowered as a human being?
This, I believe, is the kind of question we, as parents and as citizens who pay for public education, need to be asking not just about specific schools, but about the current culture of public school in general.
As I prepare to send my own daughters back to school, I've been reflecting on what a difference two or three decades makes. My daughters are in the throes of back-to-school dread, and for good reason: to them school does indeed feel like a sort of prison. Despite the "progressive," child-centered rhetoric of the last thirty years—rhetoric that is especially prominent in school boards such ours (Toronto District School Board), which pride themselves on their forward-thinking approach to education—I would argue that schools have become more repressive, more prison-like than when I was a kid. Take lockdown drills, for instance, which every school in the TDSB is required to conduct twice yearly. This is a practice that originated in prisons as a means of containing riots by controlling the movement of the inmates; its adoption by school boards throughout North America is justified by citing hypothetical threats to "security." When my children were subjected to their first mock "lockdown" in grade 2, they were traumatized, their minds filled for days with images of potentially violent intruders skulking around the schoolyard or wandering down hallways. Around the same time, the school implemented new anti-bullying policies and procedures, the literature for which was full of references to "safe" schools. Could the administrators not see a contradiction between the two policies? How is subjecting children as young as four to lockdown drills conducive to creating a psychologically "safe" space? Have school boards ever performed a cost benefit analysis of the practice in terms of psychological harm versus physical security? (When kids get to high school, the "lockdown" effect is in many cases compounded by the presence of armed police officers enforcing "zero tolerance" policies. But that is a subject for another post.)
Today's schools are punitive and authoritarian in a subtler but arguably more harmful manner as well. Without much debate or any overt change in policy, schools have begun in recent years to exert more and more control over children in the most basic, bodily of ways. In the playground there are rules against running, against using the playground equipment in an unapproved manner, against play fighting or roughhousing of any kind. Within the school and classroom, access to the bathroom is even restricted. If a child asks to go to the toilet before or after recess, his or her request is likely to be denied. I witnessed this policy being enacted in a junior kindergarten class a few years ago while I was volunteering in the school library. A junior kindergartner (i.e., a four-year-old child!) had the audacity to ask the teacher if he could go to the bathroom soon after recess. I didn't hear everything the teacher said in response, but I did hear her when she began to yell loudly at the child who was slinking down the aisle toward the nearest bathroom, "No, it's not okay. You know you're supposed to go at recess. You know the rules. It's not okay!" When Michel Foucault wrote about the ways in which the state exerts it power at the micro level, including at the level of the human body, he probably did not have this scenario in mind. But for me, it is a perfect example of the early "disciplining and punishment" of the human soul.
A few more anecdotes to drive home the point, especially the under-acknowledged fact that schools have become more, not less, authoritarian in recent years:
My older brother recently told me that when he was in elementary school—this would have been in the late sixties—a teacher berated him in a manner that he felt was uncalled for and unfair. My brother's response? He simply left the school and walked home at recess. The school called my mother, who actually defended him!
Fast forward forty some-odd years. I picked my daughter up from school one day in fourth grade and upon seeing me, she immediately burst into tears. She'd been feeling physically ill for the final half hour or so of school, and upon arriving home she promptly threw up and took to her bed. I later asked her why she hadn't told the teacher she needed to call home. "It was close to dismissal time," she explained. "The teacher would have said I had to wait."
On another occasion, my daughter had a total breakdown after she accidentally dented her trombone. Even though my daughter considered the band instructor to be one of the "nice" teachers, she claimed he was nonetheless going to "murder" her for denting the instrument. I have rarely seen her so distraught. She cried for one hour straight, repeating over and over again "he's going to kill me." I asked her why she couldn't just tell him the truth: that someone had accidentally bumped into her and the trombone got dented. She looked at me as if I were stupid and said, "I can't just say that, because he's an adult and I'm not, and teachers don't believe kids." I went into the school the next day and talked to the teacher, who nonchalantly told me he'd send the trombone out to be repaired. He even provided another trombone for my daughter to use in the meantime. But I was left wondering whether he would have responded as casually had my daughter actually done the explaining herself. What is it about him, I wondered, or more generally, what is it about school that makes my daughter feel so utterly dis-empowered as a human being?
This, I believe, is the kind of question we, as parents and as citizens who pay for public education, need to be asking not just about specific schools, but about the current culture of public school in general.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
G20 and kids
"You know, if we’d only spent a billion more on security, we might have been able to save those three police cars."
Myles Murchison, White Rock, B.C. (Letter to the editor, Globe and Mail, June 29)
The G20 security fence is finally coming down. The chaos, anxiety and disruptions have come to an end and, like most Torontonians, I am relieved that it is over, irritated that it was here at all, and unimpressed with its so-called accomplishments. In the media, what really stole the attention was the so-called Black Bloc protesters, which politicians and officials of various stripes deemed "violent criminals," "anarchist thugs," and even "terrorists." Hyperbole? Perhaps. But what interests me is the way my children were influenced by the prevailing discourse about the protests.
I should preface this by saying that my kids watch very little TV, and they never watch the news. But they do check (local news station) CP24 for the weather daily. So when they turned it on during the Saturday of the summit, they saw images of protesters throwing rocks at store windows and setting police cars on fire. They heard pundits condemning the violence and thuggery, and their curiosity was piqued. They were very interested, and I decided that since they are almost 11 years old, they should be able to watch parts of this particular current event unfolding live on TV.
First they asked me why people were doing this. I told them most people were protesting peacefully, but that some felt the need to protest in a more violent manner, possibly to draw media attention to their extreme opposition to the summit and what it represents. This segued into a long discussion about the G20 and people's possible objections to it. But what stuck with my kids were the images of broken store widows and burning police cars. They began to parrot the politicians' and TV pundits' harsh condemnations of the perpetrators, with one of my daughters being slightly more nuanced in her view of what should happen to these people than the other. They both agreed that the Black Bloc rock-throwers and fire-setters needed to be apprehended and punished, though one thought several years in prison would be appropriate punishment, while the other thought a few months in jail, or possibly a stern talking-to might do the trick.
I then threw them for a loop by pointing out that the non-peaceful protesters were targeting things, not people, and the things they were targeting were—to them, anyway—symbols of larger things that they were opposed to. "They didn't actually hurt any people," I said. "Does that make a difference in how they should be treated?" My one daughter was shocked that I would even ask such a question. She'd just finished hearing commentator after commentator condemning the "violence," without making any distinction between violence against people and violence against things. I reassured my daughters that I was not condoning the tactics of these protesters, and that I do believe destruction of property is wrong. But I told them that to me, it does make a difference that the violence was directed against things, not people. One daughter saw my point of view right away, and tended to agree (which just goes to show how easily influenced some children are!). The other stuck to her guns, and tried to argue in her confused 10-year-old way, that violence is a continuum, and the Black Bloc protesters were of the same kind as those who do violence against people. Basically bad people, though not as bad as murderers, she conceded.
What to make of this? I really don't know. I have learned that it is difficult to talk to children about political issues without being heavy-handed, without trying to shove your own views down their throats. But as parents, I think we need to try to shut up a little, ask questions rather than supply answers, and allow our kids to think, even if what they end up thinking doesn't always dovetail with our own values. After all, kids will change their thinking on issues many times during their childhood and adolescence. They need to be able to grope their way through various provisional positions on current affairs, en route to some sort of—possibly always provisional—adult position. So for now I have one "law-and-order" child and one incipient civil libertarian. I can live with that.
NorthTOmom
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)